Book Hollowed Out Novels & Stories

I was nearly finished getting Amelia ready for bed, all I needed to do was make her a bottle and than she'd be down for the night. I carry her downstairs, passed ink who was halfway through his fizzy drinks, I walk into the kitchen going to the cupboard to find we had no more formula. Than it hit me, this could be our escape plan, if I send ink to the shop's we'll finally be alone in the house to escape. I walk into the living room, where he's throwing an empty can into his bag immediately opening a second one, that cannot be good for him.

It barely cut through the thick air, but it was enough to reveal symbols—etched into every surface, moving like snakes beneath glass. Damien wiped the blood from his temple and looked around. “Where the hell are we?” “I think…” I swallowed. “We’re inside the Hollow.” Theo turned sharply. “Impossible. The Hollow is metaphysical. It’s not a place you fall into—” “Tell that to my ribs,” Damien grunted. “No,” I interrupted. “It’s not just a place. It’s a living thing. And Mira’s been feeding it.” That silenced them. I took a shaky step forward, drawn by the faint thrum in the sword. It pulsed in my hand like a heartbeat, syncing with the glow beneath our feet.

"It noticed." "What is it?" I ask. "Specifically." She is quiet for a moment — not the quiet of not knowing, but the quiet of choosing how to carry something into language. "In the old texts," she says, "it is called a Hollowing. Something that moves into a space that was designed for something else and lives there long enough to reshape itself to fit." She looks at the maps on the shelves around us. "A city without a Warden develops — a vacuum. Most things fill vacuums. This one filled the Warden-shaped space and has been performing a version of the balance. Poorly. But performing it."

By noon, the news spreads through Silverpine like wildfire: the south is breaking, and we are all the refuge left. Elowen’s voice is soft at first, but it fills the hall. The witches from the south speak not only in words but in tremors that seem to pass through every floorboard, every wary heart listening. She describes the Hollowing—a devourer, ancient and without true name or shape. It is not a demon and not a spirit, but something that eats the world’s heart quietly, leaving nothing behind. No bodies, no bones. Only the hush of something erased, the faint, acrid scent of a scorch mark in the grass, or, in the coldest dawns, a rim of white frost swirling in unnatural spirals around the ru

“Piano. Something slow. I think you played it once.” “I did. Before Eidolon, I taught for a while.” “That makes sense,” he said softly. “There’s something about your hands. Like they know both creation… and destruction.” That brought a tight laugh to my throat. “You don’t forget some things.” He didn’t answer, but when our fingers brushed as I handed him the canteen, he didn’t pull away. Small miracles. The Hollow was a concrete scar in the mountains. Once, it had relayed global signals through an array of underground servers. Now, it was dead—except for the chamber Paladin had marked in red ink. There, behind layers of steel and rock, lay a terminal unlike any I’d seen before.

Ground turned to old grey bones of the world sticking up. The Hollow wasn’t a cave. Worse. A bowl in the hills where the wind went to die. The grass lay flat and colorless, like it had given up on green. The air smelled… empty. No sap. No rot. No animal sharp. My skin crawled before we even dropped over the lip. “What happened?” I whispered. “Rovan practiced.” I wanted to leave. I didn’t. At the floor, the threads found me at once. There were so many.

I answer before she asks. My voice is low, steady. “You’re about to see where the Hollow ends.” She tilts her head slightly, the silver strands of her hair catching in the breeze. “There’s more beyond it?” I nod, gesturing ahead where the trees thin. “There’s always been more. Our homeland still exists. Our people, our kingdom. The Hollow was carved away from it—a prison sealed by mist and magic. No one comes in. No one leaves.” She frowns. “But you can see it?”

The Hollow was guiding them, aiding them as only a living place could. At the center of a clearing stood a grotesque figure—twisted branches, bleached bone, and ash formed into a towering figure. It pulsed red like a second sun, emitting waves of evil. Symbols carved into it oozed black substances, and at its base lay fragments of something that looked far too much like infant clothing. Lyra didn’t hesitate. She sprinted to it. “Wait—” Kaelen called, but it was too late. She thrust her hand into the heart of the figure.

If one of us fell, the others could pull back. The third trap was an echo. We passed a cluster of black stones, smaller than the main circle. Inside the cluster, I saw shapes. Figures. People. No. Not people. Remains. They were bodies. But not dead bodies. They were... hollow. Their eyes were open. Their mouths were open. But there was nothing behind their eyes. No soul. No spirit. Just empty shells, frozen in time. "Who are they?" I whispered.

Alejandro The forest remained unnaturally silent after the Hollow Arc withdrew. Not the silence that followed victory. The silence left behind when something ancient chose to retreat instead of continuing a battle. No birds sang. No insects stirred beneath the fallen leaves. Even the towering pines stood motionless, their branches refusing to sway as dawn slowly spilled between them. No one lowered their guard. Not after what we had witnessed. The First Hollowed knelt where the darkness had abandoned him, breathing as though every breath had to fight through centuries before reaching his lungs. The shell that had imprisoned him was still breaking apart. Thin cracks spread across the black su