Chapter 1: Six Miles In

Chapter 1: Six Miles In

The air, thick and humid, tasted of damp earth and decaying leaves. Every breath Liam Carter took was a conscious effort, a heavy weight in his lungs that had nothing to do with the miles they’d hiked.

“Six miles in,” Greg Miller announced, his voice booming with unearned confidence as he slapped a compass against a creased, sweat-stained map. “No trails, no rangers, no phone signal. This, my friend, is what you call freedom.”

Liam leaned against the rough bark of an ancient oak, trying to catch his breath without looking as pathetic as he felt. He offered a weak smile. “Or what you call being completely, utterly lost.”

“Lost is a state of mind,” Greg shot back, grinning. He was the picture of an outdoor adventurer, ripped from a magazine cover: tanned skin, easy smile, and an energy that seemed to defy the oppressive stillness of the Appalachian forest. He was the sun; Liam was the shadow trailing behind. “We’re exactly where we need to be.”

Liam wasn’t so sure. The woods here felt different. Back on the marked trails, the forest was a welcoming thing, a symphony of birdsong and rustling squirrels. But here, six miles deep into a patch of state land locals quietly called the ‘Hush,’ the symphony had died. The canopy was so dense it choked the afternoon sun, casting the forest floor in a perpetual twilight. The only sound was their own ragged breathing and the crunch of their boots on the leaf litter. It was a silence that felt less like peace and more like a held breath.

Their shared desire had been simple: one last trip before their final year of college swallowed them whole. One last taste of real wilderness before dissertations and job applications became their entire world. It was Greg’s idea, of course. It always was. He’d found the spot on some obscure hiking forum, a place promising true isolation. He’d gotten exactly what he wanted.

They made camp in a small clearing bisected by a sluggish, tea-colored creek. As Greg expertly hammered in the tent stakes, Liam gathered firewood, his eyes constantly scanning the wall of trees that pressed in on them from all sides. He couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched. It was a primal prickle on the back of his neck, the kind that made the hair on his arms stand up. He dismissed it as city-boy paranoia. The woods were full of animals. That’s all it was.

By the time the fire was crackling, casting dancing shadows that made the trees look like skeletal giants, a fragile sense of normalcy had returned. They ate rehydrated chili straight from the bag and passed a flask of cheap whiskey back and forth.

“To our last stand,” Greg toasted, raising the flask. “Before we become respectable members of society.”

Liam took a swig, the whiskey burning a welcome trail down his throat. “I don’t think ‘respectable’ is in your vocabulary, man.”

“Details, details.” Greg laughed, his face illuminated by the orange glow of the flames. “Next year, you’ll be buried in historical archives, and I’ll be… well, I’ll be figuring it out. But this? This is what matters. No concrete, no deadlines. Just us and the trees.”

Liam nodded, wanting to believe it, wanting to share his friend’s infectious optimism. But as the night deepened, so did the oppressive silence. The usual chorus of crickets and frogs was eerily absent. The fire spit and hissed, its sound swallowed by the vast, quiet dark.

Later, huddled in his sleeping bag, Liam listened to Greg’s soft, even snores. Sleep, however, refused to come. A full bladder finally forced him out of the relative safety of the tent. He fumbled for his boots, unzipped the flap as quietly as he could, and stepped out into the chill night air.

The fire had burned down to a bed of glowing embers, painting the clearing in a dull, hellish red. The moon was a sliver, offering no real light. Liam walked to the edge of the creek, the quiet gurgle of the water the only thing breaking the profound stillness.

And then he saw it.

Across the creek, standing at the edge of the tree line, was a figure.

It was tall and impossibly thin, draped in what looked like dark, heavy robes. It was utterly motionless, a column of shadow against the deeper shadows of the forest. There was no face visible, just a void where one should be. Liam’s heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drum in the silent woods. He froze, one hand half-raised, his breath caught in his throat.

He waited for it to move, to reveal itself as a trick of the light, a strangely shaped tree stump his tired mind had warped into a nightmare. But it didn’t move. It just stood there, watching. He felt its gaze like a physical weight, a cold pressure against his skin. A silent, unwavering scrutiny.

Panic, cold and sharp, seized him. He scrambled backward, tripping over a root and landing hard on the damp ground. When he looked up again, his heart pounding in his ears, it was gone. The space where it had stood was just an empty patch of darkness.

He scrambled back into the tent, zipping it shut with trembling hands. He lay in his sleeping bag, his body rigid, every muscle coiled tight. He should wake Greg. He should tell him what he saw. But what would he say? I saw a spooky ghost in the woods? Greg would laugh it off, call him a wimp. And what if it was just his imagination? A waking dream brought on by whiskey and exhaustion?

Rationality warred with terror. He clung to the logical explanation. It was a hallucination. A trick of the light on a dead tree. It had to be. He forced his eyes shut, repeating the mantra in his head until the sheer emotional exhaustion finally dragged him into a shallow, restless sleep.

When Liam woke, the morning light was a weak, gray filter through the tent’s fabric. Greg was still asleep. The memory of the figure came rushing back, and he felt a flush of foolishness. A bad dream. He’d let the creepy woods get to him.

He unzipped the tent, a self-deprecating laugh ready on his lips, and stepped outside. The laugh died in his throat.

The air was cold, but that wasn’t what made him shiver. A profound wrongness had descended upon their campsite. Dotted around their tent, arranged in a perfect, deliberate circle, were three macabre totems.

They were crude things, fashioned from stripped branches and bound with what looked like sinew. Dangling from the cross-pieces were bundles of black feathers, yellowed animal teeth, and small, polished stones that glinted dully in the dim light. They hadn’t been there last night. He would have seen them. He would have tripped over them.

His gaze swept the clearing, his blood turning to ice. Then he saw it, near the embers of their dead fire.

A young doe lay on its side, its throat cut with brutal precision. Its dark, glassy eyes stared into nothing. But that wasn’t the worst part. Its stomach had been sliced open, and its entrails had been carefully pulled out and coiled in a neat, ritualistic spiral on the ground beside it. The body was still warm; steam rose faintly from the wound in the chill morning air.

This was no bear attack. This was no dream. This was a message.

Liam stared at the gruesome tableau—the silent totems, the sacrificed deer, the unnatural neatness of the violence. The words of the old man at the gas station twenty miles back echoed in his mind, words Greg had laughed off. “Some places, son, ain’t meant for walking in. Some things are best left alone.”

He stumbled back a step, a strangled cry escaping his lips. He finally understood. The silent figure hadn’t been a dream.

It had been a warning. And they hadn’t listened.