The wind changed when she stepped past the gate.
Ashroot's edge was not marked by walls or fences, but by silence. A line of dead grass, a twisted tree with iron nails in its bark, a cairn of bones too carefully stacked to be chance. That was the edge of safety—or whatever passed for it here.
Elara walked beyond it.
The fog peeled back like breath on a mirror, revealing a dirt path barely wide enough for two. It was uneven and sunken, lined with gnarled trees whose branches clawed at the sky. Moss clung to the trunks like old skin. The air grew colder, sharp and metallic, tasting faintly of rust.
She walked fast. Her boots crunched dry leaves and brittle twigs. She didn't look back.
But she heard the steps.
Soft. Slower than hers. A drag-and-tap rhythm.
She didn't stop.
"Do you ever do what you're told?" she asked aloud.
Mira caught up with a grin. She wore two coats, three scarves, and carried a pack nearly her size. Her hair was a mess of black tangles stuffed beneath a knit cap. One of the raccoons from the village sat on her shoulder, looking just as unimpressed as Elara.
"Not once in my life," Mira said proudly.
"I told you to stay behind."
"You did. I also told you I'd follow. So now we're even."
Elara turned to face her fully. "You're not strong enough for this. You make jokes when you're scared. You trip on flat ground. You're a child."
"I'm sixteen."
"Still a child."
"I can cook," Mira offered. "I can find mushrooms that only make you slightly hallucinate. And I can scream really loud if something tries to eat us. That's a skill."
Elara opened her mouth to argue—but the raccoon bared its teeth and hissed.
Mira gave it a scratch behind the ear. "He agrees with me."
Elara sighed. "You're going to get yourself killed."
Mira's grin faded. She looked past Elara, toward the gray horizon.
"Maybe," she said softly. "But I'd rather die walking forward than rotting behind village walls, waiting for something worse."
Elara said nothing.
They kept walking.
The Hollow Road wound through forest that didn't breathe.
There were no birds. No wind. The trees didn't sway. The fog thickened until the world felt carved from ash and bone. Elara felt her heartbeat louder than her footsteps.
They passed remnants of failed campsites—burned-out fire pits, torn tents, bones with bite marks too large to be wolf.
Once, they found a tree with dozens of hands nailed to the trunk.
Mira stopped laughing after that.
On the second day, they met him.
The road narrowed, curling around a glade where the mist coiled low like sleeping cats. Elara heard the hum first—low, rhythmic. Not quite singing. Not quite human.
She raised her blade.
Mira stepped closer, whispering, "Don't you dare say 'it's probably nothing.' That's how people die in stories."
Elara didn't answer.
A figure stood in the glade. Cloaked in red, face obscured by a veil of black thorns woven like a crown. He stood perfectly still, arms out, palms upward. A small fire burned at his feet—but it didn't give off heat or smoke.
"Don't move," Elara said.
Mira had already crouched, rummaging in her pack. "I've got salt. I've got sage. I've got... expired honeycakes?"
The figure tilted his head. The thorn-veil clicked.
"Pilgrims," he said. His voice was too smooth. Too clean. Like water running over glass.
"We're just passing through," Elara said carefully.
"No one passes through," he said. "You either go forward to die, or turn back to sleep."
"We're going forward."
He nodded once.
Then lifted a small bell from beneath his cloak and rang it once.
The sound wasn't loud—but it rippled through Elara's bones like a scream held underwater. Her vision blurred. For a heartbeat, she saw the trees breathing. Their bark peeled back like skin. Mouths opened beneath roots.
"Salt!" Mira shouted, flinging a handful into the fire.
The man recoiled.
The flames turned blue. His form flickered—too tall, too thin, limbs in the wrong places for half a second.
Then he was gone.
Just mist.
Elara dropped to her knees, gasping.
Mira crouched beside her, shoving more salt in every direction. The raccoon curled around her neck, shivering.
"Okay," Mira panted. "So, uh. I'm officially terrified."
Elara didn't speak. She touched the hilt of her knife.
It was warm.
That night, they found shelter beneath the ruins of an old chapel. The stone walls had collapsed inward, but the altar remained—carved with a symbol Elara didn't recognize. A rose made of blades.
They didn't light a fire.
They didn't speak of the thorn-veiled man.
Elara wrapped herself in Mira's extra scarf and listened to the night sounds—or the absence of them. She couldn't sleep.
At some point, Mira stirred beside her.
"I'm not brave," she whispered. "Just stupid."
"You're not stupid."
"I followed you because I wanted to matter. Because I thought maybe... if I walked far enough, the world would give me something back."
Elara stared at the ceiling.
"I didn't ask for a follower."
"I know. You didn't ask for a friend either."
Elara didn't respond.
Mira rolled over and muttered, "Tough luck."
By dawn, the fog had changed again. It pressed against the ruins like a living thing.
When they stepped outside, they found a message carved into the earth.
"YOU ARE SEEN."
Mira exhaled sharply. "Cool. Cool cool cool. Love that. Totally not ominous."
Elara studied the words. No footprints. No sign of the thorn-veiled man.
But she felt it again—that creeping, breathless presence watching from the woods.
And still... she moved forward.
The path twisted like something in pain.
Each hour, it grew more difficult to follow—choked by roots that rose like ribs from the ground, branches that reached like arms. The trees were black now, not from fire or rot, but something older, something beneath the bark. Their trunks shimmered with a strange oil-sheen. Birds did not sing. Even insects refused to crawl.
By the third day, they were no longer sure they were on a path at all.
"I think we've walked in a circle," Mira muttered, staring at a crooked birch they'd passed before. She pulled a small piece of chalk from her pocket and scrawled a crude drawing of a raccoon with teeth the size of knives.
"There," she said. "If we see murder-coon again, we've looped."
Elara squinted at the trees. "We've looped."
"Right. Great." Mira kicked a root. "This is fine. We're definitely not cursed or slowly being swallowed by a sentient forest that feeds on lost hope."
Elara didn't respond. Her jaw was tight, eyes fixed ahead. She could feel something... not watching exactly, but waiting. The silence was deliberate.
Something wanted them here.
They came upon the stone arch just before dusk.
It stood alone—no ruins, no wall, just two massive pillars of gray stone twisted with old vines. At the top, a carving barely visible beneath moss: a rose with its petals pulled back like a scream.
Beneath the archway, a smooth stretch of road led deeper into the forest. No roots. No fog. Just a straight, perfect path.
Too perfect.
Elara stepped forward.
Mira grabbed her arm. "That looks like a trap."
"It is."
"You're walking into it?"
"Yes."
"Well... I hope you know I'm blaming you in my death soliloquy."
They passed beneath the arch.
At first, it was quiet. Peaceful, even.
Then the air thickened. Each breath tasted like soil and rust. The light dimmed though the sun hadn't yet set. Their footsteps sounded too loud.
Mira coughed. "I feel like I'm walking into someone else's dream."
"No," Elara said. "A memory."
She didn't know why she said that.
They walked for what felt like hours, though the sun didn't move. The path narrowed until trees leaned in close, whispering with dry leaves. The forest smelled of dying things—wet bark, mold, bone dust.
Then the air changed.
It rippled, subtle as a blink.
They stepped out of the woods—and into fire.
But it wasn't real.
They stood in a village. One that had clearly burned down years ago. Smoke curled from houses that no longer stood. Bodies lay crumpled in the road—ash-gray, faceless. A dog whimpered from a collapsed stable.
Mira whimpered too.
"Is this a test?" she whispered. "A memory?"
Elara walked forward. Her boots left no prints.
Then she heard it—a voice. A child's scream. Wordless and high.
She turned.
A little girl ran from the burning house. Her dress torn, her arms streaked with blood. She stumbled toward Elara, reached out—
And passed through her.
Mira gasped.
More screams echoed behind them. Doors slammed. Hooves pounded the dirt. The illusion grew louder, brighter.
"Elara?" Mira's voice trembled. "What is this?"
Elara didn't answer. She stepped into the fire.
It burned cold. Like frost, not flame. Her body prickled, eyes watering from smoke that wasn't there.
She passed through the ruins of a bakery, then into the town square.
A figure stood at the center.
Hooded. Silent.
Not the thorn-veiled man—but tall. Rigid. Something about the way he tilted his head made her gut twist.
He raised a hand.
A blade of thorned black iron bloomed from his palm.
"Prove yourself," he said in a voice made of knives scraping glass.
Then lunged.
It was like fighting the memory of pain.
His blade passed through her shoulder—but she felt it. The fire, the tear, the bone snapping. She screamed. Staggered. Raised her knife.
Mira shouted something—then went quiet.
The air warped.
The man struck again.
Elara ducked, rolled, slashed back. Her knife caught something solid. The illusion flickered.
Then, just as suddenly, it ended.
She lay in grass. Real grass. The fire gone. The village gone.
Mira sat beside her, eyes wide, holding her hand. "You stopped breathing."
Elara gasped. Her shoulder ached where the blade had struck, but there was no wound. Only the memory of one.
"What the hell was that?" Mira asked.
"A warning," Elara said hoarsely. "A trial. This road—it shows you something. Tests you."
"Test me next time. I'm less stabby."
Elara tried to smile, but her body was still shaking.
They didn't speak much after that.
They found the man near midnight.
He sat beneath a black tree, whispering to the dirt.
His clothes were shredded, skin blistered from sun or magic or madness. One eye had been gouged out. The other was sharp and bloodshot.
When Elara approached, he didn't move.
"Don't go," he muttered. "Don't go further. He's not a man. He's not a king."
Mira knelt beside him, offering water. He didn't touch it.
"He waits at the end," the man whispered. "With roses in his ribs. With love that burns. You think he'll save you. But he's a cage, girl. He's a crown made of bone."
Elara stiffened. "You've seen him?"
"I was him," the man breathed. "Or I thought I was. That's what he does. Makes you forget who you were."
"Who are you now?"
"Nothing."
He collapsed forward. Dead.
They buried him beneath the tree.
Mira said a few words. Elara didn't. She stared at the sky, at the strange curl of clouds forming a spiral above them.
They slept beneath that spiral.
And in the morning, when they rose, the woods had thinned.
The air was brighter. The wind moved again. Birds—real birds—sang.
But the words the madman whispered stayed with her.
He's a crown made of bone.
He's not a king.
He's not a man.
Elara's grip tightened on her knife.
She hadn't met him yet.
But already, he was everywhere.