Chapter 13 - The Violet Spark
Six months passed since the horrific night at Blackwood Ridge.
Rachel and Madison had moved into a smaller, cozier apartment in a different suburb, desperately trying to build a normal life.
Madison had returned to school and seemed to have completely recovered, no longer speaking of her father or the shadow monsters.
But one cloudy afternoon, while cleaning under Madison’s bed, Rachel found something that made her blood run entirely cold.
It was a thick stack of drawing paper.
Rachel pulled it out with trembling hands, praying she was just being paranoid.
Unlike the aggressive, black crayon scribbles from the hospital, these drawings were highly detailed and deliberate.
Madison had drawn the tall shadow figures lingering around their new neighborhood, hiding behind streetlamps and oak trees.
But the most terrifying detail was the color she had chosen to outline them.
Every single figure was drawn with a vibrant, glowing violet crayon.
It was the exact same color of the impossible light that had pulsed through Thomas’s veins before he died.
"Madison!" Rachel called out, her voice cracking with pure panic.
The eight-year-old walked into the room, her calm blue eyes meeting her mother's terrified gaze.
"Why are you drawing these things again? I thought they were gone," Rachel pleaded, holding up the papers.
Madison tilted her head, a gesture that looked far too old and detached for a child.
"They don't hurt me, Mommy," Madison replied in a flat, monotone voice.
"They are just watching me."
"Daddy left a little piece of his light inside me to keep me safe, but the light... it's like a lighthouse."
Rachel backed away, feeling the air completely leave her lungs.
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The entities hadn't been destroyed at the cabin.
They were just waiting, and her daughter was the beacon calling them back from the void.
