Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMQSWMKA86NVM1KVANK9AB6

The gravel crunched under Aurora’s boots, each step a loud accusation in the suffocating silence of Richmond Park. Headlights sliced through the black, erratic beams of a passing car on the distant road, illuminating ancient oaks and gnarled hawthorns before plunging the path back into deeper shadow. She clutched the worn strap of her backpack, the chill of the autumn night seeping through her thin jacket. She wasn’t supposed to be here. Rory, who prided herself on logic and practicality, felt a tremor of unease, a cold knot tightening in her stomach. Driven by a frantic, almost superstitious hunch, she’d ditched her delivery route, her mind buzzing with a desperate need to verify something she couldn’t quite articulate. The air grew heavy, thick with the scent of damp earth and decaying leaves, a cloying perfume that did little to soothe her unraveling nerves. Her breath plumed in front of her, ephemeral ghosts in the oppressive dark. The standing stones, hulking silhouettes against the bruised twilight sky, loomed ahead. They were supposed to mark the boundary, a transition. But as she approached, a deep, primal instinct shrieked that she was already on the wrong side of something. She stopped just short of the outermost stones, their lichensearsouls seeming to watch her with ancient indifference. The Fae Grove. The name itself sounded like a whispered invitation and a dire warning. According to the hushed tales that sometimes surfaced in the hushed corners of the city, it was a place where the veil between worlds thinned, where time played tricks. A place for things not entirely of *here*. A faint warmth pulsed against her chest, a subtle thrum beneath her shirt. The Heartstone Pendant. It had been a peculiar gift, left anonymously on her doorstep a week after she’d fled London. She’d kept it for its strange beauty, the way the deep crimson stone seemed to hold an inner fire, and the faint, persistent warmth that had led her to believe it was connected to the odd, fleeting glimpses of other places she’d experienced since leaving Cardiff. Tonight, it felt more insistent, its glow a faint, internal ember against her skin, a silent beacon. She stepped between two of the massive oaks, her heart hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs. The air inside the grove was different. Still. It felt like stepping into a held breath. The usual night sounds – the rustle of nocturnal creatures, the distant hum of traffic – were swallowed whole. The darkness here was a palpable entity, not merely an absence of light. It clung to her, pressing in, whispering indecipherable secrets. She pulled her phone from her pocket, the bright screen a jarring intrusion. No signal. Of course. She’d expected that. A single wildflower, impossibly vibrant blue, bloomed defiantly at the base of an oak, its petals unfurling as if in defiance of the season and the encroaching night. Wildflowers bloomed year-round here, a persistent rumour she’d dismissed as folklore. Now, seeing it, felt wrong. Displaced. Like finding a canary in a coal mine. A twig snapped behind her. Rory spun around, her breath catching in her throat. Nothing. Only the inscrutable shapes of the trees, their branches like skeletal fingers reaching for the sliver of moon overhead. Her grip tightened on her backpack strap, knuckles white. She told herself it was the wind, a stray animal. The park was vast, after all. But the silence that followed the snap was unnerving, as if the very air had held its breath with her. She took a hesitant step further in, her boots sinking slightly into the mossy ground. The trees here were older, their bark fissured like ancient skin. The floral scent, stronger now, was not entirely pleasant. There was an undertone to it, something unnervingly sweet, almost sickly. She felt a prickling sensation on the back of her neck, the undeniable feeling of being watched. She forced herself to breathe, to think. What was she even looking for? A confirmation of a feeling, a flicker of impossible truth. This place, the whispers of it, the persistent thrum of the pendant— it all coalesced into a desperate need to *see*. To understand the strange currents that had begun to buffet her life since she’d left Evan and the suffocating familiarity of home. Another sound. This time, it was a faint, sibilant whisper, like dry leaves skittering across stone, but there was no wind. It seemed to emanate from the darkness between the trees, just at the periphery of her vision. She strained her ears, her head tilted, trying to pinpoint the source. The whisper faded, leaving a ringing silence in its wake. Her eyes darted from shadow to shadow. A flicker of movement, a swish of something dark and fluid, dissolved as soon as she focused on it. Her mind, usually so sharp, felt sluggish, dulled by the oppressive atmosphere. It was like trying to grasp smoke. The longer she stood there, the more the wrongness intensified. It was a tangible pressure, a subtle distortion of reality. The trees seemed to lean in, their shadows deepening, coalescing into shapes that hinted at, but refused to reveal, familiar forms. She imagined eyes, countless unseen eyes, fixed on her. Not the curious gaze of a nocturnal animal, but something ancient, predatory, and deeply alien. The faint warmth of the pendant intensified, a frantic pulse against her skin, as if it too sensed the encroaching wrongness and was trying to warn her. A Hel portal. The pendant pulsed faintly with warmth when near a Hel portal. The thought, unbidden, sent a fresh wave of dread through her. She stumbled back, a gasp escaping her lips. Her foot caught on a root, and she half-fell, catching herself on the rough bark of a massive oak. The impact sent a jarring shock up her arm. When she pulled her hand away, a smear of dark, viscous substance clung to her palm. It wasn’t mud. It was slick, cold, and smelled faintly of ozone and something metallic. Blood? But it wasn't red. It was a deep, unsettling violet. Terror, cold and sharp, finally pierced through her denial. She wasn’t alone. She had never been alone since stepping into this place. The whispers coalesced, not into words she could understand, but into a palpable aura of mockery, of ancient amusement. They were watching her, playing with her, a curious specimen caught in their strange, timeless world. She scrambled to her feet, her heart a frantic drum against her ribs, desperate for the open sky, the mundane reality of the park beyond the standing stones. She didn't look back, didn't dare to. The air seemed to claw at her, the shadows reaching, stretching. She ran, her boots pounding on the yielding earth, the alien perfume of the grove a suffocating shroud at her heels. Behind her, she heard it again – not a twig snap this time, but a low, guttural sound that was too deep, too resonant, to be made by any earthly creature. It was laughter, a sound that scraped against her very soul, and it followed her out of the Fae Grove, a promise that this night was far from over.