Whispers at The Pine Hollow Lodge
Tucked deep within the thick, whispering pines of the Hollowridge Forest stood The Pine Hollow Lodge—an aging, timber-framed inn with a slanted green roof and moss-covered stone chimney. It was the kind of place you didn’t find unless you were either very lost… or very intentional.
The lodge had no official address. No website. No social media. Yet somehow, it always had just enough guests to keep its lights glowing warm through the trees.
Inside, the smell of woodsmoke and rosemary-roasted venison filled the air. The bar, a long slab of polished birch with knots still visible in the grain, was tended by a woman named Mae—gray streaks in her hair, a small scar on her chin, and a way of pouring drinks that made people talk.
Travelers, hunters, writers, and the occasional runaway all found their way to Pine Hollow Lodge. They’d stay for the food—locally caught trout, crusty sourdough, mulled wine—and often linger longer than planned, captivated by the place’s odd charm.
But there were whispers.
Locals in the nearby village of Dunn’s Bend warned of strange things in the woods: soft singing at night, lights that danced between trees, and dreams that seemed to follow you home. Some claimed the inn itself was older than the forest, that the beams inside were carved from a tree that no longer existed anywhere else on Earth.
One autumn night, as leaves rained gold and crimson outside, a storm rolled in. A stranger arrived—a woman in a soaked trench coat, carrying nothing but a journal and an old map. She didn’t give a name, only asked if Room 9 was available.
Mae’s eyes flicked up at the mention of that room, just for a moment.
Room 9 had been locked for years.
Still, she handed the stranger a brass key, and said nothing.
That night, lightning cracked the sky. The fire in the lounge dimmed, though no one touched it. And the woods outside fell deathly still.
By morning, the woman was gone.
Only her journal remained, open to a page with a charcoal drawing of the lodge—but older, rougher, with a different roof and a circle of standing stones around it. Scrawled beneath it were the words:
“This place remembers. And it waits.”
Mae closed the book. Lit a fresh candle behind the bar. And went back to pouring drinks like nothing had happened.
The regulars didn’t ask. They never did.
