Weirdly enough, he’d jammed a construction helmet onto his head, and a pair of pale horns arched upward above it. The plastic was cracked around the base of each pale blue horn, as if they had been shoved through it rather than attached. Very clever design, though I couldn’t help but puzzle over why someone would wear that indoors at home. The spooky season was long gone, and it was doubtful he’d be having a costume party all by his lonesome. Perhaps he cosplayed while he played video games, some streamers did that...
I stared at him; I couldn’t help it. My mind stuttered over the strangeness of his appearance, how surreal and utterly beautiful he was. Not human, some part of me whispered, but that was ridiculous. It wasn’t like I’d just stumbled into the lair of some kind of winter monster, Jack Frost, perhaps. Though that would explain the ethereal ice sculptures outside.
His gaze locked on mine, startlingly pale, like the heart of winter. A scowl tugged at his mouth, but it only made him more compelling, like a storm contained in flesh. My stomach flipped, heat flooding through me despite the cold. That mouth was so lush and tempting, though his lips were a possibly alarming shade of blue. I’d almost worry he was the one freezing to death on his porch, but no, that was definitely me.
“Who are you?” His voice was rough, low, threaded with icy disdain. His pale eyes locked onto my face in a way that was predatory, harsh; it would have made me squirm if I weren’t already shaking from the cold so badly. It was on my lips to ask him how that could possibly be important at a moment like this. Didn’t he realize I’d die if he didn’t let me in?
I swallowed, my lips numb but my heart hammering with something that wasn’t just fear. “I...I’m Bianca. I was hiking, and the storm…” I stuttered, the words tangling on my frozen lips, but I didn’t care. All I could think was that I should’ve been afraid of him. Instead, every nerve in my body hummed with dangerous, impossible attraction.
Chapter 2
Ísarr
The storm was building. I could feel it in the bones of the cabin, in the way the timbers groaned and sighed under the first real lashings of the wind. I moved from window to window, tugging the shutters closed, running down the same checklist I always did when the snow came in fast: waterlines outside disconnected; the pipes on my old heating system steady, insulated. Did I have enough firewood stacked high near the hearth? My lanterns were trimmed and cleaned, refilled with fresh fuel, and lined up on my table—a pile of candles at the ready.
Last, I crossed to the bear in the corner, the one I’d been carving all day. Its shoulders were broad and ridged with the chisel marks I still needed to smooth out; the face was half-finished but already intent, protective. It was going to turn into a good piece: strong, evocative, just as planned.
I brushed shavings from its paws and eyed the piece with a more critical eye. I’d have to adjust the fur strokes on his left flank, and the hind legs needed more trimming. Another commission. Grandma Liz would need to come by and haul it into town once I had the varnish done. She always said there were buyers who “just had to have a touch of the Hollow’s mystery.” If only they knew what mystery really meant.
There was nothing mysterious about me, my cabin, or my carvings. As long as people left me alone, all was well in my world. I touched the horn rising from my forehead andgrimaced. As if I were an abomination who could not control his shift or his powers—a danger to the entire supernatural world and its secret existence, and a great blemish on my family name.
The knock startled me. It was soft—a rapping against the door, easy enough to dismiss—except I had not heard that kind of sound in so long… I froze, head tilted, listening. It was probably a branch, I told myself; the wind was strong enough to throw whole limbs against the siding. Then it came again: a steady knock. And again, much harder this time.
I ground my teeth so hard, my jaw ached. What the fuck? No one came here, that was the point. The dozen “Keep Out” and “Stay Away, trespassers be warned” signs always did the trick. Who was brazen enough to come up my hill, into my stretch of the forest—especially at a time like this, when my powers were most unpredictable?
The knocking grew insistent, quick as a heartbeat but also weaker, as if whoever was knocking was losing strength. I hoped that meant they’d give up and leave. A hard blast of wind struck the side of the cabin just then, and I guiltily remembered the storm flaring to raging life outside.
My shoulders tightened. I wanted to ignore it, bury myself in the silence I’d built for years, but the damn sound wouldn’t stop. With a muttered curse, I went hunting for my old helmet. The one ridiculous attempt at a disguise. I wasn’t sure if it was gifted to me by one of my supposedly helpful relatives, or if it was an attempt from the overly concerned town sheriff to convince me to socialize.
It took me too long to find the thing, buried under a stack of old tarps in the corner by the door, at the bottom of a basket of scarves and hats. Dust clung to it, and when I jammed it on, the plastic gave an ominous crack as my horns punched through holes too small to properly fit. Like they’d grown bigger since the last time I’d suffered the indignity of wearing this thing. Perfect. Just perfect. I stalked over to the mirror by the door and scowled at my reflection. The helmet sat crooked—a ridiculous, lurid shade of yellow—and the breaking plastic had spiderwebbed cracks all across the domed top. A poor excuse for hiding what I was; the worst disguise in the history of disguises. But it was all I had.
The knocks came again, just soft, slow thuds, as if the knocker had barely any energy left. I yanked the door open with a muffled oath, already beyond fed up with the entire situation, and I hadn’t even met my intruder yet. Then there she was.
For a long moment, I could only stare. Snow clung to her lashes, her black hair plastered damp across her cheeks. Her coat was warm and thick, but no match for the steeply dropping temperatures outside. Her boots were caked in ice, and those eyes—huge, startling blue, like a lake caught mid-freeze. Everything about her was trembling, fragile, as though the storm had sculpted her just to leave her on my porch.
My chest tightened painfully. She looked like my wayward powers had already gotten hold of her and frozen her to the bone. Heat surged beneath my skin, unwelcome, unfamiliar. I wanted to drag her inside, wrap her in every blanket I owned, and, at the same time, shove her back into the snow and slam the door before she could undo me. Or worse, before I could undo her, permanently.
“Who are you?” The words came out sharper than I meant—low and gruff—but it was safer than blurting the truth: You’re beautiful, and I don’t know why you’re here. I want to wrap you up inside my den and add you to my hoard forever and ever.
She opened her mouth, fumbling for words, and I couldn’t stop myself from glancing past her. The snow was falling thick now, a wall of white I longed to step into, to lose myself in, to spread my wings and chase. I focused on the pertinent things I needed to check: there was no vehicle on the overgrown road, no footprints leading away. There was no one else. It was just her, as though she’d appeared from thin air.
I only vaguely heard her stutter out her name—Bianca—and her request for shelter, as if the gods had decided to curse me even more by tempting me with a creature like her. Bianca: pale white, like snow—like the paleness of her skin and the brightness of her blue eyes.
Her voice trembled when she asked, “Can I… please… come in? Just for a little while. Out of the cold.” Her expression said she was desperate, but also hopeful—like she thought she’d found the safety she’d been looking for. She was dead wrong. There was no safety in my presence; she needed to leave.
Reflex snapped through me like ice breaking. “No.” The word was out before I could truly think through the options. I’d been alone so long that sharing my cabin—my sanctuary—seemed unthinkable, but this was a snowstorm… What did I expect would happen?
Her face fell. Something twisted hard in my gut. Those ridiculous blue eyes widened, rimmed red with cold, and Inoticed her hat for the first time. It was pink, knitted, with a floppy pompom that bobbed when she shivered, and a bright pink flower. Childish. Ridiculous. For some reason, it made her look unbearably sweet.
I swore under my breath and stepped back, holding the door wide. She shuffled past me, small and uncertain, and before I could stop myself, I leaned down—just a fraction—inhaling the scent of her: snow, flowers, something warm beneath it all that stirred an ache low in my belly. My cock grew hard in my pants in a rush, aching to claim her, to fill her.
Shock ripped through me, hard and fast. I slammed the door, much harder than I meant to. The walls rattled, the wood groaned; I thought maybe the thick oak door even cracked from the force. Damn it! The last thing she needed was a drafty door that wouldn’t shut. Get it together! Then, on the heels of those thoughts: why did I care so much? What the hell had just walked into my home?
She stood on my doormat, kicking at the snow clumped on her boots. Flakes scattered across the floor, melting into small puddles that made me wince. I didn’t think she was trying to make a mess—just the opposite—but my beautiful hardwood floors were not going to like that.
She didn’t seem to notice. Her lips moved, spilling nervous words into the warm hush of the cabin. “I’ll stay out of your way, I promise. Just until the storm clears. I know this is an inconvenience. You won’t even notice me. I’ll go as soon as it passes, truly. This never would have even happened if—” She swallowed, her voice breaking. “—if Kevin hadn’t abandoned me out there.”
Every muscle in my body went rigid. “Abandoned you?” The words scraped out of me like ice grinding against stone. My gaze narrowed, heat flashing behind my ribs in a way I didn’t recognize. “Where is this Kevin?” I demanded, with such vehemence that she took a step back.
