By SHADOW...

Elara’s memory snapped into focus. She’d dreamed of this well every night for a month before her mother disappeared for good. In the dream, voices rose from the water—not screaming, not whispering. Singing. A low, harmonic thrum that felt like being held underwater.

Her name, spoken from the water. Not a voice, exactly. More like a vibration that traveled up through the stones, into her bones.