THE COMPASS

The journal’s ink shifted again, letters forming so slowly it was agonizing.

“You will hear a voice. Do not answer it. Do not look at it!”

A pause.

“No matter what it says!!”

Ella barely had time to process the warning before the voice came.

Soft. Gentle. Definitely human.

"Ella, Mi nieta."

Her body stiffened. The voice was familiar.

"Why won’t you look at me?"

No, no, it couldn’t be. She recognized that voice—the pronunciation, the tone, the thick warmth buried in every syllable. She had grown up with it and found it comforting.

Her grandfather.

“It’s a voice in your head, it’s a voice in your head.”

She forced herself forward moving through the trees but the voice kept speaking.

“You don’t have to be afraid, sweetheart. Look at me.”

Her hands trembled as she gripped the journal and opened it. She looked at the words written just to reassure herself. Ella focused on them, mouthing the words to herself. She could feel a warm breath on her right ear speaking. She clenched her jaw and closed her eyes so tightly that white spots flared behind her eyelids.

Suddenly the voice changed, the softness disappearing replaced by something hollow, angry.

“Don’t you want to see me?  My Wild Blossom, Look at me!”

The voice was demanding now. It no longer resembled human speech.

A guttural clicking sound filled the air, something raw and unnatural, like bones knocking together. Ella could barely breathe, her chest tightening with every second. She fell down trying to gasp in the air when the voice shouted again.

“Open your eyes, Ella!!”

The ground beneath her feet felt wrong. It shifted slightly, bringing her nose closer to the ground and then back again. The voice was inches away now. The pressure in her chest became unbearable when suddenly the voice stopped.

Ella gasped, the air finally filling her lungs. She woke up and ran.

Her legs screamed in protest and her ribs seared with every step but she didn’t stop.

By now, she had learned two important things—

The whispers were not her friend.

And when the wind stopped, you ran.

The whispers behind her surged in a chorus of angry voices. The ground kept shifting beneath her, but she kept running. The path twisted and blurred, the trees warping as if the forest itself was trying to stop her. Ahead, the trees split open, revealing a break in the woods, a sliver of open space. A way out.

Ella pushed forward then the journal fluttered wildly and ink bled across the pages again.

“Turn Left. Now.”

Her stomach twisted. She should run straight, toward the clearing. Toward the light.

But then again the journal had saved her before. She had no reason to disobey so she turned left.

The moment she did, the clearing behind her vanished.

As if it had never existed.

Instead, she now stood at the entrance to something else entirely.

A massive stone monolith.

Half-buried in the earth, covered in twisting carvings—the same symbols she had seen in the journal. Ella staggered forward, her breath coming in short gasps. She had been here before when she kept circling the forest.

“Find the compass.”

“Woah, woah. Why am I here again?”

“Hello! Tom?”

The journal wasn’t responding.

“How in the hell am I supposed to find a compass here?”

Ella clamped her hands over her face, pressing her palms against her temples as if she could physically hold back the frustration threatening to consume her. A silent scream built in her throat, raw and desperate, but she didn’t let it out. Instead, she sank to her knees, her body trembling with exhaustion, her breaths ragged.

She just wanted to get out of this place but everytime she got close, the door was closed to her face. The weight of it all bore down on her, thick and suffocating, like she was trapped in a cage with no way out.

Her fingers dug into the damp earth as doubt coiled around her like a snake, whispering that maybe she had been wrong. Maybe there was no way forward. Maybe she had already lost.

She was getting close to giving up when she heard her grandfather’s voice in her head. Warm and tender, giving her clarity.

“Nature is your compass, Mi nieta.”

Ella shook off the feeling of doubt and opened her eyes, blinking rapidly as she forced herself to focus. Slowly, she got to her feet, her movements stiff and reluctant. She turned, scanning the ground around the monolith, her mind racing.

Last time she was here, she had been trapped. No way in, no way out. But the monolith was still here, the exact place. If that was so, then the fire pit from earlier with blackened circle of stones would also be where it was. There was a metal container there, maybe the compass was also there.

She remembered the way clearly so she started moving. As she passed by the trees she saw the marks that she made but had been erased earlier.

“This place is really weird.”

Ella dropped to her knees at the fire pit and her fingers clawed into the loose soil, desperate. Her breath was shallow, her heart pounding against her ribs. She dug faster, dirt pressing under her nails, frustration mounting with every handful of nothing.

"Come on, come on."

But there was nothing. No hidden trinket. No buried clue.

She exhaled sharply, forcing herself to keep looking. Crawling forward, she swept her hands over the ground, searching for anything—anything at all.

Then her fingers brushed against something solid. Metal.

The container.

She grabbed it, turning it over in her hands, willing it to hold what she needed. But it was empty. A low growl of frustration came from her mouth as she threw the container behind her. The metal made a loud sound as it fell, like a metal hitting another.

Slowly she turned and scrambled toward the spot removing the excess dirt there and unearthed an object. The object was small, round and rough beneath her fingertips. A rusted compass.

The journal’s ink shifted again.

“Follow the compass.”

Ella scoffed, shaking her head. “Oh, really? A lotta help you were.”

The compass’ glass face was cracked, the needle trembling wildly even though she wasn’t moving. How was she supposed to follow it? She tightened her fingers around it as another gust of wind swept through the clearing rattling the trees and the journal wrote again.

“ You will be tested. Follow the compass.”

“Okay! You win!”

The needle was spinning so fast it was blurring. Then suddenly it stopped, pointing directly behind her. Straight into the trees.

A part of her wanted to hesitate—to take a second and process what was happening.

But she could feel it.

The thing that had spoken to her before. The one that had tried to make her look.

It was still there. Watching. Waiting.

Clutching the journal in one hand and the compass in the other, she took a slow, deliberate step forward. Then another.

The forest swallowed her whole.

The deeper she walked, the quieter the world became. Even her own footsteps sounded muffled like she was walking through something thicker than air.

She glanced down at the compass. The needle still pointed ahead, unwavering now. As if it knew exactly where it was leading her.

She had no idea how long she had been walking when she noticed it.

A shape up ahead.

At first, it looked like just another tree. But as she drew closer, she saw a door.

An old wooden door, standing alone in the middle of the forest.

No walls. No structure.

Just a door cracked slightly open, seemingly standing on invisible air.

The compass pointed directly at it.

And then the journal’s ink shifted again.

“Enter.”

Ella’s grip tightened on the leather cover exhaling slowly.

Then, stepped through the door.