Exhausted, she collapsed into the sagging green velvet chair. Nine days ago, she had packed her meagre possessions and moved into the one-bedroom cottage off the beaten track. It was small, shabby even—paint peeling around the windows, the door creaking like a fox’s screech in the night. The only heat came from the open fire in the living room. Water had to be drawn from the well out back. But she loved it.
From the front windows she could see the loch, vast and glassy, mirroring the trees since the day she arrived. Each evening, she watched the sunset. Shadows stretched long and thin across the ground, caressing like a lover. The yellows deepened to flames of orange, igniting the loch in a blaze of false fire. Then came the reds, the bruised purples, until at last the hills swallowed the sun and the water lay black beneath the moon.
She loved this hour—the world silent, still. She could almost believe she was alone. Almost.
The cottage was hemmed in by old oaks, gnarled and twisted, battling for light. Each time she tried to step into the wood her feet halted at the garden’s edge, as if an invisible barrier held her back. A city girl all her life, she told herself it was only nerves, or her imagination fed by too many horror novels. She laughed aloud, the sound jarring in the stillness. Time for bed, before she invented monsters in the shadows.
Later, tucked into bed, she listened to the house creak and sigh, already finding comfort in its strangeness. She drifted to sleep with thoughts of herb borders and vegetable beds. A crow’s caw echoed in the distance, harsh and uncanny.
The next morning, she sipped coffee at the kitchen table, watching the sun erupt in pinks and oranges across the sky. Birds sang, trees swayed, the loch rippled gently. Pulling on boots and a coat, she crunched through frosted grass to a small walled patch overgrown with moss. Perfect for her herb garden. A crack in the woods drew her gaze. This time she forced her feet forward, across the threshold.
At once the light dimmed. Oaks and birches clawed at the sky, strangling the sun. The air was dense, stale, tinged with the smell of moss—and something else. Rusty. Metallic. Salty.
Her boots sank into spongy earth. A crow cawed overhead. She heard water running, then found a clearing. A fawn stood drinking from a stream. Their eyes met; then it bolted, vanishing in silence. She cursed herself for not bringing her camera. The colours were impossibly vivid, as though the whole clearing shimmered. At its centre stood a grey stone, half-swallowed by lichen. Upon it perched a massive crow, feathers gleaming with a blue sheen.
Then—nothing.
She startled awake, stiff and aching, damp on her cheek. Had she slept? The clearing looked unchanged, yet her legs felt locked in place. Panic swelled—she no longer knew which way she had come. The moss had been on the right, she told herself. Place it there again, and walk. She forced herself onward. Light brightened. The sun glared overhead. A moment ago, it had been dusk; now it was midday.
At last, she saw her boundary fence. Relief surged—until she noticed the crow waiting on a fence post. She hurled a stone. The bird screeched, wings unfurling, and lifted into the sky.
Back in the garden, she froze. The day had changed. The loch glittered with summer light, tulips and daffodils blooming on its banks. The cottage, freshly painted, gleamed. A swing swayed in the garden.
Confused, she staggered closer. The door opened. A young couple stepped out, hand in hand, oblivious until they saw her.
“Who are you?” she demanded. “What are you doing in my house?”
The man stepped forward, protective. His name was Paul, he explained gently. He and his wife had moved in two months ago. The house had been repossessed years before, after the previous owner vanished.
Her blood ran cold.
Inside, her green chair was gone, replaced by a teal sofa. The fire replaced with a flat-screen TV. She sank into the cushions, head in her hands.
When the police arrived, the officer—bearded, kind-faced—spoke patiently. She had been missing for three years. The woods had been searched. No clearing existed. No deer lived here anymore.
“That’s impossible,” she cried. “I was in the woods this morning. At the stone. By the stream.”
They only looked at her with pity.
A tapping cut through the silence. On the windowsill sat a black crow. Its eyes fixed on her. It opened its beak.
The caw split the air.
She screamed.
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