The forest behind Astra's house was denser than it had been in childhood.
The trees pressed too close, trunks warped and leaning at odd angles like they were listening. Fog slithered low across the ground, clinging to their ankles as the five girls moved in silence, each gripping a flashlight like a talisman.
Astra led. The painting she'd made had haunted her, clawing at the edge of her vision until she'd finally followed the memory it had left behind.
Now, the memory was leading them here.
"This is the place," she whispered.
They broke through a wall of brush, and suddenly, it was there.
The Ashwood Tree.
Or what was left of it.
The tree was massive and twisted, its bark blackened and peeling like old scabs. Its roots had ruptured through the earth in a wide circle, the ground pulsing faintly beneath their feet. The air here felt wrong—electric, humming low like a buried wire.
Noa stepped closer, her breath catching in her throat.
"I've seen this tree before," she murmured. "In my dreams."
The trunk bore deep gouges like claw marks, and between the cracks in the roots… something glinted.
Riven crouched and dug with her bare hands, the soil wet and loose. Her fingers struck tin.
They unearthed a rusted box and pried it open. Inside: a leather-bound book. The same as the one from the prologue. The oath book.
The pages were water-stained but mostly intact—until the end.
"The last page is gone," Celeste said, flipping carefully. "It was torn out."
Suddenly, Mavis shivered. "We're not alone."
They turned.
Through the thick fog between the trees, a figure loomed. Taller than any person. Moving slowly but with purpose. It had no clear outline—only the suggestion of limbs and a gaping center where a chest should be. As it shifted, the fog bent around it.
It watched. It waited.
And then it was gone.
No movement. No sound.
Just gone.
The girls stood frozen.
"Was that the thing from your dreams?" Riven asked Noa.
Noa didn't answer.
Her hand was pressed to the tree's bark, where something was carved beneath the moss.
She scraped it clean.
Words appeared—barely visible:
"THE HOLLOW BENEATH.
THE OATH ABOVE.
FIVE TO BIND.
ONE TO BLEED."
She stumbled back. "The seal… it's weakening."
Celeste looked around. "Then we're running out of time."