Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMQQEXETNZJ6PKGKFD6KS2B

The iron gate of Richmond Park had been locked for hours, but that had never stopped anyone who knew where the gaps in the fencing were. Rory slipped through the breach in the hedgerow, her boots sinking silently into the damp mulch of the forest floor. The air here tasted of charcoal and impending rain, a sharp contrast to the stale exhaust fumes of the city she had left behind. She checked her watch. It was just past two in the morning. The timing had to be precise. The message left taped to her door—no signature, just a time and a map coordinate—had been cryptic, but Rory didn’t believe in coincidences. Not anymore. She pulled the collar of her leather jacket up against the chill, her hand instinctively moving to her chest. Beneath the fabric, the Heartstone Pendant was warm, a steady, thrumming heat that radiated against her skin. Usually, the stone was dormant, a heavy lump of cool crimson. Now, it felt like a second heartbeat. She moved deeper into the park, guided by the pale, sickly moonlight filtering through the canopy. The trees here were ancient oaks, their branches twisted into shapes that looked painful, like arthritic limbs grasping at the sky. She counted her steps in her head, a trick to keep the panic at bay. One, two, three, breathe. Ahead, the trees thinned. The standing stones rose from the earth like the broken teeth of a buried giant. Seven pillars of weathered gray rock, arranged in a rough circle. This was the boundary. The entrance to Isolde’s grove. Rory stopped at the edge of the clearing. She had been here once before, in the daylight, under the supervision of Silas. Then, the place had felt peaceful, a sanctuary of wildflowers and dappled sunlight. Now, in the dead of night, the silence was heavy. It wasn’t the empty silence of a library; it was the held-breath silence of a predator waiting in the tall grass. The Heartstone pulsed against her sternum, a frantic rhythm that matched the thudding in her ears. It was warning her. Whatever she was supposed to find here, it wasn’t a person waiting to say hello. Steeling herself, Rory stepped between the two nearest pillars. The change was instantaneous. The ambient noise of the city—the distant hum of traffic, the faint sirens of South London—snuffed out as if someone had flipped a switch. The air pressure dropped, popping her ears. Inside the circle, the temperature was ten degrees colder, biting through her jacket. The Grove. It looked wrong. The wildflowers that bloomed here year-round were clustered in tight, frantic bunches, their colors too vivid in the monochrome wash of moonlight. Purples so dark they looked black, reds the color of fresh liver. They weren't swaying in the wind; there was no wind. They were vibrating. "Okay," Rory whispered, the sound of her voice jarringly loud. "You’re here. Now what?" She took a few steps deeper into the clearing. Her breath plumed in front of her, a white fog that lingered too long before dissipating. The grass crunched underfoot, dry and brittle, despite the dampness of the surrounding park. A sound cut through the silence. *Snap.* It came from her left, sharp and deliberate. A twig breaking underfoot. Rory spun around, dropping into a crouch, her eyes scanning the tree line. "Who's there?" Nothing. Just the dark, imposing silhouettes of the oaks and the shifting shadows of the standing stones. She remained still, counting her breaths, forcing her heart rate to slow. *Think,* she told herself. *Panic gets you killed. Analyze.* It could be a deer. Richmond Park was full of them. But deer didn't make the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Deer didn't trigger the Heartstone like a radiation detector in a meltdown. The pendant grew hotter, almost searing now. She clutched it through her shirt, the silver chain biting into her neck. The crimson gemstone was emitting a faint glow, casting a bloody light on her fingers. She held it up, using the weak illumination to survey the perimeter. The light caught something near the center of the grove. Rory squinted. It looked like a distortion in the air, a ripple like heat haze rising off asphalt, but there was no heat here. Only cold. As she watched, the ripple seemed to fold in on itself, taking shape. It was roughly human in height, but its proportions were elongated. Its limbs were too long, its torso too narrow. It stood perfectly still amidst the vibrating flora, and as the light from the pendant touched it, the thing didn't reflect it. It absorbed the light. Rory backed away, one slow step at a time. She needed to get to the standing stones. The boundary. If she crossed the threshold, would it follow? She didn't know. She didn't know enough about this place, about the magic that bled through the thinning veil between worlds. She was a delivery girl from Cardiff, not a mage, no matter what Silas told her. She turned her head to check her path, a mistake. When she looked back, the figure was closer. It hadn't walked. It hadn't made a sound. It was just… there. Five yards away. Rory’s breath hitched. She could see it more clearly now. It was composed of shadow and stone, a shifting silhouette of bark and night. Where a face should have been, there was only a smooth, concave surface of darkness. The silence of the grove suddenly became a cacophony. A low, thrumming vibration began to rise from the earth, shaking the marrow in her bones. The wildflowers went still. The entity tilted its head. It was studying her. "Back off," Rory said, her voice trembling despite her best efforts. She fumbled in her pocket for her phone, for a weapon, for anything, but her fingers closed on nothing but lint and keys. The thing raised a hand—impossibly long, fingers tapering into sharp points of obsidian. Rory bolted. She didn't think, she just moved. She sprinted toward the gap in the stones she had entered through. The ground seemed to tilt beneath her, the physics of the grove warping to hinder her escape. The distance to the exit stretched like taffy, the standing stones receding into the darkness. Behind her, the sound of movement began. It wasn't footsteps. It was the sound of dry leaves skittering across pavement, multiplied by a thousand. A whispering, rustling tide rushing at her back. She risked a glance over her shoulder. It was gliding. Its feet didn't touch the ground. And it wasn't alone. The shadows were peeling themselves away from the trees, detaching from the bases of the oaks, lengthening into jagged, mockeries of limbs. The grove was waking up, and it was hungry. Rory screamed, a raw burst of adrenaline, and threw herself forward. The air grew thick, like wading through water. The Heartstone was searing her skin now, burning a brand into her chest. The nearest standing stone loomed ahead. A jagged monolith of gray, weathered rock. The rustling sound was right behind her. She could feel a coldness pressing against her back, colder than the winter air, a void that sought to pull the heat right out of her body. Fingers of ice brushed the hair at the nape of her neck. She scrambled over the gnarled root of a border tree, tripping, her hands scraping against the rough bark. She hit the ground hard, tumbling, dirt filling her mouth. She scrambled on all fours, lunging for the gap between the pillars. Just as she crossed the threshold, the noise stopped. The sudden return of the silence was deafening. Rory rolled onto her back, gasping for air, clutching the pendant. The glow was fading, the heat dissipating rapidly, leaving only a lingering ache in her bones. She lay on the grass of Richmond Park, just outside the ring of stones. The normal night sounds of the city rushed back in—the distant roar of the A3, the hoot of an owl. The air was merely cold, not supernaturally freezing. Rory sat up, her body shaking uncontrollably. She looked back into the circle of stones. Inside the grove, the moonlight hit the empty clearing. There were no shadows, no distorted figures. The wildflowers were motionless in the stillness. It looked exactly as it had when she arrived: peaceful, mundane, deserted. But as she watched, trying to calm her racing heart, she saw a single detail that froze the blood in her veins. Lying in the center of the grove, right where she had first seen the entity, was a small, perfect circle of crushed flowers. And in the middle of that circle, resting on the bare earth, was her mobile phone. She patted her pocket frantically. It was empty. She hadn't dropped it. It had been taken from her without her ever feeling a hand touch her. Rory scrambled to her feet, backing away from the stones, her eyes locked on the device sitting innocently in the dirt. As she watched, the screen lit up, illuminating the darkness of the grove with a pale, ghostly blue. Then, the grove began to fade, the boundary shimmering out of existence as the pocket dimension collapsed for the night. The phone, and whatever else was in there, vanished with it.