And still, the wolf of Midnight found me.
He always found me, for it was his game, and it was as rigged as any could ever be.
Hands and teeth as sharp as knives.
“Don’t struggle, pretty little fae,” he said, his hand on my shoulder as he winked at me. “You’ll only make me angry, and you know what happens then.”
“My apologies, master.” I dropped to my knees. Bowed. This too was part of the game, just like what came next.
A fist in my hair.
The sharp crack of a leather switch against bare skin.
Face pressed hard into the wet earth, his cruel hand as large as my head.
Gasping for every breath as he held me down in the rancid mud and took.
And took.
And took.
The pain, the blood, the darkness…
It crashed upon me in heavy waves, my screams muted only by his wicked laughter…
* * *
“No, stop! Please!No!”
I awoke with a start, heart hammering against my chest like the beating of war drums. Sweat rolled down my back, and my every muscle quivered in fear.
Nightmare. Just a nightmare. I was safe in the library, nowhere near the old forest. As for the wolf… the monster in the shadows had since been de-fanged. Now he rotted away breath by breath, bone by bone, no longer the master. No longer the predator, but the prey.
Don’t struggle, pretty little fae…
I picked up the half-full glass of bourbon from my table. Pitched it against the wall. The clear, unmistakable sound of something breaking calmed my nerves.
I had no idea how long I’d been carrying on in my half-sleep, but soft footsteps on the polished floor on the other side of the bookshelves told me it hadn’t gone unnoticed.
Haley.
In the week or so she’d been living here, I saw to it that our paths had rarely crossed. I preferred to let the guards keep watch, reporting back to me on the comings and goings of all my new guests. Being close to her was too distracting for me. Too dangerous. Too confusing, for the inexplicable pull I felt toward her had only intensified since that night on her balcony.
Yet I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t watched her, on occasion. Hadn’t lingered outside her door or peered through the windows of my own suite, hoping for a glimpse of her on the balcony, her long hair blowing in the breeze, her spine straight and determined as she looked out across the city lights, held out her palms, and tried to make her roses bloom.
“Keradoc?” came her soft call in the darkness now, as I knew it would. I recognized the cadence of her steps as easily as I recognized the warm touch of her magick. The scent of her skin. All of it reaching me before she finally appeared before me.
She was dressed for bed, wrapped up in the bathrobe she’d seemed to so love, her hair woven in a loose braid that hung over her shoulder. In her hands, she held a steaming mug of peppermint tea.
“Are you all right?” she asked, her brow knitted with concern. “I thought I heard you shouting.”
I felt as if I had one foot still in the land of dreams, the room blurring at the edges, her face as pale as an apparition.
“Something is… hunting me,” I whispered. “A dark and vile thing.”
The moment the words had left me, my thoughts cleared, the ridiculousness of my confession making the back of my neck burn with shame.
But Haley said nothing. No mockery, no sharp-tongued repartee about how I deserved to be hunted. Deserved to suffer.
