Run: 2026-07-07-01KWZ3MFV7Z6Q2YK0NNDQ9CR30

The standing stones rose from the earth like broken teeth. Rory passed between two of the ancient oaks, their bark twisted into shapes that resembled faces caught mid-scream. She'd come because the pendant told her to. Three days now it had burned against her sternum, that deep crimson gem pulsing with a rhythm too steady to be her own heartbeat. Yu-Fei had noticed her wince when she reached for a delivery bag, had told her to take the night off. Eva had texted twice, worried. Rory ignored both of them and followed the warmth. The grove opened before her. Wildflowers carpeted the ground in colours she couldn't name — not quite purple, not quite blue, something between that existed only in dreams. Richmond Park sat on the other side of those stones, joggers and dog walkers and the distant hum of London traffic. She could still see the lights of the city through the trees, could still hear a car horn blare somewhere beyond the boundary. But inside the grove, those sounds came through wrong. The horn stretched into a wail. A dog's bark became a child's cry. Then silence swallowed both. Rory touched the pendant. It throbbed against her fingertips, warm as a living thing. "Right then." Her voice sounded small. "What am I looking for?" The grove didn't answer. But the wildflowers turned toward her, all at once, like sunflowers following the sun. She took a step back. The flowers returned to their original positions, petals swaying in a breeze she couldn't feel. Rory pressed her palm flat against her chest, feeling the Heartstone's pulse through her shirt. The silver chain had grown warm too, warm enough that she could feel it without touching it. She'd read about the grove in her father's old journals — the ones she'd stolen from Brendan Carter's study before she left Cardiff. He'd written about the standing stones, about the way time behaved strangely within their circle. An hour inside could be minutes or days outside, he'd noted in his precise barrister's hand. Do not linger. Rory checked her phone. 11:47 PM. The signal had died the moment she stepped between the stones. The moon hung fat and low above the clearing, casting light that turned the wildflowers silver and the shadows deep. She could see the full extent of the grove — perhaps fifty metres across, circular, bounded by those twisted oak stones on every side. In the centre, a pool of water reflected the moon without rippling. Perfectly still. Too still. Wind moved through the clearing — she could feel it now, cold against her neck, stirring her black hair — but the water didn't so much as shiver. Rory approached the pool. The pendant blazed hot against her skin. She gasped and grabbed the gem through her shirt, half-expecting it to burn her. It didn't. The crimson glow intensified, painting her fingers red. The water reflected her face back at her. Blue eyes, pale skin, the crescent scar on her wrist visible where her sleeve had ridden up. Normal. Herself. Then the reflection smiled. Rory wasn't smiling. She stumbled backward, her heel catching on a root. The ground caught her, but the image stayed — her reflection in the still water, grinning with teeth that looked too numerous, too sharp. The smile stretched wider than any human mouth could stretch. She scrambled to her feet and put distance between herself and the pool. Twenty metres. Thirty. The pendant's heat faded as she moved away, settling back into that steady, watchful pulse. The reflection in the water returned to normal. Just her face. Just the moon. But when she looked away, she caught something at the edge of her vision. Movement. A shape stepping behind one of the standing stones. Rory turned. Nothing. Just the oaks and their tortured bark faces. "Hello?" Her voice echoed. That was wrong — it shouldn't echo in an open clearing. The sound bounced between the stones, multiplying, each repetition softer and somehow more wrong. By the seventh echo, it didn't sound like her voice anymore. It sounded like someone else asking the same question, someone with a deeper register, someone standing much closer than she was. The wildflowers turned toward her again. Rory's breath came fast and shallow. She forced herself to stop, to think. She'd come here because the pendant led her, because something was wrong and the Heartstone wanted her here. Brendan's journals mentioned the grove as a place of power, a threshold between worlds. If there was a reason she'd been pulled here tonight, she needed to find it. She needed to not run. The temperature dropped. Not gradually — all at once, like someone had opened a door to winter. Her breath clouded the air. The wildflowers didn't wilt. They frosted over, crystal patterns spreading across petals that had no business blooming in November. And then the sounds began. Not from any direction. From everywhere. A whisper that wasn't quite words, a language she almost understood. It scraped against her skull, pulling at memories she didn't have — places she'd never been, faces she didn't recognise, a name that tasted like ash when it formed on her tongue. "Malphora." The word left her mouth. She hadn't meant to speak. The pendant exploded with heat. Rory cried out, clutching at the gem, and this time it did burn — a sharp, sudden pain that spread from her palm up her arm. The crescent scar on her wrist glowed white. The pain vanished as quickly as it came. The pool in the centre of the grove began to move. Not a ripple. Not a disturbance from wind or stone. The water rose, defying gravity, forming a column that twisted as it climbed. The moonlight caught it and for one heartbeat Rory saw something inside — a shape, human-sized, suspended in the water with its arms outstretched and its head thrown back. The column collapsed. Water slapped against the pool's surface, spraying droplets across the frosted wildflowers. Rory stood frozen. The pendant pulsed against her chest. Her phone showed 11:48 PM. One minute. One minute inside the grove and she'd already seen the pool smile at her, heard her voice echo wrong, spoken a name she didn't know. The whispering returned. Closer now. The language resolved into English, syllables sharpening. "Aurora." Her name. Her actual name. Not Rory, not Carter. The name on her birth certificate that she'd only ever heard in her mother's voice and in court documents. "Aurora Carter." She turned in a slow circle. The standing stones watched her with their carved faces. The wildflowers remained frozen, their petals white with frost. "You're not alone, are you?" The question left her before she could stop it. The pendant answered — one sharp pulse, hot and bright, as if confirming what she already knew. Something moved behind the nearest oak stone. Not at the edge of her vision this time. Directly in front of her. A shadow peeled away from the bark, darker than the darkness around it, and stood in the moonlight. It had no face. It had no face, but it was looking at her.