The Hollow

The Thirst of the Hollow

It was a month before the first snow of the season, and the air was thick with the scent of decay. The trees of The Hollow stood bare, their skeletal branches clawing at the sky. A damp mist clung to the forest floor, and the sunlight struggled to break through the canopy above, casting everything in a muted, sickly gray.

Abby had always loved The Hollow.

As a child, she would spend hours playing at the edge of the forest, weaving between the thick trunks and listening to the stories the wind would whisper through the leaves. Her grandmother had always warned her to stay away from the deep woods, saying that the deeper you went, the older the trees became. The older the trees, the darker the things that lived there. Abby had never taken the warnings seriously-not until now.

This was her first time back since that night. The night she had felt the pull.

It started with dreams. Vivid, terrifying dreams where she would find herself in the heart of the forest, standing on an ancient stone circle, surrounded by towering trees that seemed to speak to her. Their branches would twist and move as if alive, and in those dreams, she would hear the voice-a deep, gurgling whisper that rose from the earth itself, calling her name. Abby...

The whispers grew louder with each passing night, until they felt like a presence that hovered just beyond her senses. It was as if the forest itself wanted her to return, to find what had been left behind.

So, when the opportunity presented itself-a rare moment when the sun was low and her friends were off on some other adventure-Abby decided to face whatever had been haunting her dreams.

Her feet crunched on the dry leaves as she made her way past the familiar boundary of the village and into the woods. The path, usually well-trodden, seemed unfamiliar today, as though the trees themselves had shifted since the last time she walked here. The deeper she went, the quieter it became. The air grew still, thick with an unsettling quiet.

Her mind screamed at her to turn back. Her grandmother's voice echoed in her ears, reminding her that once the Hollow called, it never let go. But Abby couldn't stop now. She had to know. What did the forest want? Why was she being pulled in?

As she walked deeper, she felt it again-the tug-a soft, almost imperceptible pull, as if something was reaching out, grabbing her by the soul and drawing her in. It was more than just a feeling; it was an instinct, an overwhelming urge to keep going.

Soon, she found herself standing in a part of the forest she didn't recognize. The trees here were taller, darker, their gnarled branches twisted into unnatural shapes, like the hands of forgotten gods. The ground was uneven, the earth soft and spongy beneath her feet. A strange, acrid scent hung in the air, a mix of mold and something far worse-decay, rot. She glanced around, but the forest was too thick, too oppressive to see much beyond the immediate space around her.

That's when she saw it.

A clearing ahead.

At first, it seemed like nothing more than a patch of open ground, but as she moved closer, Abby saw something that made her blood run cold.

In the center of the clearing, there was a massive stone altar, covered in a thin layer of moss and lichen. Its surface was smooth, almost unnaturally so, as if it had been carved by hands far more ancient than any human's. Around it, the trees bent inward in a protective circle, their branches arching above like a canopy, casting long, sinister shadows.

And there, lying on the altar, was something alive. Or at least, something that seemed alive.

At first glance, it appeared to be a pile of roots-long, knotted, and tangled together like vines. But upon closer inspection, Abby's breath hitched. The roots were moving. Twisting. Reaching.

The things on the altar were not roots at all. They were veins-pulsing, stretching, squirming like some unnatural, parasitic organism. They were alive. And they were feeding.

A low, wet sound came from the altar as Abby stepped closer. The veins writhed, pulling in and out of the stone as though they were sucking something from it, something Abby couldn't see. A voice, faint and hoarse, whispered from the altar, too low for her to understand at first.

But then the words came into focus.

"Thirst... hunger... You... must... feed..."

The voice was deep, ancient, and it felt as if it came from the very earth itself, as though the soil beneath Abby's feet was speaking to her.

Feed?

Her heart skipped a beat. The voice... it wasn't speaking to her directly. It wasn't addressing her. But it was speaking to someone.

Abby took a step back, but the ground beneath her feet felt uneven, as if the forest itself was tilting, pulling her toward the altar. The roots-or veins-quivered in anticipation, stretching toward her like tendrils seeking a connection. She recoiled instinctively, but before she could pull away, the voice grew louder, more urgent.

"Come closer..."

Her heart pounded in her chest. She wanted to run. She wanted to turn and flee, but her body refused to obey. It wasn't just fear anymore; it was something far worse, a suffocating, crushing need to listen, to understand, to obey.

With every step she took toward the altar, the trees around her seemed to close in, their branches swaying and creaking, their leaves rustling in unnatural rhythm. Abby could feel them watching her, waiting, as though they were part of some vast, hungry thing that stretched far beyond the woods.

She was close now. So close that she could see the veins more clearly, the way they pulsed, like living arteries, feeding from the stone, soaking up something from the earth itself.

"Join us..."

The voice was now a chorus, coming from all directions, filling her ears, her mind, her very soul. "Join us... Become one with the Hollow."

Without warning, the veins on the altar lashed out, wrapping around Abby's ankles, pulling her toward the stone. She screamed, trying to pull away, but the roots tightened around her, drawing her closer, dragging her towards the altar. Her legs buckled beneath her as the roots wrapped around her chest, her arms, her neck, pulling her into the gaping maw of the stone.

"The Hollow is hungry," the voice whispered. "And you will feed it. You will become part of it. You will be one with the roots. One with the hunger. Forever..."

The last thing Abby saw before the darkness closed in was the trees-their branches swaying, their leaves rustling in a rhythm she now knew was not wind. The forest was alive, and it was waiting for her.

And as the world went black, Abby understood. The Hollow didn't just feed on blood. It fed on souls. And it had claimed hers.