Don't Let the Forest In meets The Hazel Wood in this folk horror romance about a girl, a boy she must sacrifice to an ancient god, and a road trip.

Lena has spent her entire life in servitude to the occult. The Beaumonts are the secret stewards for an eldritch entity known as the Witness, and for generations, it has granted their family knowledge, influence, and power. But every gift comes at a cost. Blood for understanding. Death for insight.

When Lena is chosen to deliver the next sacrifice to the Witness, she never expected it to be Oliver Vance—the infuriatingly charming, folklore-obsessed boy from her astronomy lecture. Her task is simple: befriend him, gain his trust, and lead him to the altar where The Witness will claim what is owed. Simple. Clean. Necessary.

But Oliver isn’t what she expected. What begins as a calculated act of deception transforms into something heady and electric—midnight confessions in motel rooms, contagious laughter in babbling streams, hands brushing in old roadside diners. And no matter how many distractions Lena seeks, the open road still carries them toward the inevitable. For the forest is waiting and patient, where the pull of the Witness grows impossible to ignore, whispering Oliver’s name through the trees.

Lena was never meant to love him. And Oliver was never meant to survive.