The night fell over Duskwood with unnatural weight, as though the village itself was sinking into its own silence. Chizzy stood in the doorway of the chapel, heart beating like a distant drum. Ezra had gone to scout the eastern woods where the altar stones were said to glow under moonlight, but he hadn't returned.
She clutched the silver lantern Maura had given her, its flame dim but unwavering. It wasn't an ordinary flame Maura said it had been blessed in a place where the Hollow Man couldn't reach. A dying convent, long abandoned. She had lit it herself.
Chizzy descended the chapel steps. The fog clung to the earth like breath frozen in place, curling around her ankles as she passed the graves. Names whispered through the wind, half-formed and unfamiliar.
She headed toward the forest's edge, the lantern trembling in her grip. Each tree she passed seemed to bend closer. She could feel them watching.
Then she saw it movement beyond the tree line.
"Ezra?" she called softly.
But it wasn't Ezra.
A figure stepped from the mist tall, gaunt, its limbs too long, fingers dragging like broken branches. It didn't walk. It glided.
The Hollow Man.
His face was not a face at all. A smooth void where features should be, like someone had wiped it clean.
The lantern's flame pulsed.
The Hollow Man stopped.
Then he spoke not with lips, but directly into her mind. Cold. Deep.
"You delay the inevitable."
"I made no vow," she said, raising the lantern. "I owe you nothing."
"Blood remembers. Your mother broke the circle. You must restore it… or rot beside her."
At the mention of her mother, something in Chizzy snapped. She stepped forward, the lantern's glow sharpening, illuminating her defiant face.
"I will not repeat her mistakes. I will not kneel."
The Hollow Man tilted his head. Behind him, other shadows stirred. Echoes of villagers who had given parts of themselves to keep him at bay. Their eyes were hollow, mouths sewn shut.
Chizzy raised the lantern higher and the shadows recoiled. The Hollow Man hissed, retreating into the trees.
Suddenly, a rustling to her left.
Ezra stumbled into view, bloodied but alive.
"You found it?" she whispered.
He nodded, lifting a carved stone from beneath his coat one of the original altar markers.
"We can reset the seal," he said breathlessly. "But only if you're ready."
She looked once more at the lantern, its flame dancing like hope.
"I've never been more ready," she whispered.
Behind her, the chapel bells tolled though no one had touched them.
Something had awakened.
And time was running out.