The Watchers in the Trees (en Inglés) - Matthew Petchinsky

Something is watching Briar Hollow.

When strange reports begin circulating about figures standing silently in the pine forests outside town, Rowan and Maeve assume it's another rumor born from fear and darkness. But when thermal imaging reveals impossible shapes between the trees-forms that distort gravity and mimic human bodies-they realize the woods are no longer empty.

The figures are not animals.

They are not ghosts.

They are scouts.

As the nights grow heavier and the forest itself begins to bend under strange forces, Rowan confronts one of the creatures at the tree line and discovers a horrifying truth: the watchers are learning how to exist in our world by inhabiting human bodies. Missing townspeople are being used as living conduits while something vast and ancient builds stable ground beneath the forest.

When one of the creatures collapses into black particulate dust and is absorbed by another, the surviving entity grows stronger-and closer.

But the true terror lies above the trees.

Massive antler-shaped shadows begin sliding across the canopy at night, signaling the arrival of something far larger than the scouts.

The invasion has already begun.

And Briar Hollow is only the first doorway.