Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMQJPDWD4GTYKA52Z5T653V

The air changed before they saw it. Rory felt it first—a prickle along her scar, the old crescent on her wrist tingling like a wire humming beneath her skin. She stopped, boots scuffing the damp grass of Richmond Park. The trees ahead swayed, though no wind stirred the branches above. Between two ancient oaks, the air shimmered, not with heat, but with something deeper: a ripple, like oil on water, bending the light. “Something’s wrong,” she said. Nyx stepped beside her, a silhouette carved from midnight smoke. Their form flickered, edges blurring. “No,” they whispered, voice like wind through dry leaves. “Something’s right.” Isolde stood apart, silver hair untouched by the breeze, her pale lavender eyes fixed on the shimmer. She didn’t blink. “Step through,” she said. “But step together. The Grove remembers the lonely.” Rory tightened her grip on the Heartstone Pendant beneath her coat. It pulsed — warm, steady — a quiet drumbeat against her ribs. She’d woken three nights ago with it in her palm, left on her pillow with no note, no sign of who’d brought it. Yu-Fei had warned her not to trust gifts with no giver. But the pendant had led her here — to the edge of the Veil. “Last chance to turn back,” she muttered, glancing at Nyx. The Shade tilted their head. “I’m already halfway across.” Isolde stepped forward first, gliding through the shimmer as though parting a curtain. She vanished without sound. Rory exhaled. “Guess that’s it.” She took Nyx’s shadowed hand—cool, like touching a moonless night—and stepped. The world folded. One moment, Richmond Park’s misty twilight; the next, a clearing bathed in golden-green light. The air was thick with the scent of crushed mint and wild thyme, of something sweet like overripe figs and cold iron. Flowers carpeted the ground: blue stars, crimson bells, and blossoms that pulsed faintly, as though breathing. The standing stones were gone—replaced by towering oaks, their trunks wrapped in silver ivy, bark etched with runes that shifted when not stared at directly. “Time moves differently here,” Isolde said, her voice echoing from everywhere and nowhere. “You might return to find seconds passed… or weeks.” Rory turned slowly. The trees arched overhead, joining in a lattice of leaves that filtered the light into dappled patterns, shifting as though dancing. The sky was not sky—more like a dome of stained glass, colors bleeding slowly from amber to indigo. No sun. No moon. Only a deep, internal glow, as if the grove itself were lit from within. Nyx drifted forward, their form solidifying slightly, taking on a sharper silhouette. “This place remembers magic,” they murmured. “Old magic. Fae.” “It was never meant for mortals,” Isolde replied, trailing fingers along a bloom shaped like a tiny lute. It chimed once, softly. “But you are here now. And that changes things.” Rory’s pulse quickened. She reached for the Fae-Forged Blade at her hip. The moonsilver remained cold, but its faint luminescence had strengthened, a soft silver radiance pulsing along the leaf-shaped edge. She hadn’t drawn it since receiving it—from Isolde, no explanation, just a quiet, “You’ll need it.” A bird—no, not a bird—flitted between branches: a flash of iridescent wings, body like spun glass, voice like a child laughing underwater. It vanished into a thicket that hadn’t been there a moment before. “Did you see that?” Rory whispered. Nyx nodded. “Spirits. Watchers. They taste your fear.” “I’m not afraid,” she lied. “You should be,” Isolde said, turning. “The Grove grants truth, not comfort. It will show you what you need to see. Not what you want.” Rory swallowed. “Why are we here?” “To prepare,” Isolde said simply. “The Veil weakens. Hel reaches through. Belphegor’s chefs hunger for new flavors. And you—” she paused, eyes locking onto Rory’s “—you carry a key they do not know you have.” Rory touched the pendant again. “This?” Isolde didn’t answer. Instead, she walked deeper into the grove. They followed. The ground sloped gently, carpeted with moss that glowed faintly underfoot. Each step left a ripple of light, fading seconds later. Trees bent inward, forming an archway. Beyond it, a pool—still as glass—mirrored not the false sky, but constellations unknown: spirals, zigzags, a crown of seven eyes. Isolde knelt at the pool’s edge. “Look.” Rory crouched beside her. Her reflection rippled—then changed. For a heartbeat, she wasn’t herself. She wore a chef’s coat stitched with obsidian thread, stood in a kitchen vast as a cathedral, flames of cold blue fire leaping from copper stoves. Before her, a body—faceless—lay on a silver platter, steaming. She recoiled. “What was that?” she gasped. “A possibility,” Isolde said softly. “One thread among many. Dymas calls. Not to consume you. To recruit.” “That’s insane,” Rory said, heart hammering. “I’m not a cook. I can barely fry an egg.” “No,” Nyx said, stepping forward, their violet eyes fixed on the pool. “But you understand flavor. Balance. Risk. And you’ve known hunger—not just of the body, but of the soul. That makes you valuable.” Rory touched her wrist again. The scar burned. Then, a sound. A low, resonant hum, rising from beneath the earth. The pool darkened. The flowers closed. Even the air seemed to hold its breath. Isolde rose. “They know you’re here.” “Who?” Rory demanded. “The ones who watch from below. The Wardens. Or what remains of them.” Nyx’s form flickered, half-corporeal, half-shadow. “We’re not alone.” From the edge of the clearing, figures emerged—not walking, but gliding. Tall, hooded, cloaked in gray mist. Their faces were indistinct, featureless save for twin points of dim silver light where eyes should be. They carried staves of black wood, topped with shards of crystal that pulsed in time with the Heartstone. “The Wardens,” Isolde whispered. “Or remnants. They patrol the rifts. Monitor the Veil.” One stepped forward, raised its staff. The crystal flared. Rory felt it before she saw it—the Veil, not as concept, but as presence. A taut membrane, invisible but felt, like static in the blood. The crystal pulsed in rhythm with her pendant. A connection. “They’re not attacking,” Nyx observed. “No,” Isolde said. “They’re recognizing.” The lead Warden lowered its staff. Then, in a voice like stone grinding on stone, it spoke. “Bearer of the Heartstone… you walk the edge. The glutton waits. The blade will cut… but not all wounds can be healed.” Then, as suddenly as they came, they faded—back into mist, into shadow, into nothing. Silence returned. Rory’s breath came fast. “What was that?” “They guard the balance,” Isolde said. “They saw you. That means you’re marked. For both sides.” Rory looked at the Fae blade, still glowing softly. At the pendant, pulsing against her chest. At the grove, alive with hidden eyes and shifting truths. She thought of Evan, his grip on her arm, his voice telling her she was nothing. She thought of Yu-Fei’s kitchen, the smell of sesame and ginger, the comfort of a warm meal. She thought of Silas’ bar, the quiet hum of late nights, the way she could disappear into her own thoughts. None of that mattered now. She was here. In a place between worlds. With a key she didn’t understand, a blade that could cut magic, and a future written in riddles. Nyx touched her shoulder—cold, solid, real. “You’re not alone.” Isolde turned, her silver hair catching the grove’s inner light like spun stars. “The path is yours to take. But know this: in Dymas, nothing is as it seems. Even hunger can be a lie.” Rory stood tall. “Then I’ll learn to taste the truth.”