Before the Shadows

<p>Alder Glen is a town shaped by secrets where the pine trees never move quite the way they should and the night carries more than simple darkness. Evan Miller never believed the stories whispered through Shadowood Forest. He grew up hearing old poems family warnings and strange superstitions from a grandfather who seemed to drift further from reality each year yet he always assumed they were nothing more than the remnants of an overactive imagination.</p><p></p><p>When tragedy fractures the life he once knew Evan is pulled into a legacy he never asked to inherit. A hidden amulet emerges from the ruins of his past. A presence stirs within the trees and begins to take shape. The Huntress watches from the shadows patient and relentless and the forest seems to recognize him in a way that feels unsettlingly intimate.</p><p></p><p>Evan's search for answers leads him through the weight of grief the unraveling of long buried family history and the quiet spark growing between him and Riley a boy whose gentle presence reveals truths Evan has avoided for too long. As his sense of reality begins to distort he must decide whether the danger is coming from the world around him or from something rising within him.</p><p></p><p><strong>Before the Shadows</strong> serves as a prequel and sequel to <em>The Shadows Within</em>. It unfolds slightly before that story begins crosses through the same timeline and continues the narrative beyond it. Although connected to the larger world of Evergreen Falls and Shadowood Forest it can be read independently without any knowledge of <em>The Shadows Within</em>.</p><p></p><p>This novel blends psychological horror with queer identity memory distortion small town dread and the fear of losing oneself to forces that feel both familiar and ancient. In a place where perception bends and the past refuses to stay silent Evan must face truths that have followed his family for generations and decide who he will become once the shadows finally close in.</p>