The lingering chill of a winter night clung to Natasha's room as she awoke with a jolt, the phantom sensation of terror still clutching her. Her sheets, soaked with a cold sweat, twisted around her legs. Another nightmare. This one, unlike the others, had felt unnervingly real.

A shiver traced a path down her spine, a lingering echo of the dream's intensity. Frustration, hot and prickly, bubbled within her. She tossed the blanket aside, the oppressive weight of the forgotten horror clinging to her. An overwhelming urge to write, to capture the dissolving fragments, pulled her from the bed.

The floorboards groaned beneath her trembling feet as she crossed to her desk, rummaging frantically for a pen and paper. Her mom had insisted she record her nightmares, but the journal felt like a childish relic, forgotten amidst school binders.

Outside, the half-moon cast a weak, silvery glow over the frosted world, painting the bare branches of the Garry Oak tree in stark relief against the inky sky. A soft scratch at her door, followed by a low whimper, startled her. Tucker, her Saluki-Cross, whined impatiently, his eyes fixed on the forest beyond their fence, a silent sentinel to the unsettling night.