The Woods

Prologue

Ashenveil has stood longer than any map that names it. Its canopy swallows daylight whole, and its floor — soft with moss, heavy with the smell of damp earth and something older, something metallic — has not known true silence in centuries. The locals know better than to enter after dusk. Most know better than to enter at all. But people come anyway. Seekers. Wanderers. Those who need the trees to give them something the world outside could not. And the forest receives them with the patience of something that has never needed to hurry. Deep within Ashenveil, where the trees press so close their roots lock together like fingers, a presence stirs. It is not new to this hunger. It has fed on fear and breath and life for longer than anyone living can remember, and it has learned exactly how to hunt — how to separate, how to disorient, how to make a voice sound like someone you trust calling your name from just beyond the treeline. Visitors have crossed into the woods today. The Wraith of Ashenveil has already taken notice. And somewhere beneath the roots of the Shadow Maze, a carved obsidian stone pulses with the slow, dark rhythm of something that believes it cannot be stopped.