Lahat ng Kabanata ng LUNAR VEIL: Kabanata 1 - Kabanata 10

The road into Black Hollow narrowed the farther Evelyn Hart drove, until the asphalt itself seemed to hesitate, curling into the dark woods like a reluctant traveler. Towering pines pressed in from both sides, their needles whispering in the wind, and for a moment she wondered if she had taken a wrong turn somewhere past the county line. Her GPS had given up an hour ago, screen flashing with the cruel taunt: No signal.Evelyn flexed her fingers on the steering wheel, trying to ease the stiffness that had settled after four hours of driving. She wasn’t supposed to be here. She belonged in a well-lit city morgue, stainless steel tables gleaming beneath fluorescent bulbs, where science stripped mystery down to bone and tissue. Yet here she was, climbing into the mountains on a winding road that seemed determined to keep secrets.Her phone buzzed in the cupholder. She glanced down—no bars. It wasn’t a call. Just the battery notification slipping into the red. She shoved it into her bag an

Evelyn was halfway through a cup of lukewarm coffee when the knock came. Three sharp raps against the lodge door, hard enough to jolt her from her restless thoughts. She checked her watch—6:14 a.m. Too early for anything good.When she opened the door, Deputy Mark Hanley stood on the porch, his breath fogging in the chill. His boyish face was pale, his freckles stark against skin gone clammy. He held his hat in his hands like a schoolboy about to confess mischief.“Doctor Hart,” he said, voice tight. “We’ve got another one.”Evelyn set the mug aside, her stomach sinking. “Where?”“In the woods. North trail, past the old logging road. Sheriff says come quick.”She grabbed her coat and bag, her recorder already in her pocket. If there was a fresh scene, she needed to see it untouched.The forest felt colder that morning, its canopy filtering the weak sunlight into a pallid glow. Frost clung to the edges of leaves, the ground stiff under her boots. Evelyn followed Hanley up the narrow tr

The forest at night was another country.By day, Evelyn had catalogued its trees, measured its scars, tried to turn it into something rational. But under the wan glow of a waxing moon, it was a place transformed—each branch a claw, each shadow a mouth.She gripped the strap of her satchel tighter, recorder and flashlight jostling inside. The cold pressed close, her breath pluming white as she followed Jonah Blackwood along a narrow deer path. He moved with a hunter’s surety, boots silent, rifle slung easily in his grip.“You sure about this?” he asked without turning. His voice was low, swallowed quickly by the trees.“I need evidence,” Evelyn replied. “Something more than bodies on tables and claw marks in bark. I need to see it for myself.”Jonah gave a humorless grunt. “Most people who see it don’t come back.”She ignored the chill that ran through her. “You’ve seen it, then?”His silence stretched. Finally, he muttered, “I’ve seen enough.”They walked for nearly an hour, deeper in

The ride back to Black Hollow was silent.Jonah drove with both hands white-knuckled on the wheel, eyes fixed on the winding road as if the forest itself might lunge across his path. The rifle lay across his lap, barrel pointed at the floorboard, but his finger twitched near the trigger whenever shadows shifted along the roadside.Evelyn sat stiffly in the passenger seat, her satchel heavy against her hip. Inside it, the pendant seemed to radiate an unnatural chill, as though the metal carried the night’s terror with it. She hadn’t spoken since they left the clearing. Her mind was still trapped in the memory of glowing eyes, bone-shaking roars, and the way the entire forest had answered in chorus.She hadn’t told Jonah she’d taken the pendant. He had been too focused on survival, too shaken by the sounds of unseen wolves echoing through the trees. And she knew—instinctively—that he would have tried to stop her.By the time they reached town, the horizon was paling with the gray light

Evelyn ran.Branches whipped her arms, tearing skin, but she didn’t stop. Every step cracked twigs beneath her boots, the forest a blur of black and silver. She didn’t know where she was going—only away, away from the man’s voice, away from his words echoing in her skull.One of us.It couldn’t be true. She wasn’t one of them. She wasn’t a monster.Her body betrayed her with every stride. She could still hear the rabbit’s heartbeat beneath the soil, still smell the musk of the beast that had torn into her flesh. Her senses clawed at her, sharper than they had any right to be, but she shoved them aside.“This isn’t real,” she gasped, lungs burning. “None of this is real. Just shock. Trauma. That’s all.”The pendant banged against her chest with each desperate stride, heavy, mocking, glowing faintly beneath her jacket. The mark on her arm tingled, burning in rhythm with her heartbeat.The man had called it infection. She called it madness.By the time she stumbled out of the trees and o