The forest had changed.
Not in the way time changes things. Not slowly. Not gently. It was like it had gone feral in the two minutes we'd been gone. Or maybe it was just done pretending.
The air was thicker than before—hot, wet, electric. It stuck to the back of my throat like grief. The moss squished under my feet, but not in the way moss should. It felt… awake. Like skin, almost. Like the forest didn't want to be walked on but was letting me anyway.
Antic walked beside me, quiet. That wasn't normal. He's usually got a joke, or a groan, or a flirt he thinks is subtle. But right now, nothing. Just his shoulder, brushing mine sometimes when the path got narrow.
Dolly floated a few paces ahead, lace barely moving. She didn't spin or hum or threaten to eat anybody. She just glided. The silence looked weird on her.
Grin lagged behind, dragging the sharp tip of his scythe through the moss, making lazy lines in the ground like a kid pretending not to be scared.
The trees were taller than I remembered. Hungrier-looking. Their branches twisted like arms that'd forgotten what they were reaching for.
"It's watching us," I said.
No one corrected me.
Antic's breath hitched, just barely. "Yeah," he muttered. "She remembers me."
"Who does?"
He didn't answer.
His voice had a tremble in it. Not fear exactly. Something older. Like guilt.
I stopped walking. The ground underneath me pulsed once. Like a beat. Like a vein.
"What is this place?"
Grin didn't lift his head. "Woke up wrong. Trees do that sometimes."
Dolly finally spoke. "It's a warning. The forest doesn't want us to move forward. And yet, here we are. Trespassing."
Antic ran a hand through his hair. It looked damp from sweat or air or memory—I couldn't tell. "This used to be safe," he said. "Before I... before I left."
There it was again. That word.
Left.
I looked at him.
His jaw was tight. Eyes flicking too fast. One overall strap had fallen down again, hanging loose against his hip. He hadn't even noticed.
"Antic," I said. "What did you do?"
He didn't meet my eyes.
Didn't speak.
Didn't breathe, for a second.
Then the forest did something I didn't know forests could do.
It blinked.
Not metaphorically. I felt it. Like the moss sucked in a breath and something—something huge—opened its eyes beneath us.
I stumbled. My ankle twisted slightly in the dip of a root. I felt myself start to go down—
Antic caught me.
Again.
"Careful," he murmured, voice too low. Too still. "This place has a heartbeat."
Dolly turned midair, hovering like a judgmental chandelier. "Honestly, how many more times is she going to faint or fall or emotionally spiral? I didn't sign up for a full-time melodrama."
"You're literally a floating haunted doll in a ballgown," Antic snapped, still holding me upright. "That's rich."
She made a show of yawning. "Rich. Like irony stew."
Grin didn't say anything.
The moss rippled again under our feet.
Antic's grip on my waist tightened—not in a gross way. Not even in a protective way. More like if he let go, he'd slip too.
"We shouldn't be here," he said.
"You mean now," I whispered.
He shook his head.
"I mean ever."
We didn't run.
That's the thing about dread—you think it makes you faster, sharper, braver.
But the real kind? The kind that moves through the air like a warning baked into your DNA?
It roots you.
And then it watches.
The first sound wasn't a roar.
It was a drag.
Like claws over bark. Like something too big, too old, too angry was waking up slow—on purpose.
Grin stopped walking.
Antic's arm, still looped around me, went rigid. His other hand drifted toward the strap of his satchel like it could protect him. Like magic would mean anything against what was coming.
Dolly didn't hover now.
She dropped to the ground without a sound and whispered, "Don't move."
But I was already hearing it.
The shift. The crawl. The breath of something carnivorous.
My fingers tightened around Antic's wrist.
He didn't pull away.
The trees parted.
Or maybe they were pushed.
Out of the thicket came a beast with eyes that burned—not just red, not just bright. Recognizing.
A bear, or something that used to be a bear, scales replacing fur, ribs like spines pushed outward. Its claws were long enough to comb the sky. Moss hung from its mouth like it had bitten the forest and never let go.
And it was just the start.
Behind it slinked wolves with twisted necks and forked tongues. Bats the size of Antic's worst ego, their wings twitching like razors. Creatures that didn't make sense in daylight. Or nightmares.
They didn't rush us.
They circled.
Dolly whispered, "Oh good. Theater."
Antic didn't blink.
He was too busy staring at something behind the scaled bear. His breath hitched in time with mine, but for a different reason.
Then it stepped forward.
A mantis.
Ten feet tall.
But that wasn't the scary part.
The scary part was how beautiful it was. Not in a human way. In the way hurricanes are beautiful. In the way inevitability is beautiful.
Its limbs shimmered like glass dipped in poison. Its voice was a buzz through bone.
"Antic."
He flinched.
He never flinches.
"Where have you been?"
Antic opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
"We've hunted you for centuries," the mantis said. "You broke order. You broke us."
The other monsters hissed like a choir.
Grin raised his scythe.
Dolly cracked her neck.
But Antic—he just stood there.
Then, with a groan that came from somewhere lower than courage, he raised both hands.
"Okay. Okay. Let's not do the whole murder opera right now."
"Your crimes cannot be unfanged," the mantis droned.
"Oh for the love of fungus," Antic muttered. "I didn't mean to leave. I tripped into a prophecy, okay? It happens."
No one laughed.
The scaled bear lunged.
I barely had time to move.
Grin was knocked down. His scythe flew into the trees.
Dolly screamed—not like a girl, not like a doll, not like a ghost.
Like something older.
She spun, laced sleeves whipping, and knocked three bat-things into a tree. They exploded into spores.
Antic was grabbed. Claws dug into his shoulders. He didn't fight.
He just looked at me.
Like he was sorry.
Like he'd expected this.
"Antic!" I shouted.
But he didn't answer.
The mantis lifted a serrated limb.
And the forest growled.
Everything stopped.
Even breath.
Even thought.
A hum rolled through the clearing—low, vibrating, sacred.
The creatures froze.
The mantis' blade halted midair.
From the shadows came a figure—not beast, not ghost. Something divine.
Tall. Cloaked in skin like night and carved symbols that pulsed with memory.
No words.
Just presence.
And every monster in the clearing bowed.
Antic hit the ground with a grunt.
Grin's bonds snapped.
Dolly glowed faintly.
I didn't move.
The figure looked at us once.
Just once.
And then it vanished.
And so did everything else.
Gone.
Like the forest had blinked again—and decided we weren't worth eating.
Antic coughed from the dirt.
"I think I peed a little," he croaked.
Grin helped him up. "You reek of it."
Dolly smoothed her skirt. "I liked the part where we almost died. It really tied the vibe together."
I stepped forward.
Antic looked at me. Really looked.
And for the first time, I saw it.
Not charm.
Not mischief.
Not even fear.
Just... relief.
Like the worst part had already happened, and he was still here anyway.
The monsters were gone.
But the quiet they left behind felt sharp—like it had edges. Like we were sitting in the open mouth of something still deciding if it wanted to close.
The moss crackled faintly beneath my feet. The air was thick with the ghost of something huge.
Antic sat cross-legged, elbows on his knees, still bleeding from the arms. Not a lot. Just enough to smell like truth.
I sat beside him.
Grin was a few feet off, hunched and watchful, checking the trees like they might lie if he blinked.
Dolly floated just above the moss. One ankle delicately crossed over the other. Unscathed, but twitchy.
None of us talked right away.
Antic broke it first.
"I need a new name," he said, wiping his bloody nose with the inside of his arm. "Like... something that doesn't make ten-foot mantis assassins crawl out of the woods lookin' for me."
"'Not It,'" Dolly offered sweetly. "That's what we'll call you when they come back."
Antic glared. "I bled for this team."
"You bled because of this team."
"Correction: I bled because I'm cursed, charming, and historically hunted."
Grin sighed. "If they were after you, why didn't you tell us sooner?"
Antic looked away.
I watched his jaw tighten, his mouth twitch.
"I didn't think it'd matter," he muttered. "Figured if they caught me, that'd be it. Wouldn't drag anyone else down with me."
He flicked a twig. It bounced off Dolly's knee.
She didn't react.
I leaned forward, elbows on my thighs. "It's not just about you anymore."
He turned, met my eyes—or tried to.
I think he forgot, sometimes, that I didn't have any.
"Right," he said. "No Eyes. Always looking, even when you ain't."
"Yeah," I murmured. "Funny how that works."
Dolly hovered lower. Her expression changed—barely.
She cocked her head.
"How many times," she asked slowly, "do you think she's gonna faint before we invest in a pillow?"
Antic coughed a laugh. "What, like a trauma travel set?"
"She drops like a cursed daisy at least once per major event."
"It's part of her charm," Grin said. "Very operatic."
I tried to keep my face still, but the corner of my mouth twitched.
"You're all ridiculous."
Dolly grinned. "But alive."
Antic rubbed his temples. "For now."
The forest shifted again.
Quieter now, but not still.
Like it was breathing around us. Watching. Waiting for our next move.
And I felt it—low, distant, not a voice, not a memory. Just... a tug.
A direction.
Antic caught it too. He looked up, blinking. "You feel that?"
"Yeah."
He stood slowly, overalls sticking in the wrong places, arms bruised. "So... we walk?"
Dolly twirled mid-air. "Or float stylishly. Same difference."
Grin picked up his scythe. "Let's find out where that thing went."
Antic offered his hand.
I took it.
His palm was still warm.
And mine was still shaking.
But we moved forward.
Into the mist.
Toward whatever came next...