Lilith didn't go home.
She couldn't.
Not after what she saw. Not after the thing that wore Lena's face tried to drag her into the dark. Her skin still felt bruised by invisible hands. Her mind still echoed with the words:
"You still owe."
So she did the only thing left to do.
She went back to the records.
The Blackwood Camp archives were buried in the town's oldest library, behind creaking doors and forgotten shelves. She had to beg the librarian to let her in.
"Those files are sealed," the woman warned. "What business does a young lady like you have with ghosts?"
"They're not ghosts," Lilith said, voice low. "They're warnings."
The files smelled like mildew and dust and secrets. Camp rosters. Photos. Incident reports.
She found her name.
Lilith Aduna ... Cabin 5
She found Lena's too.
But then she found more.
Names she didn't recognize.
Emery Clarke
Hugo Mensah
Beatrice Owusu
Children who attended that summer. Children who vanished.
Each file ended the same way:
Missing. Presumed runaway. Case closed.
But Lilith saw through the lie now. The woods never let them go. They were taken just like Lena. Just like she almost was.
As she kept reading, something caught her eye.
A folder dated twenty years before her birth.
Inside, a picture black and white, faded at the corners.
A group of kids standing in front of the same lake.
One of the names, written on the back, nearly stopped her heart.
Agatha Aduna.
Her mother.
Lilith stumbled back.
Her fingers trembled.
Her mom had been there. At Blackwood. At that same cursed place.
And she never told her.
Why?
Why would her mother keep something like this secret?
Was she protecting her?
Or hiding from something?
Lilith snapped a photo of the paper and ran out of the library. Her legs carried her faster than her mind could keep up.
The cold air hit her like truth.
Her mother knew.
Her mother was part of it.
Maybe the wish didn't start with Lilith.
Maybe it started long before.
Back home, the house was silent.
Her mom stood at the kitchen sink, back turned, hands in the water like always.
Lilith held the photo up.
"Why didn't you tell me you went to Camp Blackwood?"
Agatha froze.
Didn't turn. Didn't speak.
Just let the water run.
"I almost died," Lilith continued. "Something tried to take me. And I think it took Lena. You knew, didn't you?"
Agatha finally turned.
Her face pale. Eyes full of fear not for her daughter, but for something else.
"Lilith… they promised they'd never come for our blood again."
"They?"
"The ones in the lake. The ones in the woods. The Ancient."
Lilith stepped back, horror settling in her bones.
"You made the first deal."
Agatha's silence was the only confirmation she needed.
So now Lilith knew.
She wasn't just a girl with a haunted past.
She was part of a legacy.
A chain of broken promises. Of wishes traded for lives. Of mothers trying to protect their daughters, and failing.
But Lilith wasn't going to fail.
She would be the one to end this.
No matter what it cost...