The moon hung full and round in the sky, with a silver light shimmering on the rippling surface of Hawthorne Lake. The mist had sunk low, curling over like ghostly tendrils about the dark water and along the shoreline. The world was hushed, time itself slowed to a whisper, leaving Scarlett alone with the sound of her breathing and the lapping of the water against the shore.
She did not know why she was here. Maybe it was the lake itself, the quiet darkness, and its secrets. Or perhaps it was the weight of Eliot's words—the patterns, the betrayals, the impossible truths they had uncovered. She needed to clear her head, to step away from the weight of maps and cryptic symbols and half-truths.
But as she stood there by the water's edge, she knew this was no ordinary moment.
The air here felt chilly; pine and damp earth hit her nose hard. She drew the wrap of her coat close, wanting that nervous feeling inside of her to get out. The lake had always been so mysterious, in the way it held things so sacred that kept the secret too dark for words. Even the lake breathed quietly over the absence of her father, as though even that lake waited on her unraveling the mystery.
Scarlett moved forward one step closer to the water. Her boots sank into the soft wet earth, and her heart jolted.
It was when she realized that there was movement.
Faint, a shadow really, but it was there. A figure on the far side of the lake, at the tree line.
Was someone out there?
She froze, trying to make of the silhouette. The rush of fear, her first instinct; then she reminded herself of it: it had to be something—perhaps a deer, some small creature that had wandered up close to shore. Yet still, she stared, and would not shake off the sense that she was watched.
Then the sound.
A soft splash.
Scarlett turned back to the water, her heart thudding. She could have sworn it, unmistakable-something splashing against the surface of the lake. She felt a shiver slide down her, and she stepped back at one pace.
"Hello?" she said hesitantly.
There was nothing.
She was holding her breath and straining to hear something. But there was nothing, no sound at all. The lake seemed as still as glass, its ripples catching in the moonlight full below. But then, just as she was taking another step back toward shore, she heard it again, the sound of water moving, deliberate this time.
Scarlett's hands were shaking. She needed to stand up, backpedal toward the warmth of her car, back toward the safety of her mother's house. But something rooted her to that spot.
Then she saw it: a figure breaking through the surface of the water.
It was small but unmistakable: pale skin, water running off dark hair. Scarlett breathed quickly, her body quaking.
He looked down at her and bright shining eyes in the silver moonlight.
Scarlett stepped backward, croaky words, catching half of it over the thud of her heart, she tried to speak and clear the sound, and said loudly over the thud and thud of her poor weak beat with her heart, "Who are you?"
She was so a familiar shape, a dream, half-remembered, all so achingly recognizable yet holding none of the comforts she brought.
"Scarlett,"
came a voice low and familiar yet somehow not at all of this earth.
She could hardly credit it. Her voice came out strangled in a whisper: "No. It can't be."
But the figure was coming closer yet, and in Scarlett's chest, something was tugging.
The figure spoke again; closer yet, this time on the wind itself:
"Let the shadows not win. Face the truth you must. You will know, even if you fear."
Her knees weakened at the roots. Words looked inside her to the cloudy headache; she felt herself diving for the ground.
She breathed in a whisper,
Who are you? Who's that?
The creature steadied as if to catch its breath for the right words.
"The lake remembers this. The lake has always had it. Behind the mask. Trace the threads,"
And then gone once more.
She seemed to melt away into the mist as easily as slipping beneath the surface of the lake as nothing but smoke. Scarlett found herself staring; her body still shuddering, her mind screamed in fear, then revulsion, and finally, sheer desperation.
It is deep inside, blacker, chilly water, which keeps its thoughts to itself. She listened therefore the lapping waters against the shore, it was as slow and melodic and even more hostile than she had thought.
She attempted to convince hherselfofthatt was an illusion, the trick of brightness and obscurity. However, not her heart.
The figure was a real,
cryptical voice. Well, now these two entities had spoken about her.
Scarlett gulped in a jerky breath, trying to pull herself together, but her mind was spinning. What was it? What truth did she need to face?
The words danced in her head as she turned away from the shore, mist swallowing the lake behind her.
"Follow the threads," she said aloud.
But how?
Her chest hurt as she climbed up towards the road toward her car. The moon still hung in the sky, casting its weak light on the mist and the trees. The wind talked through the pines and Scarlett knew one thing: she could not ignore it.
The lake had shown her the truth, though it was veiled in darkness.
And now, she needed to find out how to untangle it.