The fog sat heavy over Misty Oaks a village in the kingdom of Aetherland that morning, so thick it made the gas lamps look like floating stars. Damp air clung to the old wood porches, curling in through window cracks, soaking into the creaky bones of every house on Hollow Street.
In a little kitchen that smelled of burnt biscuits and mothballs, a boy sat at the table swinging his legs, chewing the corner of his sleeve. His grandmother, stiff in the knees and sharper in the tongue, stirred her tea without ever sipping it.
He looked up at her. "Gramma, is it true? About the Perennial Forest? That people go in and don't come back?"
Her spoon paused mid-stir. The soft clink against the porcelain suddenly sounded too loud.
"That's what they say," she muttered, not looking at him. "Happened to my best friend, Lottie. We was twelve. She ran in after her brother dared her. Thought she could be brave. Never saw her again." She tapped the spoon once, twice, then leaned in close, her whisper so soft it felt like the fog itself:
"They say the trees don't like to give back what they take."
The boy's eyes widened. "But it's just trees, right?"
She gave a tight, humorless smile. "So's a coffin, 'til you're in it."
Just then, the neighbor, old Mr. Gellar, came bumbling by the front gate with a newspaper rolled under one arm and his shirt collar turned up against the chill.
"You seen this morning's Tribune?" he shouted, as if the fog had stolen his hearing. "It's those Ennuis again. I swear, that family's cursed."
Gramma squinted. "What now?"
He unrolled the paper and read with theatrical flair:
"Tragedy Strikes Ennui Estate: Wealthy Heiress Goes Blind Overnight."
Mr. Gellar snorted, tapping the headline. "Blind overnight. Sounds mighty convenient, don't it? They've always been strange up in that big house, but now they're tryin' to spin this like it's some heartbreaking misfortune. Poor little rich girl can't see." He shook his head, clearly unconvinced. "She'll probably grow wings next and call it a miracle."
The boy frowned. "She's really blind?"
Gramma sighed, the fog catching in her throat. "That poor child... No one deserves to lose their sight. Especially not a girl who ain't ever been allowed to leave that mansion, not really." Her voice softened. "Her mama was always... delicate. Her daddy's a ghost literally he's dead. And that place..." she glanced toward the hill where the looming outline of the Ennui mansion could barely be made out through the mist. "That place don't raise children. It just keeps 'em."
The wind whistled faintly through the trees, bending the branches near the edge of town — just enough to make them creak.
The boy looked toward the distant forest, barely visible beyond the last crooked fence post. "If I ever got close to it... would you be mad?"
"I'd be mourning," she said flatly. "And not just because of the trees. That forest remembers who walks in. And it don't forget easy."
She reached out, brushing a strand of hair from his forehead.
"So don't be stupid, darling. There's enough sad stories in Misty Oaks without you makin' another.