THOR - Chapter 4: The Blackwood Pursuit
The Finch house was suffocating. The air hung heavy with the scent of ozone and copper, as though lightning had struck indoors. Samantha collapsed to the floor, gasping for air as the invisible force released her. Martha rushed to cradle her, whispering frantic prayers under her breath.
Maria remained standing in the center of the room, her eyes rolled back so far that only the whites were visible. Her body twitched in rhythmic spasms, movements that resembled a grotesque dance, mechanical and inhuman.
"Hanna, look at me!" Father John commanded, gripping the sobbing girl by the shoulders. "Where exactly did they take Anni?"
Hanna's teeth chattered so violently it was audible. "The… the old mill at the edge of Blackwood. We were trying to find a way to stop it, but the shadows… they rose out of the ground like oil. They dragged her toward the trees."
Father John's face hardened. "Logan, stay here. Protect Martha and Samantha. Do not let Maria out of your sight, but do not touch her with your bare hands. Use the salt I gave you to circle her."
Logan nodded, his face pale but resolute. "Just find that girl. Save Maria's friend."
Into the Woods
Father John and Hanna drove toward the edge of town. The streetlights thinned, replaced by the suffocating darkness of Blackwood Forest. The trees loomed like skeletal sentinels, their branches interlocking to blot out the moon.
As they stepped onto the forest floor, silence swallowed them. No crickets, no owls, no rustling leaves. It was the silence of a vacuum.
"Anni!" Hanna cried, her voice swallowed by the trees.
A sound emerged from the depths of the woods—a rhythmic thud, like a drum. Thud. Thud. Thud.
"That's not a drum," Father John whispered, clutching his silver rosary. "That's a heartbeat. The forest is breathing."
They pressed forward, guided by the faint glow of Hanna's phone flashlight. The deeper they went, the thicker the air became, as though the forest itself resisted their intrusion.
The Old Mill
The mill appeared suddenly, a rotting structure of grey wood and rusted iron. Its roof sagged, its windows shattered. Yet it pulsed faintly, as though alive.
Hanging from the rafters by thick, black vines was Anni. Her body dangled limply, her skin turning the same grey hue as the building.
Below her stood Marcus. Or what was left of him. His eyes were gone, replaced by glowing embers. His jaw hung slack, broken at an unnatural angle. He was no longer a boy; he was a puppet.
Hanna screamed. "Anni!"
Marcus turned his head slowly, his movements jerky, marionette-like. "The circle is broken," he rasped, his voice layered with echoes. "The Debt is being collected."
The Bond of the Three
Back at the Finch house, Maria began to hum. It was a nursery rhyme, distorted and slowed until it sounded like a dirge.
"Maria, please," Martha cried, clutching Samantha. "Fight it, baby. Come back to us."
Maria's head snapped toward her mother. "Maria isn't home, Martha. She's watching you from the basement of her mind. Do you want to know what she's thinking? She's thinking about how much she hated you for telling her to 'ignore' the monsters. So she became one."
Her skin began to crack. Dark, viscous fluid leaked from the welts on her arms, forming symbols on the floorboards—symbols Maria had never learned.
The Confrontation at the Mill
Father John stepped into the mill, splashing holy water toward the Marcus-entity. "Release the girl!"
Marcus shrieked, the sound cracking the remaining glass in the mill's windows. "The circle is broken! The Debt is being collected!"
Hanna, trembling but desperate, grabbed a rusted sickle from the floor. She swung it at the vines holding Anni, slicing through them. Anni fell, limp, into Father John's arms.
The moment her feet touched the ground, a shockwave rippled through the earth.
The Convergence
At the Finch house, Maria screamed in perfect synchrony with the shockwave. She levitated, her back arching until her spine looked ready to snap.
"The three!" Father John shouted over the roar of the wind inside the mill. "We have to get Anni back to Maria! The circle must be closed where it began, or they will all be consumed!"
But the trees themselves moved, blocking the path back. From the shadows, the veiled woman emerged, her needle-like fingers clicking together.
"You brought the other two," she hissed, her voice like dry leaves skittering across a grave. "Now the feast can truly begin."
Father John stepped forward, shielding Hanna and Anni. "Hanna, take her and run through the creek! The water is moving—it will slow her down! Get to the Finch house! Don't look back!"
The girls scrambled away into the dark. Father John remained, clutching his crucifix, beginning the Rite of Exorcism—not for a person, but for the very ground they stood on.
The Siege at Home
Back at the Finch house, Logan and Martha watched in horror as Maria's scars transformed into metallic ridges, sharp and glinting. She turned her gaze toward Samantha.
"You were always the pretty one," Maria—or the thing inside her—growled. "Let's see how you look with my face."
She lunged, not with the speed of a girl, but with the force of a predator. Logan threw himself between them, but the invisible force slammed him against the wall. Martha screamed, clawing at the tar-like floor that trapped her feet.
The front door burst open. Hanna stumbled inside, dragging Anni. Both were covered in mud and scratches, their eyes wide with terror.
"We're here!" Hanna cried.
Maria turned her head 180 degrees, bones cracking, to face them. "The runaways return. The circle wants to be whole again. It wants to be closed… in skin."
Closing Image
The furniture circled the ceiling like a cyclone. Shadows detached from the corners, multiplying into copies of the veiled woman.
Father John's voice carried faintly from the woods, his exorcism echoing across the town. But inside the Finch house, Maria's shadow stretched across the walls, whispering in unison:
Blood for blood. Shadow for shadow. The circle must be whole.
And as Anni collapsed onto the floor, her eyes fluttering open, she whispered the words that sealed their fate:
"It's my fault. I found the book. I brought the words. Maria, I'm so sorry."
Maria smiled, her scars glowing purple. "Sorry won't pay the Debt, Anni."