“The Bell at Hollow Lake”

🕯️Episode 4: The Hollow Below

The trapdoor groaned as Lena pulled it open fully. Dust and damp rot curled up from the opening, wrapping around her like the breath of a long-dead thing.

She held the flashlight tight in one hand, a kitchen knife in the other. It was pathetic protection, but it made her feel less alone.

The stairs were steep, ancient. Carved into stone. As if the foundation predated the cabin itself. She didn’t remember them being in the blueprints. Or had she ever really looked?

Halfway down, the air grew colder, the scent sharper—metallic. Like blood.

Her foot hit standing water with a soft splash.

Beneath the house, the cellar opened into a chamber that should not have existed.

Its walls were covered in warped wooden panels, each etched with symbols she didn’t recognize: eyes, circles, jagged spirals. The carvings bled into one another like a language made of pain.

And in the center?

A mirror. An older one.

Or maybe it was the same.

Its frame was scorched black, like it had been dragged out of a fire.

The surface rippled—not reflecting her, but pulling her image inward, like a whirlpool of silver.

She stepped closer.

The moment her shoe touched the base of the frame, the water on the floor shifted. A ripple spread, and Lena felt something brush against her ankle.

She gasped and stumbled back.

Hands.

Pale hands reaching from the water.

But they vanished the moment she turned the flashlight on them.

A Voice from the Mirror

Then, it spoke. Her reflection.

Not just her face, but her entire self stepped forward inside the mirror, moving independently, like watching someone perform a dance she used to know.

“You should not have come down here,” the reflection whispered.

Lena’s throat was dry. “Who are you?”

“You, of course,” it answered, tilting its head with a smile. “The real you. The part you buried. The part you forgot. I’ve been waiting.”

The cellar shook as if something massive had shifted below. The symbols on the wall pulsed faintly.

“You’re not real.”

The reflection grinned wider. “Neither are you. Not entirely. Not anymore.”

The Past Returns

Lena fled the cellar. Upstairs, the house had changed.

The mirror in the living room was gone.

In its place: a framed photograph of her and Thomas—her ex-husband. Smiling. Arm in arm. But she had burned every photo of him a year ago. She was sure of it.

Her heart slammed in her chest. She rushed to the bedroom. On the dresser sat his watch. The one he’d lost the night he disappeared.

She hadn’t spoken of it—not to anyone.

Thomas had left one night after an argument and never came back. Or that’s what she told people.

But now…

The phone rang.

An old rotary that hadn’t worked in years.

She picked it up.

“Lena?” The voice was soft. Familiar. Drenched in static.

Her breath caught. “Thomas?”

“Why did you let her in?”

The line went dead.

The Neighbor’s Warning

Lena ran out into the fog. She didn’t care about the cold. She sprinted toward the only other house in sight—Agatha’s. The old woman had lived in Mare’s Hollow longer than anyone.

Agatha answered with a loaded shotgun pointed at Lena’s face.

“Get off my property.”

Lena sobbed. “Please, I need help.”

“You brought it back,” Agatha hissed. “That mirror. That thing. I told them to bury it deep. But no—Holloway’s blood always comes back.”

“What?”

“You’re her kin. Ilsa Holloway. Don’t you know your own name, girl?”

Lena staggered back.

“Your mother died in that cabin, didn’t she?” Agatha added coldly. “Told you she saw herself outside the mirror. So she took out her eyes.”

Lena fell to her knees, memories breaking loose like shattered glass.

The locked bedroom door.

The blood in the sink.

The mirror that had vanished before the police arrived.

She had forgotten. Or repressed it.

But the truth was clawing its way back.

The Storm Breaks

Thunder cracked overhead.

Lena raced back to the cabin—but found it changed again.

Its walls were warped. The ceiling dripped with black liquid. Photographs on the mantle now showed two Lenas in each frame—one always slightly out of focus, slightly wrong.

Every mirror in the house was uncovered.

She smashed them all.

But their shards still showed movement.

In every reflection, her double stood behind her. Watching. Waiting.

And always smiling.

The Final Room

She turned the corner toward the bedroom—and found the door ajar.

It was dark inside.

The air still.

Then came the voice.

“Come home, Lena.”

From inside the mirror, her reflection stepped forward.

But not just a reflection anymore. It crawled out—its skin too pale, eyes too wide, mouth grinning with teeth that were too many and too sharp.

Lena backed away as her double emerged fully into the room, dripping wet from the world behind the glass.

“You left me,” the reflection hissed. “You got to live. I waited in the dark.”

“No—” Lena tried to run, but the door slammed shut.

Water pooled beneath her feet. Her knees hit the floor as fingers clutched her ankle, pulling her down.

“Give me your life,” the voice whispered. “Or I’ll take it.”

To Be Continued…

💀 Next Time on "The Reflection":

Lena must confront what lies beyond the mirror. A place not meant for the living. But when your soul is fractured, which part gets to return?