An attic discovery sends Jack and Emma into a strange leap through time, where the forest is unfamiliar, the air feels wrong, and someone is already watching them.
The sun was only just lifting over the little town of Feldon when Jack and Emma pushed open the narrow attic door and climbed into the dust and shadows above Emma’s parents’ old house.
The air smelled of wood, forgotten things, and rain that had never quite reached the roof. Boxes leaned against the walls, a cracked mirror caught a pale stripe of morning light, and old toys stared out from under white sheets.
"We should definitely find treasure up here," Emma whispered, grinning as she balanced her torch in one hand. "Or at least something embarrassing from my family’s past."
Jack snorted, but he kept close behind her. "I’m hoping for treasure. Less likely to be haunted."
Emma was already opening a battered trunk near the far wall. She moved aside a stack of books, then paused. "Jack," she said, her voice changing at once. "Come look at this."
Half-buried beneath a blanket was a standing clock, taller than Jack’s shoulder. It was covered in dust, but even under the grey film it looked wrong somehow, as if it had been made by someone who had never seen a normal clock before. The face was round, but the numbers around it were not just numbers. Some were dates. Some looked like years. A few were symbols Jack did not recognise at all.
Emma brushed her sleeve across the glass. The clock gave off a faint shimmer, like moonlight on water.
"That is not normal," Jack said.
"You think?" Emma leaned closer, her eyes bright now. She reached out and touched one of the strange dates at the edge of the dial.
The clock answered with a low hum.
Then the attic lurched.
Jack grabbed Emma’s arm just as the floor seemed to tilt beneath them. The books, boxes, and mirror stretched into streaks of colour. The torch slipped from Jack’s hand and vanished in a flash of white. Emma cried out, and the room spun faster and faster until even the walls disappeared.
And then, just like that, it stopped.
Jack fell to his knees in soft, wet earth. Emma landed beside him with a gasp. They were no longer in the attic.
They were in a forest so huge it seemed to go on forever, with trees rising straight up into mist as if they wanted to scratch the clouds. Thick ferns brushed Jack’s legs. Strange birds called from somewhere far above. The air smelled wild and green, and everything around them felt too still, as though the forest was holding its breath.
Emma slowly turned in a circle. "Jack," she said, very quietly, "where are we?"
Jack did not answer. He was staring at the ground.
A line of footprints crossed the mud beside them. Fresh. And whoever had made them was already coming back.