The Hollow pulsed beneath the floorboards.
Lyra woke with its hum vibrating in her bones—not painful, not loud, but unmistakable. A heartbeat beneath the walls. It was different from before. Not angry. Not whispering secrets. It was... waiting.
She moved quietly down the hallway, passing mirrors that no longer shimmered with other faces. Only her own reflection followed now, though she never trusted it completely. When she reached the grand stairwell, Velan was already standing there—barefoot, clothed in a robe Elias had given him, staring up at the vaulted ceiling.
"It wants a name," he said before she could speak.
Lyra stopped a few steps above him. "You said that before. Why?"
"Because to name something is to give it form. Meaning. Direction."
"And if I don't?"
Velan turned slowly. "Then it remains everything. And nothing. And it will act without understanding."
A door groaned open somewhere in the house, though no one was near it.
---
Later, over a breakfast neither of them touched, Elias opened the old ledger again. The pages felt heavier now, as if the Hollow had sunk into them. He traced a passage Lyra had missed before.
Names are seeds. To speak them aloud is to grow the shape of what's to come.
He glanced at her. "If we name it wrong…"
"I know." Lyra rubbed her hands together. "We could lose it. Or worse."
Velan sat quietly beside the window. "You already know its name."
"No," Lyra said. "I don't."
"You do," he insisted. "You've felt it. It speaks with your breath. It was never Elira's burden alone."
---
By midday, the garden had changed.
Where the cradle tree had once stood, five pale blossoms had bloomed. They bent toward the house like ears. Listening. The wind rustled with voices—none distinct, all layered like veils.
Elias stood among them, hands in his pockets, frowning. "It's starting to move again."
Lyra joined him, staring at the flowers. "Why five?"
"Maybe each is a gate. Or a voice."
"Or a warning," she said.
They didn't touch the blossoms. Not yet.
---
That evening, Lyra sat with the journals again. Elira's handwriting was chaotic in the final pages—crossed-out spells, looping sentences, half-finished thoughts:
It wants to live through me. It sings through the walls. I'm not enough to hold it. Maybe she will be.
Lyra stared at that last line.
She read it again. And again.
Then flipped back to the earlier pages—the entries before Elira had begun unraveling. She was steadier then. Thoughtful.
If it must have a name, it should be one born of both memory and grief. One that will remind it where it came from.
Lyra whispered aloud, "Memory and grief."
A rumble stirred beneath her feet.
The Hollow had heard her.
---
At midnight, the mirror in the study rippled.
Lyra stood in front of it, heart pounding. Elias and Velan were asleep—or pretending to be. She hadn't told them what she intended to try.
She placed a hand on the glass.
"I don't know what you are," she said softly. "But I know you've always been reaching. Through Elira. Through Velan. Through me."
The glass chilled under her fingers. Her reflection blinked a moment after she did.
"I won't give you a name yet. Not until I'm sure. But you'll wait. You'll listen."
The Hollow didn't speak. But the glass settled.
Stillness.
Agreement.
---
She returned to her room as dawn broke. The garden outside had grown again—vines curling higher, blossoms now glowing faintly.
A whisper rose through the roots. Not a demand this time.
Just a breath. And a word.
Soon.