A Verdant Glimpse

I woke to silence.

Not the kind I knew from sleepless nights or empty halls, but something heavier. Denser. It pressed down on my chest like a weight I couldn't lift. I blinked into the dark, trying to remember where I was.

Stone. Moss. Vines clinging to half-buried walls.

The ruin.

I was still inside it. Still alive.

Barely.

My body ached. My right leg throbbed with every pulse of blood, and my ribs felt like they'd been cracked apart and badly stitched back together. My mouth was dry. My head was fog. Every breath scraped my throat.

I sat up slowly, a groan escaping my lips. My fingers found the wall beside me for balance. The stone was damp, slick with lichen… but warmer than it should have been. Or maybe my hands were cold.

I held still.

There. Movement. Just outside.

A shuffle. Then another.

I stopped breathing.

Not leaves. Not wind. Footsteps.

It had followed me.

My hand slipped to my belt. The knife was still there, but useless. I didn't stand a chance against that thing with a blade meant for skinning rabbits. 

Only the stick Eian gave me remained, still tucked safely inside my cloak, as if it had never left my side.

The sound came again. Closer.

I pulled myself upright, wincing as pain lanced through my leg. My back scraped against the stone. The vines brushed my shoulder.

They twitched.

I froze. Did I imagine that?

I reached out, my palm grazing the wall again. There was a vibration—soft, low, like a hum at the edge of hearing. I jerked my hand back, heart pounding.

What is this place?

Another step outside. Heavier this time. Something breathing. Snuffling the air.

My panic surged.

What if it had caught my scent?

What if it was inside already?

I pressed myself deeper into the ruin. The corridor narrowed, turning sharply. Crumbling archways loomed over me like jaws. The walls curved inward, the ceiling drooping with roots and broken stone.

I limped forward, every step a new wave of pain. But I didn't stop.

Something was wrong. Everything was wrong.

The pulses under my skin came faster now, like they were answering something. I shook my head. "Stop," I whispered to no one. "Get out of my head."

The air grew colder. Or maybe it wasn't cold at all, just still. The kind of stillness that warned you not to breathe too loud.

I heard the sound again.

Sniffing.

It was inside.

The monster was in the ruin with me.

I gripped the stick tighter, even though it had no magic. My breaths came too fast. I didn't have the strength to run again. I barely had the strength to stand.

I was trapped.

And I knew whatever was coming…

It was close.

Very close. Oh Gods, no.

The screech tore through the ruin like a blade through bone.

I froze.

It was here.

The same sound I'd heard in the woods now echoed off the stone walls. Closer this time. Inside.

No.

No, no, no.

I stumbled back from the crumbled doorway, nearly tripping on a root. My breath turned shallow. My leg throbbed where I'd slammed it during the fall, and every step sent sharp pain up to my hip. The stone walls around me felt like they were tightening.

Something crashed in the outer corridor, a heavy, dragging gait, like claws against ancient tile. The ruin trembled with each step.

It followed me.

I'd left blood. Tracks. Or maybe it just knew.

I turned and limped deeper into the ruin. Through a shattered archway, across a floor scattered with debris. Every breath burned. My hands found a half-fallen pillar. I leaned against it, heart hammering, trying to see where the hall ended. There was no light now. Just moon-gray shadows and my pulse pounding in my ears.

Another screech. Louder.

It was hunting me.

I pressed myself against the wall, half-crouched behind a mossy slab. Eian's wand was still clutched in my fingers, a crooked stick, a child's toy. Useless. My hand trembled so hard it barely felt real.

My thoughts raced as I realized there was nothing I could do. I had no sword. No spell. No way out.

I could hear it breathing now, a guttural hiss, uneven and wet. The sound of something wrong in its making. Wood cracked under its weight. Stone shattered. It didn't move like anything natural. Too fast. Too heavy.

I held my breath. My lips moved without sound.

Please. Not like this.

A shape passed the arch. Massive. Twisted. Limbs that bent the wrong way. A single eye gleamed in the dark, pale and clouded like rot.

It stopped.

Sniffed.

Turned.

It saw me.

For half a second, we stared at each other.

Then it screamed and lunged.

I stumbled back, my heel catching on the uneven floor. I barely got my arms up. The wand shook in my grip. I screamed. Terror. Rage. Desperation. My back hit the wall.

There was nowhere else to go.

It was over.

Its claws came down, a blur of hunger and death.

"No—!" I screamed.

I didn't know if it was a word or just noise. I raised the crooked wand like it could do something, anything. My whole body braced for pain, for death, for teeth.

I don't want to die.

Not like this. Not in the dark. Not alone.

Something snapped.

Or opened.

The air shifted.

The ruin pulsed.

A faint light flickered beneath my feet like green threads glowing under the stone. Then the vines on the walls twitched. Moss trembled. Dust lifted from the floor as if something had taken a breath.

I stared, confused, terrified. My hand still raised. The wand shaking.

The monster leapt.

It never reached me.

The ground exploded.

Roots burst from the floor in a violent, bone-snapping crack. Thick, thorned, and fast as whips. Vines erupted from the walls, from the ceiling, the stone itself. They moved like they had will, weaving in blinding arcs of emerald light.

The creature screamed. A sound twisted with pain and fury.

It thrashed in the air, limbs caught mid-lunge. Roots coiled around its arms, its neck, its back legs. Bark and green fire surged through the ruin like a storm, wrapping the beast in living chains.

I couldn't move.

Couldn't breathe.

The whole world had gone white-green. Light streamed from the floor in glowing threads, tracing along the walls, through cracks in the stone, across every surface like veins of raw energy. They pulsed in time with something I felt in my chest, like a second heartbeat, not mine.

The creature wailed. Then it was slammed against the far wall, wrapped in roots so tight they cracked bone. It writhed once, twice, and then stilled.

Silence.

A haze of light hung in the air, slowly fading.

The vines loosened. Not all at once, but like they were calming. Breathing. Settling back into stillness.

My hand dropped.

Eian's wand slipped from my fingers.

I fell to my knees, gasping, heart still racing like it hadn't caught up with what just happened.

What was that?

My fingers shook. I looked down.

The vines on the floor curled around my legs, not tight, not trapping. Like they were holding me. Protecting me.

They glowed faintly at the edges. So did my skin.

I looked at my palms. Thin green light laced along the lines, pulsing gently. The moss near me quivered when I breathed. The stones beneath me hummed.

The vines around my legs began to slacken.

Slowly. Hesitantly. As if making sure I wasn't still in danger.

I stared at them, too shaken to move. They uncurled from my boots like fingers letting go, slipping back into the stone, into the moss and rootwork below as if they had never moved at all. 

What just happened?

I should've stopped. I should've questioned it. But my body was already moving.

I scrambled to my feet, still trembling, still gasping. Pain surged through my leg, but I didn't care. I could think later. I could fall apart later.

I snatched Eian's wand from the ground where I'd dropped it. The little crooked stick was scratched now, dirt-smudged, but whole. I gripped it tight in one hand, tighter than before. Like it was my tether to something real.

And then I ran.