The house felt colder that evening.
Not in temperature—but in mood. The walls seemed to lean in just slightly more. The shadows pooled darker in the corners. And Evelyn couldn't stop glancing at the trees outside the living room window. The same trees the sheriff had warned her about. The same ones that creaked even when the wind wasn't blowing.
She dropped the grocery bag on the kitchen counter and made tea, needing something warm to cut the chill curling through her chest.
She had barely touched the journal since she found it in her grandmother's bedroom drawer—tied shut with red string, wrapped in a silk cloth that looked hand-stitched. It had her name written on the front.
Just her name.
Evelyn.
Not To my granddaughter. Not For you, when the time is right.
Just her name, like a prophecy.
---
She sat on the old velvet chair by the fireplace, lit a candle, and untied the journal.
The first few pages were blank. Then:
> "I was seventeen when I first heard the beast's howl."
Evelyn's hand trembled as she turned the page.
> "They said it was just wolves. But no wolves have a voice like that—one soaked in pain, rage, and hunger."
> "Black Hollow was founded on a lie. They didn't settle here by chance. They came for him."
> "The Beast wasn't born. He was made."
---
Her breath caught as she kept reading. Margaret had written about an ancient ritual—a deal made with something dark, in exchange for protection. Crops thrived, diseases stayed away, children were born strong.
But every ten years, they gave the woods a girl.
> "A bride, they called it. A sacrifice, in truth."
> "I was meant to be one of them. I ran. I hid. But he found me."
Evelyn's eyes darted to the window again.
> "He didn't kill me. But I was marked."
> "I escaped the forest, but I never truly left him behind. He follows. He waits. He remembers."
> "I've spent my whole life trying to keep you out of this. But the woods… the woods choose who they want."
> "If you're reading this, Evelyn… he has already sensed you."
---
Evelyn slammed the journal shut.
The house groaned around her, old wood shifting with age—or something else. A cold draft brushed the back of her neck.
Then she heard it.
Far away. Barely audible.
A low, guttural sound that rose into something inhuman.
Not a howl.
A growl.
Something not of this world… but watching it all the same.
---