Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTX5WPZKHSPPVQPB6EQ15KK

The ancient oaks of Richmond Park loomed like skeletal giants against the bruised-purple smear of the London night sky. Aurora Carter pushed aside a low-hanging branch, its wet leaves slapping against her cheek. The air, thick with the damp-earth smell of recent rain, shifted. It thinned, grew colder, and carried a new scent underneath the mulch and rot—the cloying perfume of night-blooming jasmine that had no business flowering in an English autumn. She had passed between the standing stones. The distant hum of the A307 vanished. Not faded. It was simply gone, snipped away like a thread. The world behind her ceased to exist. Here, in the Grove, the only sound was the soft crush of her boots on a carpet of wildflowers. Their colours were leached to ghost-white and silver under a moon that seemed too large, too close. A film of unnatural stillness coated everything. Rory’s hand went to her throat, her fingers finding the cool, smooth surface of the Heartstone Pendant. She ran her thumb over the crimson gem, a nervous habit. It remained inert, its temperature matching her own skin. No warmth. No pulse. The note in her pocket had been specific: *Richmond Grove. Midnight. When the moon is full. Come alone.* She was here for answers, for the person who had sent her this pendant, this key to a world she was only just beginning to comprehend. But the promised meeting place felt less like a sanctuary and more like a trap. She took a breath and stepped deeper into the clearing. The great oaks that marked the Grove’s boundary formed a jagged circle, their gnarled branches reaching for each other like the arthritic fingers of old men. Shadows clung to their bases, pools of absolute black that the moonlight could not penetrate. Her eyes scanned the clearing, searching for a figure, a sign. There was nothing. Just the flowers, the stones, and the oppressive silence. A rustle. It came from her left, from the deep darkness beneath one of the oaks. Rory froze, her head snapping towards the sound. Her knuckles were white where she gripped the pendant’s silver chain. Probably a fox. Or a badger. London was full of them. She forced her shoulders to relax, let out a slow, controlled breath. She was letting the place get to her. Cool head. That’s what got you through things. She took another step towards the centre of the clearing, her gaze sweeping the ring of trees. Then she heard it again. Not a rustle this time. A sharp *snap*. The distinct crack of a dry twig breaking under a heavy weight. It was loud. definitive. And it came from behind her. She spun around, her heart a frantic drum against her ribs. The spot she had just been looking at was empty. The same trees, the same pale flowers, the same impenetrable shadows. Nothing had moved. No animal scurried away into the undergrowth. There was no wind to stir the branches. The air was a dead weight, heavy and unmoving. “Hello?” Her voice was a fragile thing in the vast silence. It came out thin, hoarse. The sound was swallowed by the Grove before it could even echo. She waited. The silence that answered was a presence in itself. It felt watchful. Attentive. The tiny hairs on her arms stood on end. The crescent-scar on her wrist tingled with a phantom ache. She took a slow, deliberate step backwards, away from the tree line, positioning herself in the very centre of the clearing where the moonlight was brightest. Nowhere to hide, but nothing could sneak up on her either. It was a trade-off. She scanned the perimeter again, moving only her eyes. Left to right. Slow. Methodical. Oak. Shadow. Oak. Shadow. Flicker. Her eyes darted back. At the very edge of her vision, a flicker of movement. Something tall and thin had detached itself from the trunk of an oak, a sliver of deeper black against the blackness. When her focus landed squarely on the spot, there was nothing. Just the rough, time-worn bark of the ancient tree. She blinked, her eyes stinging from the strain. A trick of the light. An afterimage burned onto her retinas. It had to be. But the feeling persisted. It began as a prickle at the nape of her neck, the kind of awareness that signals another’s gaze. It intensified into a heavy pressure, a physical weight pushing down on her. She was being observed. Measured. She could feel the scrutiny like a spider crawling over her skin. She wrapped her arms around herself, rubbing her coat sleeves as if to wipe the sensation away. The sweet floral scent in the air was changing. It thickened, taking on a sickly, overripe quality, the smell of petals beginning to rot on the stem. A low hum started, a vibration she felt more in the bones of her jaw than heard with her ears. It was a sound without a source, a thrumming that seemed to emanate from the very soil beneath her feet. She knew she should leave. Turn around, walk back the way she came, push through the invisible barrier and run until the comforting, familiar drone of London traffic filled her ears. But her feet were lead. The promise of answers held her fast. And a deeper, more primal fear suggested that turning her back now would be a fatal mistake. A whisper slithered through the air. It was not the wind. It was shaped. Articulated. It coiled around the ancient oaks and slid across the moon-washed flowers, a sibilant breath that brushed against her ear. *Laila.* The name was a ghost on her tongue. A name she had not used, had not heard, in years. A name tied to Evan, to a past she had fled. Her blood ran cold. No one here could know that name. Her breath hitched, trapped in her throat. She squeezed her eyes shut, a desperate, childish denial. When she opened them, the Grove was the same. Unchanged. But the lie of her solitude was stripped away. The air was electric with presence. She was not alone. She had never been alone. The hum intensified, the rotten-sweet smell choked her, and the watching eyes—she felt them from all sides now, a ring of unseen predators closing in around her in the silent, silvered clearing. The silence that followed the whisper was the worst part. It was a hungry silence, a patient predator waiting for its prey to break.