The village of Rookport sat like a forgotten relic at the edge of the world. Its weather-beaten houses creaked against the constant howl of the ocean winds, and its cobblestone streets were slick with the eternal mist that hung low over the shoreline. The salt air clung to everything, from the tattered clothes of the villagers to the faded paint on the doors. Rookport wasn't a place that anyone visited willingly. It was a place people drifted into and left only when they had no other choice.
For sixteen-year-old Elias, Rookport was the only place left to call home.
He stood at the window of his small, damp room, staring out at the endless expanse of gray sea. The waves, always tumultuous, beat against the rocks as if they had something to say, something urgent, but they never did. Not in any way Elias could understand. He wasn't sure when the place had started feeling so wrong, so suffocating. It wasn't just the perpetual fog or the chill that settled deep into his bones. It was something else. Something worse.
It had been three months since his parents had disappeared. No one in the village seemed to know where they had gone, or if they even existed. The only thing anyone could tell him was that they had left in the dead of night. Without a word. Without a trace. And no one seemed to care.
At least no one was willing to say they did.
Elias had spent countless nights at the docks, staring into the darkness, hoping for some sign. A ship to return. A body to wash ashore. But nothing ever came. The ocean was an empty graveyard, holding its secrets in the deep. And in the silence, Elias could hear the whispers. Low, almost inaudible, but unmistakable.
Sometimes, they came from the ocean itself.
Other times, they came from his dreams.
He tried not to think about them. The dreams that always ended the same way. His parents, standing just beyond reach, their faces obscured by shadow. They would call to him, but their voices were wrong. Hollow. Distant. Their words were twisted, like something from a nightmare. And when he tried to run to them, to hold onto them, the ground would shift beneath his feet, and he would fall. He always fell.
The fall was the worst part.
He had been to the town's library more times than he cared to admit, searching for anything that might explain what happened. The old librarian, Mrs. Crowley, had been no help. She muttered something once about "the old stories" but quickly shushed him when he pressed for more. She wasn't the only one who avoided the past. Most people in Rookport preferred to forget.
Elias was different. He wasn't going to let them all lie to him, especially when something in his gut told him that the answers were buried here, in this place. The truth was hidden beneath layers of lies, and he would peel them back one by one if he had to.
It was early evening when Elias first saw it—a flash of light from the cliffs. He had been walking the old path that ran parallel to the shore, a place he'd gone countless times before, but tonight something felt different. The light flickered, like a lantern in the distance, casting long shadows over the jagged rocks. It was too far away to be anyone from the village, but it was there, unmistakably there.
He stopped, heart pounding in his chest, and then—before he could decide whether to approach or turn back—there came the sound.
A voice. Low, almost drowned out by the wind, but distinct enough to make his skin crawl.
"Come closer, Elias..."
He froze.
The voice sounded like his mother's. His father's. A mixture of both. But the words, the way they hung in the air, weren't their own.
They were a command.
And with the voice came the unmistakable feeling of something... wrong. Like the air itself had shifted, and now something was waiting for him, just beyond the horizon.
He wanted to run. To turn away and forget what he had heard. But his feet wouldn't move. Something was pulling him forward, urging him toward the cliffs, toward that flickering light.
The whispers in the back of his mind grew louder. Closer.
Come closer…
He stepped forward.