"Don't go out to the woods tonight."

Few within the Elderwilds remember where the tale began.

Only that it has always been told.

Long before the lantern paths were carved beneath the boughs, there was said to be a child who wandered into the woods after nightfall.

No one agrees why.

Some say they heard someone calling their name.

Others believe they followed a lantern that was never truly there.

A few insist the child simply stepped from the path...

...and the forest stepped back.

By dawn, the child was gone.

Search parties wandered for days, yet no footprints led away, no cries echoed through the trees, and no trace of the child was ever found.

After that night, travelers began speaking of a lone figure glimpsed between the trunks after dusk. Sometimes it stood watching from the edge of the lantern light.

Sometimes it walked just beyond sight.

Sometimes it whispered.

Those who claimed to have heard its voice all remembered something different.

A mother's gentle call.
An old friend's laughter.
The comforting voice of someone they had long believed lost.

Some turned back.
Some followed.

The oldest keepers of the Hollow Tree never argued over what became of the child.

For they believed that was the wrong question.

Instead, they would quietly ask:

"Who is calling your name tonight?"

Then they would lower their voices, tend the fire, and repeat the only part of the story that had never changed.

"Don't go out to the woods tonight."