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Shadows at the edge of the woods
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2025-04-27 04:10:19It was a little past midnight by the time the boys finished pitching the tent.
They picked a hidden spot near the woods — close enough for cover, just in case someone drove by. Dylan and Mark stayed close together, letting Ben take the lead as they explored the area. “Guys, wait a minute,” Dylan whispered, his voice shaky. “I swear I just heard something… in the woods.” Ben turned, unimpressed. “Dude, it’s the woods. What do you expect? Kids laughing? Car alarms? It’s just animals,” Mark said sarcastically. Still, they moved carefully, every snap of a twig putting them more on edge. Suddenly, headlights flashed up the road. The boys froze, panic setting in. Without thinking, they bolted — sprinting toward the lake, away from the road. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Mark hissed, stumbling over a root. “This is insane. We should’ve skipped this dare! I could be with Cassidy right now — not stuck here with dead people!” The headlights slowed at the gates to the cemetery… And then, in an instant, the car vanished. The boys rubbed their eyes, sure they were imagining things — but when they looked again, there was nothing. No lights. No engine. No car. “Great,” Dylan said, throwing up his hands. “We’ve been here, what, three hours? And we’re already seeing freaky shit! This place is gonna make us lose our minds!” Mark and Dylan kept arguing in hushed tones. Meanwhile, Ben… just wandered off. “Where the hell are you going, Ben?!” the twins whispered harshly, scrambling after him. “Shh,” Ben hissed. “I keep hearing someone talking… but I can’t hear it over you two idiots.” Mark tried to reason with him. “Dude, you’re tired. We all are. Let’s just crash at the tent and get the hell out of here at sunrise.” But Ben ignored them, pushing further into the field. Reluctantly, Dylan and Mark followed. As Dylan jogged to catch up, he noticed a headstone off to the side. Something about it made him stop. The inscription was barely readable in the moonlight: “1894–1902. In loving memory of Nadia Grace. Daughter and Sister.” He stared at it for a long moment, feeling an eerie connection he couldn’t explain. With a shiver, he ran after the others, silently cursing himself for always getting dragged into this kind of mess. Ben led the way toward the woods, the twins close behind, when all three boys suddenly froze. Somewhere nearby, faint voices drifted through the trees: “It’s time again, Sue. See? I told you you’d get another chance. There’s enough for both of us… and they look pretty healthy too. Not like the usual bone bags we get.” The boys stared at each other in horror, barely breathing. Another voice — softer, almost regretful — answered: “I don’t know, Willy… I haven’t done it in so long. They put me here for a reason, remember? So I’d stop… They’re just boys. They haven’t even lived yet. They have futures, families…” Ben gave Dylan and Mark a look, silently urging them to back away. But the twins, terrified, refused to leave his side. “Damn it, Sue!” the harsher voice snapped. “We barely ever get out, and tonight we got lucky! You’re either gonna kill one of them, or I will. It’s just like when you killed that little bitch you shared a room with, remember?” Ben had heard enough. Without thinking, he turned and bolted, crashing through the underbrush. Dylan and Mark sprinted after him, their hearts hammering. Back at the tent, Ben didn’t waste a second. “Pack. Now,” he barked. The fear in his voice was enough; neither twin asked questions. They grabbed their bags and started tearing down the tent in frantic silence. But then — snap — a twig broke nearby. The boys froze. Don’t look. Don’t move. Get out. They abandoned the tent, running as fast as they could toward the road. That’s when they saw her. A girl, standing alone by the path. She looked about eight years old, in a tattered white dress, her hair hanging in tangled waves. Ben slowed, cautious. “Hey… are you okay?” he asked. No answer. He took a step closer — and the girl finally lifted her head. Her mouth moved, but no sound came out. One word: Run. Dylan and Mark didn’t need to hear it twice. They took off toward the truck. But Ben — something made him stay. “Who are you?” he asked. “What’s going on out here?” The girl, her voice eerily calm, answered. “My name is Nadia,” she said. “My parents put me here when I was six… after I drowned my baby brother.” Ben felt the blood drain from his face. “He didn’t deserve a life when my kittens didn’t,” she whispered. “I just wanted him to feel the pain I felt.” Nadia looked around the dark woods nervously. “Once a month, the guards let some of us out… We get to roam the grounds. Sometimes, people like you come. Most of us just watch. But some… they hurt people. Willy and Sue — they’re out there now. They were watching you.” Ben’s stomach twisted. “Come with us!” he begged. “We can get you out of here — my mom’s always wanted a daughter, she’d love you!” Nadia smiled sadly. “I can’t leave. This place won’t let me. If I tried… it would drag me — and you — back.” “Now run!” Before Ben could move, Nadia vanished — disappearing into the air like mist. Heart pounding, Ben sprinted toward the gate.
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Ben burst out of the woods, lungs burning, legs pumping harder than they ever had on the football field.He could see the gate ahead — and just beyond it, Dylan and Mark waiting, waving frantically.Almost there. Don’t stop.But then, from somewhere behind him, a horrible wild laugh echoed through the night.Ben glanced back.Out of the trees, two figures barreled toward him — Willy leading the charge, his mouth twisted into a manic grin, with Sue trailing behind, a look of pure desperation on her face.Ben threw himself at the fence. He scrambled up the rusted iron bars, his fingers slipping on the cold metal.Halfway up, a hand grabbed his ankle — Willy.“Gotcha, boy,” Willy hissed, yanking him downward.Ben kicked wildly, fighting to stay on the fence, but the madman’s grip was like iron.“Let go, you psycho!” Ben shouted.Willy only laughed harder — a bone-chilling, broken sound — and bit down on Ben’s leg.The pain made Ben lose his grip. He fell with a hard thud to the ground.B
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The truck roared down the country highway, its headlights cutting a frantic path through the darkness.Inside, the boys sat in stunned silence.Ben’s knuckles were white against the steering wheel.Mark stared blankly ahead, his chest heaving.Dylan kept glancing over his shoulder, half expecting to see Willy sprinting after them out of the darkness.No one spoke until they reached the safety of town.Ben jerked the truck into the driveway of their friend’s house, killed the engine, and turned to the others.“We can’t tell anyone,” he said hoarsely.Mark shook his head violently.“Are you crazy? We have to tell the cops — tell someone! That guy… those people… they’re still out there!”Ben leaned his forehead against the steering wheel, trying to breathe.“And say what, Mark? That we snuck onto state property because of a dare? That we saw ghosts? That some psycho tried to eat us?”Dylan finally spoke, his voice small:“What if they don’t believe us?”The truck sat silent for a long mo
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The gates of Terrell State Hospital loomed in the headlights like the jaws of some massive, ancient beast.The boys sat in the truck for a moment, none of them moving.Ben flexed his fingers around the steering wheel.“Once we’re inside,” he said, “we stick together. No running off. No being a hero.”Mark and Dylan nodded.Ben popped the glove compartment and pulled out a flashlight and a rusted baseball bat.It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing.Dylan found an old tire iron under his seat and clutched it like a lifeline.“Should’ve brought holy water and a priest too,” Dylan muttered.They climbed out of the truck and made their way toward the gate.It groaned open slowly under Ben’s push, like it had been waiting for them.The air inside the hospital grounds felt thicker — heavier — like stepping underwater.Their footsteps echoed unnaturally loud on the cracked pavement as they crossed onto the grounds.The camp itself lay hidden beyond the trees, dark and silent.But som
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Years passed, and life went on. Ben, Dylan, and Mark graduated, moved away, started families of their own. They buried the memories of WildWood deep inside themselves, convincing each other it had all just been fear and hallucination — tricks of the dark. But late at night, when the world was quiet and sleep wouldn’t come, Ben sometimes caught a glimpse in the mirror — not of his own reflection, but of twisted trees and rusted gates. And when he drove alone, sometimes the truck’s radio would flicker, a familiar wild laugh slipping through the static. The worst part wasn’t the memories. It wasn’t even the shadows he sometimes saw at the edge of his vision. It was the feeling that maybe — just maybe — he had never really left WildWood. That a part of him was still wandering the woods, still running through the endless night… Still trapped with Nadia, and Willy, and the others. Because some places, once they get inside you, don’t ever let you go. And some doors — no matter ho
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Ben’s heart pounded in his chest as he took another step back, his feet stumbling over the uneven ground. The laughter came again, louder this time, mixing with the whispers of the others—Willy, Nadia, the nameless faces of the past. They circled him like vultures, their eyes unblinking, their smiles twisted into something grotesque. “You’re one of us now, Ben,” Nadia’s voice echoed, her words distant and close all at once, like the forest itself was speaking. “No,” Ben gasped, shaking his head. His hands trembled, his breath coming in short, panicked gasps. “This isn’t real. This isn’t—” But the forest seemed to swallow his words. The trees groaned, their branches moving in slow, deliberate sways, as if alive, as if they were listening, responding. The air felt thick, oppressive, like something was closing in from all sides. “You were one of us,” Willy’s voice sliced through the air, sharp and mocking. Ben’s gaze snapped to the boy standing at the edge of the clearing—Willy, but
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The earth beneath Ben trembled again, but this time it wasn’t the pulsing of WildWood. This time, it was something else — a deep, guttural vibration that seemed to echo from the very heart of the forest, a force older and darker than anything he could comprehend. It rippled through him, through his bones, vibrating with an energy so pure and raw it almost felt like a living thing, like the very breath of WildWood itself. For a fleeting moment, Ben felt a shift inside of him — as if something was waking up, stirring to life in the deepest corners of his mind. His vision blurred, the shadows growing thicker, swirling around him like a storm. The faces of the others faded, their hollow eyes turning into something less human, more monstrous, until only the dark forest remained. The forest that had always been there, waiting, patient. “You feel it now, don’t you?” Nadia’s voice was barely a whisper, but it cut through him like a knife. “It’s in your blood. It always has been.” Ben clen
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A Night at Wildwood The root beneath the green
Deep WildWood — The Edge of the Threshold The ground had changed. The further Clara and Ashani moved into the WildWood’s heart, the more the forest stopped resembling anything earthly. Trees leaned at impossible angles. Bark had gone from deep brown to a pale gray, like the skin of something long dead. The leaves overhead no longer rustled — they hung still, as if holding their breath. The old ranger paths had vanished. Now, only roots marked the way — wide, veinlike things coiling through the dirt like exposed arteries. “We’re close,” Ashani murmured. “I can feel it pulling.” Clara nodded. The ember inside her had begun to burn hotter. Her chest felt tight — not from fear, but pressure, like something wanted out. “Clara…” Ashani paused, then lowered her voice. “What if what we find… isn’t Emily anymore?” Clara didn’t answer right away. Her eyes scanned the warped horizon, the way the trees bent away from some central point ahead, as though recoiling from something too ancient
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Ranger Station – Just Before Dawn Clara hadn’t slept. She sat at her desk surrounded by books — some borrowed from the Terrell Historical Society, others from the dusty back shelves of the town’s near-forgotten library, and one, far older, bound in worn deer hide. It was a gift. Left anonymously at her door six months ago. No note. No return address. Only a title burned into the cover in no language she could read. But tonight, when she flipped to its center, the same split tree symbol was there. Beneath it, in delicate, angular script: “Kaarayael. The Forgotten Root.” Clara exhaled, slow. The name vibrated in her skull. Just like the whisper from the forest. A call from below. She kept reading. ⸻ The Fragmented Record – Translated Excerpts “Before the settlers came, the Yanuwah spoke of two spirits: the Guardian and the Dreaming Root. One kept the balance. The other longed to become something else.” “The Root was not evil… but incomplete. Hungry. It did not understand dea
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Terrell State Hospital – Sub-Basement Level 3 The fluorescent lights above flickered once, then died. It didn’t matter. He didn’t need them. He moved by memory now — not his own, but inherited. Hand-me-down thoughts from long-dead voices. He muttered names as he walked: Halloway. Ishtaya. Marla. Emily. Over and over. Like steps in a staircase made of blood. In one hand, he carried a canvas duffel filled with tools: a chisel, two glass vials, and a fragment of bone etched with symbols that hummed if you tilted it just right. In the other, he held a map. Not one of paper. One burned into his palm. He had followed the corridor that used to house the hydrotherapy ward — the deepest part of the hospital. The place that, officially, no longer existed. Half collapsed after the fire in ‘73. Sealed since. Forgotten by the state. But the forest remembered. The Door Beneath the Ashes The hallway ended in melted iron bars and charred stone. He knelt, brushing away soot and ash until hi
A Night at Wildwood The first name
Hello! Before diving in I was just hoping to say I hope everyone has liked or enjoyed the story so far.. I know it’s changed a lot! I have decided this is the turn the story will take and I hope you all enjoy it as much as I have while working on it! Thank you all for the support! Now back to the book!! ————————————————-Long Ago — Before the Founding of Terrell The forest did not yet have a name. It breathed with the quiet of sacred things, watched over by those who knew the rhythms of root and sky, who spoke to stone and river as kin. The people — the Yanuwah — did not fear the woods. But they respected it. And they never went beyond the Hollow Hill after dusk. Not even the elders. Because something had fallen there, long before even their time — not a god, not a demon, but something stranger: a dream left unfinished, still writhing beneath the earth. And its name was Kaarayael. The Dreaming Root. It whispered in the soil. ⸻ The Healer and the Flame Ishtaya was
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Six Months Later — Late Autumn in Terrell WildWood had grown still. Not silent — the birds had returned, deer moved carefully along the outer trails again — but the forest no longer watched. It no longer reached for blood or whispered in tongues older than man. The rift was gone. The old altar beneath the roots had collapsed into itself, swallowed by earth, sealed by whatever strange magic Clara had invoked. Yet something new had taken its place — a single grove of pale white trees, grown in a perfect circle, their bark smooth as bone. Locals called it the Heart Ring. No one entered it. No one even tried. Clara Moss — Caretaker Clara lived in the old ranger station now. Alone. The others had moved on. Devon, still shaken but alive, had returned to his life — a little quieter, a little less smug. Lucas had left Terrell altogether, vanishing into the city, chasing some promise of peace he hadn’t yet found. But Clara stayed. Every morning she walked the forest lin
A Night at Wildwood The hollow god
The Core of WildWood — Where the Rift Bleeds Through They stepped out of the tunnel and into a cathedral of rot. Above them, the sky was wrong — not made of clouds, but of tangled roots pulsing like muscle, and torn open to expose a void beyond comprehension. Below, the altar Emily had once bled upon now crackled with black fire. The vines had formed a crude throne where a figure sat hunched, spasming in fits of unnatural movement. Vareth’kaal. Or what remained of him. He was unraveling. Smoke bled from his seams. His limbs twitched in broken, uneven rhythms. From his chest leaked streaks of golden light, not his own, but stolen — borrowed — from Emily. Her essence. Her defiance. It was killing him. Clara gripped the bone key tighter. Lucas whispered, “Do you see that? His chest— It’s like something’s trying to burn its way out.” Devon, pale with awe, added, “It’s her. She’s still inside.” Vareth’kaal rose from his throne, taller than before — but less stable. One of his
