Ashen walked with the villagers until the road thinned into crooked stones. The festival chatter had long since fallen behind, leaving only the crunch of boots and the sharp hiss of the evening wind. He kept the notebook pressed under his arm, though he hadn’t written since last night.

Marrec broke the silence first. “You didn’t say much when they spoke of the fog. Not like you.”

Ashen lifted his eyes. “Because I don’t know if they’re telling a story… or confessing something real.”

“Fog that eats people,” Marrec muttered. “Sounds like something old wives talk about to scare children.”

Ashen’s lips curved, not quite a smile. “And what if it isn’t?”

For a moment, there was nothing but the echo of crows overhead. Marrec stared at him, as if searching for a jest, but Ashen’s gaze stayed steady.

Behind them, Talia kicked at a loose stone. Her voice was soft, almost unwilling. “I… I don’t like how it sounds. If people vanish, why doesn’t anyone leave this place?”

Ashen turned to her. She had her hands buried deep in her sleeves, shoulders tight. Fear lived in the corners of her eyes.

“Because leaving isn’t simple,” Ashen said quietly. “Home binds tighter than rope. Even when danger walks its halls.”

Her brow furrowed. “You sound as if you’ve lived that.”

Ashen hesitated, the words heavy in his chest. He almost told her of his village, of smoke rising where houses once stood, but he closed his mouth instead. Some memories had teeth.

The path bent, revealing the outline of the old watchtower that loomed over the marshland. Its stones were broken in places, vines wrapping the crumbled edges like veins. A cold draft carried from within, the kind of air that felt older than it should be.

Talia stopped walking. “We’re… going in there?”

Marrec tried to sound brave. “It’s just a ruin.”

But Ashen felt the shift in the air. A silence too thick. He rested a hand over the worn cover of his notebook, the habit of a man who reached for words when steel wouldn’t serve.

“Stay close,” he said, voice firmer than he meant.

They stepped inside. The tower’s hollow throat swallowed their footsteps. Dust clung to every breath, and something faint scratched along the stone as though it moved just beyond the edge of light.

Talia’s hand brushed his sleeve. Not on purpose, but it stayed there a heartbeat longer than needed. Ashen didn’t pull away.

He thought of the villagers’ voices the night before, whispering about the fog. And for the first time since arriving in this place, he wondered if he had stepped into a story he wasn’t meant to tell.