Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTX8KTG1WC68494QS8BSBPJ

The glow of the streetlamps faded into a bruised purple smear behind her, swallowed instantly by the encroaching black of Richmond Park. Rory adjusted the straps of the nylon delivery bag, the sweat on her back beginning to chill as the evening wind picked up. It was late—past eleven on a Tuesday—but Yu-Fei had insisted on the double shift to cover for a sick cook. The spicy beef noodles inside were getting cold, a crime she couldn't let happen. She slowed, her boots crunching on gravel. The ancient oaks of the park usually swayed in a rhythmic whisper, a comforting lullaby of the city. Tonight, the trees stood rigid, their branches black against the starless sky. Rory focused on the path ahead, her gaze drifting past the chain-link fence that separated the road from the deer enclosure. It wasn't the deer grazing near the perimeter that caught her eye. It was the stones. A cluster of granite monoliths stood in a semi-circle near the tree line. Rory knew this spot well. A popular spot for teenagers looking to get lost in the thrill of breaking curfew. Yet, the air around them felt wrong—stagnant, thick, as if she had walked into a room that hadn't been aired out in a century. A faint, rhythmic throb pulsed against her collarbone. The Heartstone pendant. It was hot, searing against her skin, radiating heat through the fabric of her white delivery shirt. "Rory." The voice wasn't hers. It was a rasp, wet and tasting of phlegm, coming from directly above. She ducked, swatting at an empty branch, but the noise had been silent. The pendant heated up, a sudden spike of crimson light blooming through the silver chain, vibrating so hard it scratched her throat. She didn't think. She just moved. She stepped through the gap between the two tallest standing stones. The transition was instant and nauseating—a sickening lurch of the stomach that dissolved into the scent of damp earth and ozone. She fell forward, catching herself on hands and knees in tall, trembling grass. The noise of London was gone. There was no traffic, no sirens, no distant hum of the Tube. Only silence. Heavy, suffocating silence that pressed against her eardrums. Rory scrambled up, wiping the grass stains from her palms. This wasn't the park she knew. The flora was off. The wildflowers that normally carpeted the ground in a riot of spring colors were bunched together in unnatural, compact clusters. They glowed with a pale, sickly luminescence, casting long, wavy shadows that didn't match the angle of the moon. The pendant was burning now. The deep crimson gemstone inside the silver cage was pulsing in time with a steady, rapid heartbeat—*thump-thump-thump*. It wasn't just heat; it was a pressure, like the air in the room had thickened to the consistency of molasses. She began to walk, her strides short and deliberate, scanning the perimeter. The ground beneath her boots was soft, spongy, and covered in a fine mist that hissed when her shoes stepped through it. She kept her hand on the pendant, thumbing the rough stone, trying to tether herself to her human self. "Hello?" The word died in her throat, too small for the space. To her left, a cluster of foxgloves shivered. Not from the breeze—the air was still. They moved in unison, the flowers leaning toward her as if curtsying. The stems were thick, woody, devoid of the delicate fuzz that summer foxgloves possessed. They looked like fingers. Long, green fingers reaching for her ankles. Rory took a step back, her heel catching on a root. The root snapped with a dry, audible crack that sounded like breaking bone. She stilled, freezing like a statue. *Crack. Snap.* From the darkness between the trees, a sound repeated. It was rhythmic, wet, and clearly predatory. She tightened her grip on the bag of noodles, her fingers aching around the handles. If it was a deer, it would have fled by now. If it was a fox, it would be silent. A low, bubbling chuckle drifted toward her, followed by the rustle of heavy fur dragging against dry leaves. She picked up the pace, moving past the center of the clearing. The mist swirled around her ankles, cold and tasting of copper. The pendant flared, the crimson light casting frantic shadows that seemed to stretch impossibly far behind her, touching the ancient oaks that loomed over the perimeter. *Rory.* The voice was clearer this time. It came from inside her head, a cold finger sliding between her thoughts. She stopped. The air grew heavy, the gravity pulling down on her shoulders. She dropped the delivery bag. It hit the ground with a soft thud, the container inside unbroken. She stared at the bag, watching it. For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the lid of the container lifted on its own. Spicy steam curled out, shaped not like a cloud, but like a small, curling snake. It spiraled upward, twisting around her wrist, and dissipated into the crimson glow of the pendant. The Heartstone stopped pulsing and turned a deep, opaque charcoal black. The warmth vanished, replaced by an icy numbness that spread from her chest to her fingertips. Behind her, the rustling stopped. Something stepped out from behind the gnarled roots of a massive oak tree. It stood taller than a man, cloaked in shadows that refused to be displaced by the faint glow of the strange flowers. It had no face. Instead, where a head should be, a twisted mass of branches and bark grew, capped with a single, unblinking eye the color of the void. The creature extended a hand, a limb made of grey, mottled wood and grasping, bark-like fingers. It pointed not at her, but at the dark, twisted shape of the trees behind her, which were no longer trees, but the jagged stone teeth of a skull. "Where is the food?" the creature asked, its voice a grinding of two rocks together. Rory didn't answer. She looked at the stone skull. She looked at the dead flowers. She looked at the delivery bag that had opened, revealing the cold, flat noodles. The pendant burned against her skin again, hot and bright, pushing against her sternum. It wasn't hers anymore.