A Curse of Thornwood

Chapter 1: The Comeback For ten years, Thornwood village had stayed the same. The roads were still muddy and crooked, the air was still thick with pine and peat, and the woods still whispered secrets to anyone who dared to walk too close to their shadows. Elara Wren got out of the creaking carriage with only one trunk in her hand and the weight of a buried past pressing down on her back. The rain hung in the gray sky like an old curse that wouldn't go away. The light was already fading, even though it was only late afternoon. There was always twilight in Thornwood. The coachman didn't help her with her things. He kept his eyes down and his mouth shut, and when he said goodbye, it sounded more like a prayer than a goodbye. She didn't hold him responsible. Most people didn't come back to Thornwood after they got away. As she looked around the village square, her boots made a wet squelch when they hit the mud. There were still skinned hares hanging from rusty hooks in the butcher's window. The old well was cracked and covered in moss. A few villagers stopped to look at her, but then they quickly turned their heads. She thought, "So it starts again." The cottage at the edge of the woods waited like a tomb. The house of her grandmother. It was the last piece of her family tree, and the only place that had ever felt like home and prison at the same time. She walked past the Black Ram tavern's crooked sign. When he saw her, a man smoking a pipe on the steps stopped. His eyes got smaller. "Elara Wren?" he asked, sounding more like an accusation than a question. "I see that your memory is still as sharp as ever, Tavish." He spit to the side. "Didn't think you'd come back, not after what happened." I didn't either. She said simply, "I'm here for the cottage." "That's it." "Take what's yours and go." "Thornwood isn't nice to ghosts." She didn't say anything and walked past him. The road to Wren Cottage went around the edge of the forest, where the trees bent like twisted spines and their branches clawed at the wind. When she pushed the iron gate open, it squeaked. The nettles and brambles were choking the stone path in the garden. The house itself sagged under the weight of secrets and time. Dust ruled inside. Cobwebs hung from the rafters like funeral veils. There was old ash on the fireplace and it was cold. Even though no one had sat in her grandmother's chair in ten years, it still faced the window. Elara lit a lantern, and the flame shook in her hand. She went upstairs and saw that her old room was still the same. The bed was made, the books were still stacked up on the shelves in crooked rows, and the carved wooden wolf her father had made was still on the windowsill. She opened the window and let the wind blow in. It smelled like pine, wet dirt, and something else—something sharp and metal. Blood? A howl came from the woods. The howl was long, sad, and far away, but it didn't make her hair stand on end. Thornwood had wolves in it. Wolves have always been there. But this howl didn't sound right. Too deep. Too human. She shook and closed the window. --- Later, by the fire, she sat with a cold cup of tea and the silence of the dead all around her. She ran her fingers over the silver loop ring she wore on a chain around her neck. The runes on the ring were not clear to her. The one thing her grandmother told her to never take off was the one thing she could never take off. The wind howled again outside. Then there was another sound. More gentle. Like steps. Elara got up slowly, her instincts on edge. She walked over to the door, put her hand on the latch, and stopped. A shadow passed by the window. Something big. It has two legs. She couldn't breathe. Then it was gone. The shutters rattled like bones in a jar, and the wind was the only thing left. --- Chapter 1 is over