Chapter 5: The Offering

Chapter 5: The Offering

The archway of bone-white trees was a threshold. As David and Abby passed through its grotesque frame, the world changed again. The air grew colder, and the rhythmic chanting, once a distant drone, became a palpable force that vibrated up from the soles of their feet, through their legs, and into their chests. It was a single, guttural word, repeated over and over in a language that was not human, yet its meaning was horribly, intuitively clear: appease, appease, appease.

The path before them was illuminated by the flickering orange light they had seen from the clearing. It wasn't the warm, dancing light of a bonfire. It was a sickly, unnatural phosphorescence that pulsed in time with the chant, casting long, distorted shadows that writhed like living things. Every step forward was a step taken against their will, pulled by the gravity of the ritual ahead, pushed by the mocking, sentient forest behind.

David’s hand was locked with Abby’s. Her skin was as cold as marble. He kept glancing at her, his heart a frantic hammer against his ribs. The terror in her eyes was a reflection of his own, magnified by the crushing weight of his guilt. His stupid, reckless quest for a forgotten story had led them here, to the end of a path that felt like a throat, swallowing them whole.

The path widened, and the trees fell away, revealing a vast, circular clearing. And in the clearing, they saw it all.

The entire population of Croft Pines was there, standing in a perfect, concentric circle. Men, women, children, even the shrieking old woman, Elspeth—all barefoot, their soles black with the damp, grey earth. Their heads were bowed, their bodies swaying slightly to the hypnotic rhythm of their own voices. They faced inward, their attention fixed on the source of the light and the center of their world.

In the heart of the clearing was a pit.

It was a gaping, circular maw in the earth, at least fifty feet across. It wasn't a natural sinkhole; its edges were too sharp, too deliberate, plunging down into an absolute blackness that seemed to drink the very light that emanated from it. A faint, foul-smelling vapor, glowing with that same sickly orange-yellow light, rose from its depths. The metallic, sweet scent of decay and ancient rust that had haunted them since they entered the woods poured from the hole in a nearly visible wave, thick and cloying. This was the source. The heart.

David understood with a sickening lurch of his stomach. The town, the forest, the looping reality—it was all just a shell, a scab grown over this gaping wound in the world. They were standing on the precipice of the thing from their dream.

The innkeeper, Silas, was not part of the chanting circle. He stood alone, near the pit's edge, his back to them. He was as still as the trees, a high priest waiting for the sacrifice to be brought before the altar. As if sensing their arrival, he turned.

His unblinking eyes caught the foul light from the abyss, and for a moment, they seemed to glow with it. The placid, symmetrical smile was fixed on his face, an expression of terrifying serenity.

"You were long," he said, his monotone voice cutting through the chanting without rising in volume. "It does not like to be kept waiting."

"What is this?" David demanded, his voice cracking. "What do you want from us?"

Silas took a slow step towards them, his bare feet making no sound on the spongy ground. "Want? I want nothing. But It has woken. And when It wakes, It is hungry."

He gestured with an open palm toward the remnants of their car, barely visible through the trees. "Your machine," he explained, his voice devoid of malice, as if he were a teacher explaining a simple, unavoidable truth. "The rubber on its skin. The turning and the turning… a vibration It has not felt since the world was young and hot. It is a… wrongness. An irritation. A flea on the flesh of a god. You woke it from a sleep that has kept us all safe for generations."

"We didn't know!" Abby cried, her voice thin with terror. "We'll leave! We'll never come back! We won't tell anyone!"

Silas’s smile faltered for a fraction of a second, replaced by something that looked almost like pity. "You still think you have a choice. You still think the old rules apply here." He shook his head slowly. "The world you came from is a dream this place is having. When It is hungry, It must be fed. Otherwise, Its hunger will spread. It will not just eat this valley. It will eat the roads, the cities. It will eat the memory of them. It will eat everything, until It is full enough to sleep again."

The pieces clicked into place in David's mind with the finality of a coffin lid shutting. The townspeople weren't just prisoners. They were keepers. Wardens. A cult whose only sacrament was feeding the unspeakable thing they lived on top of.

"So you feed it?" David choked out, the horror of the implication dawning. "You… you sacrifice people to it?"

"We maintain the balance," Silas corrected him gently. "We give It what It needs, so that It does not take what It wants. It is a terrible bargain, but it is the only one we have." His dark, unblinking eyes settled on them. "You disturbed the slumber. You created the debt. It is only right that you be the payment."

The world seemed to slow down. David’s mind raced, searching for an out, a deal, anything. Could they offer the car? Could they promise to bring something else? But he knew, even as the thoughts formed, that this wasn't a negotiation. It was a sentencing.

Silas gave a subtle, almost imperceptible nod towards the chanting circle.

In an instant, the chanting stopped. The abrupt silence was more terrifying than the noise had been. Two hundred heads lifted in perfect, unnatural unison. The vacant, swaying bodies became rigid. The hypnotized eyes, all reflecting the pit’s hellish light, snapped into sharp, predatory focus. And they all turned to look at David and Abby.

Before they could even scream, the townspeople moved. Not in a chaotic mob, but with a chilling, synchronized purpose. Four of the largest men broke from the circle, their bare feet pounding silently on the damp earth as they closed the distance in a matter of seconds.

"No!" David yelled, shoving Abby behind him. He threw a wild punch, connecting with a jaw that felt as solid as rock. The man didn't even grunt. He simply absorbed the blow, his eyes fixed on his task.

A powerful hand seized David’s arm, twisting it behind his back with brutal efficiency. Another man grabbed his other arm. He fought, kicking and struggling with a desperation born of pure terror, but it was useless. He was lifted off his feet, his struggles as meaningless as those of an insect in a fist.

He heard Abby scream, a raw, piercing sound of pure agony and fear that was cut short. He twisted his head just in time to see two other men dragging her, her feet scrabbling for purchase on the ground, her face a mask of disbelief and horror.

They were dragged forward, across the clearing, towards the stench and the sickly light of the waiting pit. The circle of townspeople parted to let them through, their faces grim, resolved, and utterly devoid of mercy.

David was forced to his knees at the very edge of the abyss. The foul, warm vapor washed over him, and he gagged. He could feel a low, deep vibration coming from the hole, a thrumming that resonated in his teeth and bones. It felt like a gargantuan purr.

It was hungry. And the offering had arrived. The price for their trespass was about to be paid in flesh and blood.