Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTYJP3FXD848BFVR0YTD983

Dew-slicked ferns brushed against Aurora’s shins, drenching her denim jeans in a creeping, rhythmic chill. She checked the silver chain at her throat for the tenth time in as many minutes. The Heartstone Pendant rested against her collarbone, a thumbnail of solid blood that hummed with a heat far exceeding the humid London night. Usually, Richmond Park offered a sanctuary of shadows and the distant hum of the A3, but the moment she stepped through the gap in the oak standing stones, the city died. Silence rushed into her ears, thick and heavy as mountain silt. The Grove didn't just look different; it felt hungry. "Just a drop-off, Rory. Five minutes in, five minutes out." Her own voice sounded thin, swallowed by the canopy of interlocking branches. She clutched the thermal delivery bag tighter. Steam from the Golden Empress’s ginger beef wafted up, a mundane scent that felt like an insult to the ancient, loamy air of the clearing. Yu-Fei had been insistent. The coordinates led here, to a pocket of land that shouldn't exist on any GPS, for a customer who had paid in heavy, gold sovereigns. The moon hung above the clearing like a cataract-clouded eye. It cast a bleached, unnatural light over the wildflowers that choked the forest floor. Bluebells and foxgloves stood tall and rigid, frozen in a bloom that felt permanent and porcelain. No wind stirred them. No crickets chirped. The Heartstone gave a sudden, sharp throb against her skin. Aurora stopped. Her boots sank into moss that gave way with the consistency of rotting meat. To her left, something crunched. It wasn't the snap of a twig or the rustle of a fox. It was the wet, deliberate sound of a heavy weight shifting on bone. She swung her flashlight beam toward the noise. The light hit the gnarled trunk of a willow. The bark seemed to ripple, a slow-motion heave of gray wood that settled back into place the moment the beam centered on it. Aurora’s pulse hammered against the crescent-shaped scar on her wrist. "Is someone there? I have the order for Isolde." The silence stretched, elastic and tense. Then, a soft, wet slither echoed from the canopy above. Aurora didn't wait for an answer. She picked up her pace, her breath hitching in her chest. The clearing was supposed to be small, a mere fifty yards from the stones to the center where the stone altar sat, yet the path seemed to elongate with every step. The trees leaned inward, their branches knitting together like skeletal fingers. A flicker of white caught her periphery. She spun, the flashlight beam dancing wildly. A pale shape retreated behind a thicket of thorns. It moved with too many joints, a jerky, puppet-like gait that left no footprints in the mud. "Stop it. Eva told you this place was weird. You knew it was weird." She forced her legs to move. The air grew colder, tasting of iron and old copper. The Heartstone Pendant was no longer just warm; it burned. A dull, rhythmic crimson glow pulsed from beneath her shirt, casting her shadow long and distorted against the white flowers. In the center of the Grove, the stone altar finally appeared. It was a flat slab of granite, stained dark with centuries of rain or something more viscous. On top of it sat a single, empty porcelain tea set, the cups thin enough to see through. Aurora lunged forward, desperate to rid herself of the bag and the obligation. She set the Golden Empress container on the stone. The plastic looked garish and foul against the ancient rock. "Your food is here. I’m leaving now." She turned to bolt, but her foot snagged. Not on a root. Something cold and slick wrapped around her ankle, gripping with the strength of a vice. Aurora gasped, shining her light down. A pale, translucent hand emerged from the earth itself. The skin was the color of a drowned man’s belly, the fingernails jagged and caked in black soil. It didn't pull her down; it simply held her, a tethering anchor. "Wait." The voice didn't come from behind her. It sprouted inside her skull, a sound like dry leaves skittering across a tombstone. Aurora kicked out with her free leg. Her heavy boot connected with something solid, but there was no grunt of pain, only the sound of air escaping a punctured lung. The hand tightened. The silver chain of the Heartstone bit into her neck as the pendant flared a violent, angry red. The shadows at the edge of the clearing began to detach themselves from the trees. They weren't people. They were silhouettes of hunger, elongated limbs and heads that sat at impossible angles. They moved in unison, a slow, crawling tide of darkness that crept over the white wildflowers, turning the bluebells to ash where they touched. "I caught the scent of ginger," the voice whispered, closer now, a foul breath tickling the hair behind her ear. "But that is not what I’m craving, Malphora." Aurora’s skin crawled at the name. She fumbled in her pocket, her fingers closing around the small iron pocketknife she kept for protection. She didn't slice at the hand; she slammed the butt of the knife into the wrist bones. A high-pitched keen pierced the air, a sound that set her teeth on edge. The grip slackened. Aurora ripped her leg free, stumbling back toward the direction of the standing stones. The Grove had rearranged itself. The path was gone. Where there had been a clear line of sight to the park beyond, there was now a wall of brambles that shimmered with a faint, oily light. The trees were closer, their trunks pressing together to form a wooden cage. She swung the flashlight, but the beam was dying. The light flickered, turning orange and weak before plunging her into the crimson-tinted gloom provided by the pendant. In the red strobing light, she saw them. Dozens of faces peered through the gaps in the leaves. They had no eyes, only deep, vertical slits that wept a clear, thick fluid. Their mouths were stitched shut with silver wire, yet they were grinning, the skin stretching and tearing at the corners. They didn't speak; they vibrated. The sound was a low-frequency hum that vibrated in Aurora’s marrow, making her vision blur. One of the creatures stepped into the red light. It was tall, its torso thin as a rake, draped in rags that might have been silk a century ago. It reached out a hand, fingers tapering into points that looked like polished obsidian. "The Heartstone is a loud bell, little bird. Did you think we wouldn't hear you ringing it?" Aurora backed away until her spine hit the altar. The thermal bag was gone. In its place sat the ginger beef, spilled across the stone like a messy sacrifice. The steam rising from it was no longer white, but a thick, sickly violet. "I'm just the delivery girl," she hissed, her voice cracking. "Take the food and let me go." The creature leaned in, its face inches from hers. It had no nose, only two small holes that whistled as it inhaled. It smelled of wet earth and something ancient, something that had never known the sun. "We do not want the salt of the earth. We want the heat in the stone." The creature’s hand moved toward her throat. Aurora squeezed her eyes shut, clutching the pendant. The heat was unbearable now, a searing brand against her chest. She felt the silver chain tighten as the creature’s fingers hooked into the metal. A sudden, deafening crack echoed through the Grove. The ground beneath Aurora’s feet buckled. The stillness of the night broke into a cacophony of screeching birds and the roar of a wind that shouldn't be there. The red light of the Heartstone exploded, blinding and hot, pushing the shadows back into the wood. Aurora didn't wait to see if the creatures were hurt. She threw herself toward the wall of brambles, North, South—she didn't care. She ran until her lungs burned and the scent of ginger beef was replaced by the acrid smell of ozone. The trees thinned. The oppressive weight of the air lifted. She stumbled through a gap in two moss-covered stones and collapsed onto the manicured grass of Richmond Park. The distant sound of a car horn on the A3 was the most beautiful thing she had ever heard. She lay there, gasping for air, her heart trying to kick its way out of her ribs. The Heartstone was cold now, a dull, inert piece of glass against her skin. Aurora sat up and looked back. There was no Grove. Behind her stood only a cluster of ordinary oaks, their leaves rustling in a gentle London breeze. The moon was yellow and distant once more. She looked down at her wrist. The crescent-shaped scar was glowing a faint, bruised purple. And on her delivery jacket, right over her heart, was a single, wet handprint of black, oily mud. She reached into her pocket to find her phone, but her hand brushed against something cold and hard. She pulled it out. It was a porcelain teacup, thin as an eggshell, filled to the brim with a thick, crimson liquid that didn't spill, even as her hands began to shake. The hum started again, low and vibrating, not from the trees, but from the ground directly beneath her feet. Aurora scrambled to her feet, leaving the cup on the grass, and didn't stop running until she saw the lights of a petrol station. She told herself it was just the shadows. She told herself the park was just old. But as she reached the pavement, she glanced back at the dark silhouette of the trees. A single, white shape stood at the edge of the woods, waving a long, many-jointed arm.