Mara stepped off the bus, her boots crunching on gravel as the salt-kissed wind tugged at her sleeves. The town of Hollow’s End had not changed in ten years—same crooked docks, same rusted fishing boats bobbing in the harbor, same hush that clung to the air like fog. She hadn’t returned since the day her father disappeared, his boat found empty two miles offshore, his journal missing from the lighthouse. The lighthouse. Its white tower loomed in the distance, weathered but standing, as if waiting.
The diner where she’d grown up was still run by Mrs. Voss, who served coffee black and pie warm without needing to be asked. Mara slid into a booth, her fingers tracing the chipped vinyl. “You back for good?” Mrs. Voss asked, wiping the counter with a rag that smelled of vanilla and regret.
“Just passing through,” Mara lied, though the words felt hollow. The town had a way of swallowing people whole, leaving only echoes.
That night, she stood at the edge of the cliffs, the sea roaring below. The lighthouse beam swept across the water, steady and cruel. She remembered her father’s voice, low and steady as the tides: *”The light doesn’t lie. It shows what’s there, even if you don’t want to see it.”* A gust of wind sent a seagull screeching overhead. Mara turned away, but not before catching a flicker of movement in the tower’s upper window—a flash of white, like a hand waving.
She didn’t sleep that night. At dawn, she climbed the spiral stairs, each step creaking under her weight. The air thickened as she reached the top, the scent of salt and old paper. The journal was there, open on the desk, pages fluttering as if someone had just left. Her father’s handwriting scrawled across the margins: *”They’re coming. The light isn’t enough.”* A knock echoed below—sharp, deliberate. Mara froze. The door creaked open.
“You shouldn’t be here,” a voice said. A man stood in the doorway, his face half-hidden in shadow. His eyes were the color of storm clouds. “This place isn’t safe.” He stepped closer, and Mara saw the silver chain around his neck, a locket that matched the one she’d found in her mother’s jewelry box—her mother, who’d vanished the same night as her father.
“Who are you?” she asked, though she already knew. The man didn’t answer. He just stared at the journal, then at her. “You need to leave,” he said finally. “Before it’s too late.” His footsteps echoed as he descended, leaving Mara alone with the whispers in the walls.
The next day, Mara met Jace at the docks. He was a fisherman’s son, all sunburned skin and easy smiles, but his eyes held the same weight as the man in the lighthouse. “You’re back,” he said, leaning against a crate of mackerel. “Didn’t think you’d come back after what happened.”
“What happened?” she asked, though she knew the answer.
He hesitated. “Your dad. The others. They didn’t just disappear. Something took them.” His voice dropped. “I saw it once—something in the water, moving like a shadow. It didn’t look human.”
Mara’s pulse quickened. “What do you know about the journal?”
Jace’s smile faded. “Nothing. But I know what happens to people who dig too deep.”
That night, Mara returned to the lighthouse, the journal clutched to her chest. The beam swept the cliffs, and she saw it—a figure in the distance, walking along the edge of the water. She followed, her breath shallow, until the figure turned. It was her mother, alive, her face pale as moonlight. “Mara,” she whispered. “You shouldn’t have come.”
Before Mara could respond, a sound—like a gull’s cry, but wrong, guttural. The figure vanished. Mara ran back to the lighthouse, but the door was locked. Inside, the journal lay open, the pages blank. The beam had stopped.
The town began to change. Lights flickered in empty houses. Children spoke in voices not their own. Mara searched for answers, uncovering a network of tunnels beneath the lighthouse, filled with old maps and symbols that matched the locket around the man’s neck. She learned of the Keepers—those who once protected the balance between land and sea, now gone, their duties passed to her father. But something had broken the cycle.
On the night of the storm, Mara stood at the lighthouse’s base, the wind howling around her. The sea churned, a dark mass rising from the depths. The man from the tower appeared, his face now clear—her father, older, worn. “It’s not too late,” he said. “But you have to choose.”
The storm broke as Mara climbed the stairs, the journal in hand. The light blazed again, and she saw the truth: the creature was not an enemy, but a guardian, twisted by the same force that had consumed her family. She opened the journal, her father’s final entry scrawled in desperate script: *”The light must be rekindled. Only the blood of the Keeper can restore it.”*
Mara pressed her hand to the lens, feeling the heat surge through her. The creature howled, its form dissolving into mist. The light steadied, and the storm receded. In the silence that followed, Mara knew she had made her choice—not to leave, but to stay, to become the next Keeper. The lighthouse stood tall once more, its beam cutting through the darkness, a promise that some secrets were meant to be kept.
