The list was short, but it was enough. William Croft had spent the night in a state of agitated recall, his mind slowly unspooling the threads that Thorne had woven into it. By dawn, he had produced a handful of names—people he had encountered at the prison's Bible study sessions, people who had shown an unusual interest in Thorne's teachings, people who had asked about the river.
Leo studied the list at the kitchen table, the morning light casting long shadows across the paper. There were six names, each with an address and a brief description: a retired nurse, a schoolteacher, a mechanic, a librarian, a postal worker, and a young woman who worked at the local diner. None of them had criminal records. None of them had any connection to the Riverbed case. They were ordinary people, living ordinary lives, carrying a secret they didn't know they were carrying.
"You're sure about these?" Croft asked, standing by the window with his coffee.
William nodded, his face pale but determined. "I'm sure. I met each of them at the prison. Thorne introduced them to me, one by one. He said they were part of a 'circle of healing.' He said they were working to release the spirits of the victims. I believed him. I believed all of it."
Leo folded the list and put it in his pocket. "Then we start with the first one. The retired nurse. She's closest."
The drive to the nurse's house took twenty minutes. It was a small bungalow on a quiet street, its porch cluttered with potted plants and a worn rocking chair. Leo knocked on the door, and a woman in her late sixties answered. Her name was Martha, and she had kind eyes and a gentle smile.
"Hello," she said. "Can I help you?"
Leo introduced himself and explained that he was working with the police on a mental health outreach program. He didn't mention Thorne or the river. He simply said he was looking for people who might be experiencing unusual dreams or sleep disturbances.
Martha's smile flickered, just for a moment. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said. "I sleep just fine."
Leo met her gaze. "I think you do know. I think you've been having dreams about a river. About stones. About a woman with folded hands."
Martha stepped back, her hand gripping the doorframe. "Who told you that?"
"A friend. A man who visited the prison. A man named William."
She stared at him, her eyes wide with a mixture of fear and recognition. "William? The chaplain? He told you about me?"
"He didn't know he was telling me," Leo said gently. "He was being used, just like you. Just like I was."
Martha's face crumpled. She opened the door wider and gestured for them to come inside. The living room was neat, filled with family photographs and crocheted blankets. She sat down on the couch, her hands trembling.
"I started having the dreams about six months ago," she said. "I thought it was just stress. I'm a nurse. I've seen a lot of death. I thought my mind was just processing things. But then I met the man—Thorne—at the prison. He told me the dreams were a gift. He told me I was being called to help. He gave me a stone and told me to put it by the river."
Leo sat across from her, his voice soft. "Did you put it there?"
She nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks. "I did. I didn't know why. I just felt like I had to. And then I started walking in my sleep. I'd wake up with mud on my shoes, not knowing where I'd been. I was so scared. I thought I was losing my mind."
Leo reached out and took her hand. "You're not losing your mind. You were manipulated, just like I was. But it's not too late to stop it. You can break free."
She looked at him, hope flickering in her eyes. "How?"
Leo spent the next hour talking to her, explaining the pattern, the manipulation, the forgetting. He told her about his own journey, his own struggle to separate memory from delusion. He showed her the stone with his mother's name, the one that had changed to his own.
"The river is powerful," he said. "But it's not evil. It's just a current. You can choose to swim with it, or you can choose to find the shore. But you have to make the choice. No one can make it for you."
Martha listened, and by the end, she was calmer. She promised to stop visiting the river, to throw away the stones she had collected, to seek help from a therapist. Leo gave her Dr. Sivan's number and made her promise to call.
They left her house and drove to the next name on the list—a mechanic named Frank. The process was similar: the initial denial, the gradual confession, the shared understanding. Frank had been carrying stones for months, placing them along the riverbank without knowing why. He had been haunted by dreams of drowning, of cold water closing over his head.
By the end of the day, they had visited four of the six people on the list. Each one told the same story: Thorne had reached out to them, had given them stones, had instructed them to place them in the river. Each one had experienced the same forgetting, the same sleepwalking, the same fear.
Leo felt a growing sense of purpose. He was not just saving himself. He was saving others. He was breaking the cycle, one person at a time.
The fifth name on the list was the librarian—a woman named Sylvia. Her address was in the old part of town, near the public library where Leo had spent so many hours as a child. He knocked on the door, but there was no answer. He tried the knob, and it turned.
The apartment was empty—not just empty of people, but empty of things. The shelves were bare, the furniture gone. The only item left was a single river stone, placed in the center of the floor. On its surface was a message, carved in the same rust-colored ink:
"THE RIVER DOES NOT FORGET. AND NEITHER DO I."
Leo picked up the stone. It was cold, dead cold. He turned it over, and on the underside was a second message:
"I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING. YOU CAN'T STOP ME. YOU CAN ONLY JOIN ME."
Croft was beside him, reading over his shoulder. "She's gone. She's either run, or she's been taken."
Leo shook his head. "She's not gone. She's waiting. She's one of Thorne's true believers. She's not a sleepwalker. She's awake. And she's dangerous."
He pocketed the stone and walked out of the apartment. The sky was darkening, the clouds heavy with rain. He could feel the river in the distance, calling to him, its voice louder than before.
"One more name," he said. "The diner worker. She's the last one."
They drove to the diner, a small establishment on the edge of town. The young woman behind the counter was named Lily—nineteen years old, with bright eyes and a nervous smile. She served them coffee and asked if they wanted anything else.
Leo looked at her, and he saw it: the same flicker in her eyes, the same shadow beneath the surface. She was not like the others. She was deeper in, more committed.
"Lily," he said softly. "I need to talk to you about the river."
Her smile vanished. She looked at him, her eyes suddenly hard, unyielding. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"I think you do. I think you've been carrying stones. I think you've been sleepwalking. I think you've been doing things you don't remember."
She stared at him, and then she laughed—a cold, bitter laugh. "You think you know what I'm doing? You think you can save me? I don't need saving, Leo. I've already been saved. The river showed me the way. It showed me the truth."
Leo felt a chill run down his spine. "What truth?"
She leaned forward, her voice dropping to a whisper. "The truth that the women—the victims—they weren't victims. They were sacrifices. They were chosen. They were the ones who carried the river forward. And I'm the one who will carry it next."
Leo's hand tightened around the stone in his pocket. "That's not true. Thorne lied to you. He used you."
Lily shook her head, her expression serene. "Thorne didn't lie. He showed me the path. He gave me the purpose I was always meant to have. And I'm not going to let you take that away from me."
She turned and walked into the back room, disappearing behind a swinging door. Leo started to follow, but Croft held him back.
"Don't," Croft said. "She's armed. I saw the knife in her apron."
Leo stopped, his heart pounding. He had come to save her, but she didn't want to be saved. She was too deep, too lost.
He walked out of the diner, the stone cold in his hand. He looked at the sky, the river, the town. He had helped four people, but there were others—like Lily—who were beyond his reach.
"There's one more," he said. "Sylvia, the librarian. She's the key. If I can find her, I can understand what Thorne is planning."
Croft nodded. "I'll put out an APB. We'll find her."
They drove back to the house, the rain beginning to fall. Leo sat in the passenger seat, his mind churning. He had made progress, but he had also encountered resistance. The cycle was not broken. It was just changing shape.
That night, he dreamed of the river again. But this time, he was not alone. Standing on the opposite bank was Lily, her eyes bright, her hands raised. In each hand, she held a stone.
"You can't stop me, Leo," she said. "The river is mine now. It's always been mine."
He woke with a gasp, the stone in his hand warm, pulsing. He looked at it, and the inscription had changed again. Where it had read "LEO," it now read "LILY."
He stared at it, his blood cold. The stone was not just a token of his own journey. It was a connection—a link to the others, a reflection of who was carrying the river at any given moment.
And if it now bore Lily's name, it meant she was the next carrier. The next vessel. The next one to walk the path of forgetting.
Leo stood and walked to the window. The rain was falling harder now, the river rising. He could hear its voice, loud and insistent, calling out to him.
"I won't let it take her," he said to the night. "I won't let it take anyone else."
But even as he said the words, he felt the pull—the same pull that had drawn him to the river as a boy, the same pull that had shaped his life. It was not Thorne's pull. It was not Pine's pull. It was the river's own.
And he knew, with a sinking certainty, that the river was not done with him yet.
It was just beginning to show its true depth.
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