Through The Withering Veil

Lezli has green skin, tusks, and a past that's been scraped clean. But in Widows Hollow-a snowbound village tucked between mountain shadows and half-remembered dreams-he's carved out a life that feels almost real. His tavern, the Braided Pines, is warm, the strangers polite, and the tea brewed just right. Even Betsy, his long-haired white cat, seems content.

Then three travelers arrive with hollow eyes and cryptic words, and Lezli glimpses the truth beneath the town's charm-and it's rotting. Reality fractures. The people fade like mist. Even Betsy seems to see things he cannot. With nothing left to trust but the cat at his heels, Lezli flees into a realm wrapped in forgetting. In the wilderness beyond, where monsters mimic the living and memory slips away, all roads lead to Mournfield-a dying town on the edge of the veil. There, Lezli must face what the mist cannot take: the choice to become something monstrous-or something true.

This novel explores identity through non-human perspective, leaning into themes of transformation, displacement, and the intimacy of found family. It blends cozy atmosphere with gothic unease, sentient settings, and weird ecology-an homage to stories where horror blooms slowly.