Run: 2026-02-19-01KHSWEX6FF2JMS5QWZ1Y0F6S6

The standing stones rose from the earth like the ribs of some buried giant, their surfaces slick with moss that shimmered faintly in the pre-dawn gloom. Rory counted seven of them, arranged in a rough circle that seemed too perfect, too deliberate for anything natural. Each oak trunk had been carved with symbols she didn't recognise — spirals that hurt to look at directly, and shapes that shifted when she turned her head. "We shouldn't linger at the threshold." Nyx's voice came from everywhere and nowhere, their shadowy form pooled between two of the stones before rising into something vaguely humanoid. "The boundary hungers." Rory's hand drifted to the Heartstone pendant at her throat. It pulsed with gentle warmth against her collarbone, a steady rhythm that quickened as she stepped closer to the circle's centre. The silver chain felt ice-cold against her skin. "Lead the way, then." Nyx flowed forward, their violet eyes leaving faint trails in the darkness. They passed between two stones — and vanished. Rory swore under her breath. Her trainers squelched in the damp grass as she approached the gap. The air here tasted different: sweeter, heavier, like the moment before a storm broke. She could see her own breath misting in front of her face, though the night had been mild moments ago. She stepped through. The world folded. For one horrible instant, her stomach lurched as if she'd missed a step in the dark. Colours bled past her peripheral vision — greens too vivid, purples that had no business existing in nature. Then her feet found solid ground, and she gasped. The grove opened before her like a secret the earth had been keeping. Wildflowers carpeted the ground in waves of violet and gold, their petals luminescent in the amber-tinged light that filtered down from somewhere above. The sky here wasn't London's perpetual grey, nor was it the black of night. It swirled with colours she had no names for, layered like watercolours left out in rain. Massive oaks ringed the clearing, their branches intertwined overhead to form a living cathedral. Between their trunks, she caught glimpses of deeper forest — shadows that moved with purpose, shapes that watched. "The air." Rory's voice came out strange, hushed. "It's... different." "Time runs thin here." Nyx had solidified beside her, their form more defined than she'd ever seen it. In this place, they almost looked human — if humans were made of darkness and starlight and regret. "An hour in your world might be minutes in this one. Or days. The Grove follows its own whims." A path wound through the wildflowers, stones worn smooth by feet that had walked here long before Richmond Park existed. Rory followed it, her boots leaving impressions in the soft earth that filled with pale light before fading. She knelt, pressing her palm flat against the ground. The earth hummed against her skin. Not warmth, not cold — something else. Something alive. "Where is she?" "The Seer knows we've arrived." Nyx drifted ahead, passing through a cluster of flowers without disturbing a single petal. "She chooses when to be found." Rory straightened and walked deeper into the grove. Her shoulder-length hair lifted in a breeze she couldn't feel, and the crescent scar on her wrist began to itch — an old sensation, one she hadn't experienced since childhood. She rubbed at it absently as she took in the impossible architecture around her. Because it wasn't just trees. Between the oaks, half-hidden by flowering vines and curling brambles, stood structures that predated anything she'd seen in history books. Stone archways that led to nowhere. A well carved from a single massive gemstone, its water rising impossibly high before tumbling back down. Benches of woven silver branches that supported sleeping figures — not people, she realised, but something else. Figures carved from wood that breathed. "The Fae built this?" "The Fae didn't build. They grew." Nyx's whisper carried an edge she'd never heard before. "They sang it into being when your world was young. This place remembers." A sound drifted through the clearing — pipes, maybe, or wind through hollow reeds. Music without a source. It wound between the trees and curled around her ankles like a cat, and Rory found herself walking faster, following it without meaning to. The grove shifted around her. One moment she was on the path. The next, the wildflowers gave way to a pool of water so still it looked like polished glass. The surface reflected not the strange sky above, but something else entirely — a constellation she didn't recognise, stars arranged in patterns that hurt to look at for too long. She stepped back. Her heel caught on a root that hadn't been there before. "Careful." A hand caught her elbow — solid, unexpectedly warm. Nyx's violet eyes were inches from her own, and for a moment, their shadowy form flickered. She glimpsed something beneath the darkness: the memory of a face, angular and pale, with an expression caught between grief and wonder. "The grove tests those who enter. It searches for weaknesses." "And what's it looking for in me?" Nyx released her arm. Their form flowed backward, becoming more insubstantial. "That's between you and it." The music changed. Deeper now, a single note that resonated in her chest. Rory pressed her hand against her sternum and felt the Heartstone's pulse quicken in response. It burned against her skin — not painfully, but urgently, pulling her forward. She followed. The trees parted like curtains. The wildflowers bent away from her path. Even the light seemed to shift, pooling ahead of her in a corridor of gold and amber that led toward a cluster of standing stones at the grove's heart. These stones were different. Older. Their surfaces were worn nearly smooth, but she could still make out carvings — hands reaching toward one another, never quite touching. Faces contorted in ecstasy or agony, the expressions so similar she couldn't tell which. In their centre stood a figure. Rory stopped. The woman was slight, no taller than Rory herself, with silver hair that cascaded to her waist and moved as if underwater. Her skin held the luminescence of moonlight, her features ageless in a way that made Rory's eyes water when she tried to focus on them. She wore a gown that might have been woven from spider silk and morning dew, and her feet hovered an inch above the earth. When she moved, no grass bent beneath her. When she turned her pale lavender eyes toward Rory, the temperature in the grove dropped. "Aurora Carter." Her voice layered over itself, harmonics upon harmonics. "You carry gifts you did not earn to a place you do not belong. The Heartstone burns for its home. The blade sleeps at your hip. And the shadow walks beside you when shadows cannot walk at all." Rory's hand moved to the Fae-forged blade strapped to her belt. Its hilt was ice against her palm. "Isolde." "The Seer." Isolde smiled, and it was the smile of someone who had watched centuries pass, who had seen empires rise and fall and knew the weight of knowledge. "You've come with questions. They always come with questions." "I need answers." "Answers are easy." Isolde drifted closer, leaving no footprints, no trace of her passage. "It's the questions that cost."