There was only one rule in Eldhollow: Do not enter the Black Tree at the center of the forest.
No one knew who made the rule. It was older than memory, older than written record. Elders passed it on like gospel, and children grew up hearing terrifying stories about what would happen to anyone who dared disobey it. They said the tree wasn’t just old—it was alive in ways nothing should be. It whispered, it watched, and if you got too close, it might even breathe.
Of course, I never believed in any of that.
My name is Lioren. I was born and raised in Eldhollow, a village wrapped in a ring of tall woods and secrets. While others shivered at the mention of the Black Tree, I always felt… drawn to it. Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe it was arrogance. Or maybe it was that my mother disappeared when I was five years old, last seen near the forest’s edge, and no one ever talked about her again. They just looked at me with a mix of pity and fear, like I was cursed by association.
That’s probably when the thought first began to form in my head: What if the stories were wrong?
It was late autumn when I finally broke the rule. The air was crisp, the leaves crimson and gold. I was twenty, restless, and tired of living in fear of fairy tales. With only a lantern and a dagger, I left my home just before midnight and crossed the old wooden fence that marked the edge of the forbidden woods.
The forest was unnaturally silent. No chirping of crickets, no rustle of animals. Just wind and the sound of my own breath. I pushed deeper, past groves of withered birch and strange fungus that glowed faintly blue. Eventually, I saw it.
The Black Tree.
It stood like a monument, hundreds of feet tall, its bark scorched and split like old charcoal. Thick roots coiled outward like petrified serpents. The moment I laid eyes on it, I felt it—something vast and old awoke, like the forest had been holding its breath until now.
I should have turned back.
But I didn’t.
I stepped closer. The air grew warmer, thicker. I touched the bark, expecting it to be rough and dry. It was smooth. Warm. Like skin.
And then, it opened.
A crack split down the middle of the tree, revealing a hollow large enough to crawl inside. I didn't decide to enter; I was invited. The forest leaned in. My body moved on instinct, my mind buzzing like a hive of bees. I stepped inside.
Darkness swallowed me whole.
---
When I woke, I wasn’t in the tree anymore.
I stood in a vast stone chamber under a sky of shifting stars. Pillars of obsidian rose high into the dark, and a river of silver light flowed through the air like a ribbon. I was no longer holding my lantern. My dagger was gone. But I didn’t feel fear.
A voice, like the sigh of leaves in wind, echoed in the air:
"You have broken the rule."
I turned. No one was there.
"You have awakened the heart of the Hollow. What is it you seek, trespasser?"
"I… I don’t know," I admitted, the words slipping from me like truth under spell. "Maybe… the truth? About the stories. About my mother."
Silence.
Then the air shimmered, and from the silver river, a figure emerged—neither man nor woman, cloaked in bark and stars, eyes glowing like amber.
"Truth is not given. It is taken. You seek what was buried. Then walk the path of what was lost."
The chamber shifted. Floor melted into forest. I was now standing in Eldhollow—but not the one I knew. The houses were whole, freshly built, and the people walked with clothes and tools from a hundred years ago.
I was in the past.
I tried speaking to them, but they didn’t see me. I was a ghost in a memory. I wandered through this dream-Eldhollow until I found her—my mother. Young, alive, laughing with a man I didn’t recognize. She held a baby in her arms—me. My heart ached.
Then, it changed again. Screams. Fire. The Black Tree, glowing. Villagers with torches. I saw my mother running into the woods, clutching something—an amulet I wore even now. She turned back, whispered a word, and vanished into the trunk of the tree.
That’s when I understood: she hadn’t disappeared. She had gone into the tree. Like I had.
But… she never came back.
The vision shattered like glass, and I was once again inside the heart of the Black Tree.
"You now know what was lost," the voice said. "Will you bear the cost to reclaim it?"
"I will," I said, without hesitation.
The figure of bark and stars opened its hands. Between them, a pulsing sphere of memory—my mother’s essence, trapped in the Tree’s root-memory. She had not died. She had been woven into the Tree.
"To bring her back, one must take her place. The Tree must have its guardian. Its memory keeper. Its watcher."
I hesitated. One life for another. Mine for hers.
But she had given up everything for me. Now, it was my turn.
"I accept."
Light consumed me.
---
In Eldhollow, they say the forest has changed.
The Black Tree no longer looms in shadow. It stands still, but its bark glows faintly with silver, and sometimes, if you listen close, you can hear whispers—not of danger, but of dreams and lost things returned.
A woman returned to the village one dawn, confused but unharmed. She remembered nothing after stepping into the tree twenty years ago. But she looked into the eyes of her grown son and cried without knowing why.
As for me, I am the watcher now. I do not age. I do not sleep. I am part of the Tree, part of its story. And I understand the rule now—not as a threat, but as a burden. A warning.
Some truths cost more than others.
But sometimes… they are worth the price.
React
