The moment Margaret opened the book, the air seemed to shift, as though the room itself took a collective breath. She glanced down at the page, her heart beating faster, but the words were not what she expected. The ink had faded almost entirely, leaving only faint, barely perceptible marks on the page. Yet, in the midst of this faded ink, one word was clear—a name, written with a forceful hand that had not allowed time to dull its sharpness.
Alder.
The name seemed to pulse in her mind like a drumbeat, reverberating through the air around her. She looked up, her gaze snapping to the window as if expecting something to change outside. The town was as it always had been—quiet, still, the early morning sun spilling across Main Street, the soft murmur of life going on as it always did.
But something was different. Something was waiting.
Calvin leaned in, his voice almost a whisper. "Alder. That name—does it mean anything to you?"
Margaret's brow furrowed, her mind scrambling for an answer. She had lived in Alder's Grove her entire life, and the name Alder was familiar in an odd, distant way—like an old song she couldn't remember the lyrics to, but knew she had heard before. It was the name of the town, after all, and yet it felt wrong somehow, out of place in the context of this journal.
"I don't know," she said slowly, her fingers lingering over the page. "It's the name of the town, but—"
"Look further," Calvin urged, his voice tight. He was already reaching for the next page, his hands trembling slightly as he turned it.
Margaret watched as he flipped the pages, skimming through more of the faded ink. Some words were still legible, others entirely obscured by time. But there was a consistency in the language, a strange sense of continuity between them.
Then, Calvin stopped. His finger pointed to a set of words near the bottom of the page, written in bold, jagged strokes that stood out from the otherwise delicate script.
"The root of Alder. Where the roots run deep."
Margaret felt a shiver crawl down her spine. The words seemed to pull her in, tugging at something deep within her that she couldn't name. The roots. The name Alder again, but now tied to something deeper, more profound. Something buried.
"Where the roots run deep…" she murmured, more to herself than to Calvin.
He nodded slowly, his expression grim. "What if this… this book is trying to tell us something? Something about the land itself?"
Margaret's breath caught in her throat. She had never thought much of the town's origins. Alder's Grove had always seemed like any other small town—quiet, settled, its history rooted in generations of people who had come and gone. But now, standing there, with the weight of the journal in her hands and the unsettling feeling that something had been hidden in plain sight, Margaret wasn't so sure.
She had heard stories as a child, vague whispers about Alder's Grove—old folk tales, mostly. People spoke of the town's name like it was a symbol of something ancient, something unspoken. The oldest trees in the town were said to be from a time before anyone could remember, and there were always rumors about strange occurrences in the forest that bordered the town. But nothing had ever seemed more than a myth. Until now.
The book in front of her had changed everything. The connection between the town's name and the land beneath it was no coincidence. Something had been buried, something that had been kept hidden. Margaret didn't know what it was, but she knew that uncovering it was no longer a choice—it was an imperative.
"I don't like this, Calvin," Margaret admitted quietly, her voice barely audible above the hum of the shop. "This… this feels wrong. Like we're opening something that should stay closed."
Calvin gave her a long look, his eyes shadowed with something unspoken. "I don't think we can avoid it, Margaret. I think this town is… changing. And we're a part of it now."
Margaret swallowed hard, her mind racing. She had felt it, too—the subtle shift in the air, the quiet stirring of something beneath the surface of her everyday life. Something was coming. She could sense it.
"Do you think… do you think the roots have something to do with the old forest?" she asked, though the question sounded foolish even as she said it.
Calvin nodded, his gaze darkening. "The forest has always been there, right on the edge of the town. But the deeper you go into it, the stranger it gets. People stay away from the heart of it. Not because it's dangerous, necessarily. But because it feels… wrong. Like something is watching. Waiting."
Margaret closed the journal with a soft thud, her hands trembling despite herself. She knew that the town's history, the strange, almost supernatural undercurrent to its past, had always been a part of her. But now it was impossible to ignore. The stories, the whispers, the unsettled feeling she had carried for years—it was all beginning to make sense.
And then, as if drawn by some unseen force, Margaret found herself speaking the words before she could stop them.
"We have to go to the forest."
Calvin's eyes widened, a flicker of surprise crossing his face. "What? Margaret—"
"We have to go there," she repeated, her voice firm, as though something in her had suddenly taken over. "If this book is leading us somewhere, then we need to follow it. We need to find where the roots run deep."
For a long moment, Calvin said nothing. His expression shifted between disbelief and something that looked a little like fear. But finally, he nodded, his decision made.
"Alright," he said quietly. "If that's what you think we need to do, then I'll go with you."
Margaret took a deep breath, the weight of her decision settling on her chest. The forest was no place for an ordinary person, and the further they went, the more they would risk uncovering something that could change everything. But the pull of the unknown was undeniable. The roots were there, somewhere. And she had to find them.
The sun had started to set by the time they left the shop. Margaret locked the door behind her, the sound of the key turning in the lock feeling final, like a door closing on the life she had known.
Together, she and Calvin walked in silence toward the edge of town, where the dark outline of the forest loomed in the distance.
Something was waiting.