Chapter 4: The Shattered Mirror

The growls grew louder, vibrating through the cave walls like the forest's own heartbeat, while the echoes in Elara's mind screamed for her to run. The sound wasn't the rhythmic panting of a wolf or the heavy rasp of a bear; it was the sound of grinding stones, of dry earth cracking under a summer drought. 

"Stay behind me," Thorne hissed. He was pressed against the damp limestone of the cave entrance, his hand white-knuckled around the hilt of his short sword. His shoulder was bandaged in linen that was starting to bloom with fresh red, yet his stance remained wide and stubborn. "When I move, you bolt for the treeline. Don't look back for me, Elara. Just get to the hollow oak."

Elara didn't move. She couldn’t. Her boots felt rooted into the silt of the cave floor. In her mind, the whispers were no longer a disorganized choir. They had sharpened into a single, piercing needle of sound. *Shadow-weaver. Breath-stealer. The one who forgot the light.*

"It’s not just a beast, Thorne," Elara whispered. Her voice felt thin, like parchment paper. "The echoes… they’re terrified. They’re saying it’s 'forgotten.'"

Thorne glanced back at her, his hazel eyes hard and flickering with a frantic kind of pragmatism. "I don’t care if it’s the ghost of the Great Oak itself. It’s got teeth, and it’s between us and the path. Now, on three—"

"Wait!" Elara reached out, catching the rough leather of his bracer. Use your eyes, she told herself. See what the echoes see. 

Outside the cave mouth, the twilight of the forest had curdled. A silhouette stood amidst the ferns, but it didn't block the light; it seemed to consume it. It was roughly the size of a stag, but its limbs were too long, moving with a disjointed, twitchy gait