There Is No Way Out. Andrew Zolt

Hopelessly, completely.

      And he couldn’t stop thinking about one thing: how to bring her back. Back to life.

      He searched the internet. He posted on esoteric forums. But none of it helped.

      Then, one morning, he found an envelope on the porch.

      It was made of parchment – triangular in shape, sealed with wax.

      It looked like something delivered from the Middle Ages by a time-traveling courier.

      Inside was a small piece of leather, and carved into it were the words: “I can solve your problem. Come tonight.”

      Below was an address in a nearby village.

      The sky above the farm was darkening with clouds. By evening, it started to rain – nearly a downpour.

      Riding his electric bike was out of the question. So he went to the barn and cranked up his grandfather’s old Dodge.

      To his surprise, it started on the first try.

      Liam drove slowly. The road hadn’t seen maintenance in years – full of potholes and rusted, half-fallen road signs pointing like dead men’s fingers into the fog.

      The house was hard to find. It had a number, but didn’t show up on any GPS map. He had to ask a few locals for directions.

      Eventually, he found it.

      It was old. Covered in weather-worn wooden planks. The windows were fogged up – he couldn’t see inside. The front door was slightly ajar. He pushed it open.

      “Hello? Anyone here?” he called out – and barely recognized his own voice.

      The inside smelled of mice, mold, and strange herbs.

      There was no chandelier. Just a single candle, flickering dimly at the far end of the room.

      “You came,” said a woman’s voice.

      She was sitting in a chair by the wall – a small, hunched figure in a shawl. A witch.

      Her face was mostly hidden, but her mouth was visible. Her lips didn’t move – yet the words echoed clearly in the room.

      “You have a tree in your yard. With faces.”

      She wasn’t asking. She knew.

      “Yes,” Liam replied.

      His eyes drifted to her hands.

      They looked like roots – thin, mottled, with fingernails far too long.

      “And you’ve fallen in love with one of the faces.”

      Liam nodded.

      The witch smiled – a soundless, reptilian grin, like snakes laughing under the floorboards.

      “That tree is an Ambrylith – the Tree of the Dead,” she said. “It grows from hidden desires buried deep in the human subconscious. From thoughts too terrifying even for dreams. It’s not a gift. It’s a mirror. It gives – but it also takes.”

      She stood up. Too fast. Like something inside her bones moved independently of her flesh.

      “You want her to wake up. To return to the land of the living?”

      “I do,” Liam said. “I love her.”

      “Fine. I’ll help you. But remember – the dead don’t return without a price. You will have to pay. Not to me. What the tree demands, I do not know. That’s for you to discover.”

      Liam agreed.

      The ritual was vile. Animal blood. A baby’s brain. His own blood. Herbs.

      She brewed it all into a potion. With the potion in hand, Liam headed home.

      It was already dark. The clouds made the night especially heavy – no moon, no stars. The rain had stopped.

      He didn’t want to wait till morning. He lit his grandfather’s old kerosene lamp, stepped outside, and walked to the tree.

      His heart was pounding.

      The lamp’s dim light danced across the faces in the leaves, making them look even more lifeless and grim.

      They swayed in the wind, whispering like a ghostly choir.

      He found her face. His girl.

      Opening the potion bottle, he poured it gently over her leaf, repeating the incantation the witch had given him.

      It contained a name. Charlotte. That was her name, when she was alive.

      Minutes passed.

      Then the leaf began to swell – stretching in all directions. Shoulders formed. Then a chest. Arms. A torso.

      She emerged fully, growing from the leaf like a figure rising from a painting.

      When Liam chanted the final words of the spell – the thirteenth repetition – her face came alive. Her eyes opened. She breathed. Her body shifted and unfolded, becoming three-dimensional.

      The tree shivered, as if exhaling.

      Charlotte stepped down to the ground.

      She stood before Liam, naked, real, alive – and unspeakably beautiful.

      They looked at each other for a long moment, unsure who should move first.

      Liam did. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly.

      She whispered softly, “Thank you… for bringing me back.”

      In the next instant, Liam’s vision darkened. He staggered, clutching his chest. His skin cracked and curled like burning paper. His veins burst.

      His flesh shriveled like a collapsing balloon. He collapsed, gasping, staring into Charlotte’s endless eyes.

      Charlotte watched him die. Without fear. Without sorrow.

      She knew. She had always known what the tree would demand in return for life.

      She could not change it. Could not stop it. Some things are simply inevitable.

      When the first sliver of sunlight appeared on the horizon, new leaves grew on the tree.

      And among them – a face. Liam’s face. Frozen in a silent scream.

      Charlotte turned and walked into the forest.

      She was starving. But the hunger wasn’t hers. It belonged to the tree.

      She knew the truth now. If she wanted to stay alive, she had to feed it. Water its roots with fresh blood. Human blood. Every full moon.

      If she didn’t – the tree would drink her dry.

      Charlotte didn’t want to kill anyone. But ending her life after escaping the void was more than she could bear.

      There was no choice. She had to begin.

      The first time was the hardest. A young traveler had lost his way. She met him on a country road at night, acting like a girl who’d lost her way too.

      He was kind. Gave her his coat, his flashlight. He laughed. Talked about cities, music, the future.

      She slit his throat with a shard of mirror while he was still smiling. He blinked rapidly, as if trying to say something. She didn’t listen, she collected his blood in a pitcher.

      The earth drank it with a hiss.

      The faces on the tree twitched – almost in pleasure. The roots pulsed. The tree swayed, like a woman in a trance. It breathed. And so did she.

      It got easier.

      Drunks on the roadside. Lonely hitchhikers.

      She took their lives. No hesitation, no mess.

      Rumors spread through the area – about a dark-eyed young witch wandering the countryside.

      But no one caught her. She left