Roofs gleam faintly under a washed, moon-thinned sky. Puddles catch what little light remains; scattered mirrors laid carelessly across the ground. The air smells clean, thick with wet earth and crushed leaves. Somewhere, water drips steadily from a roof edge.
I walk.
My stockings darken, soaking through as I cross the path, but I feel no chill, no bite. My feet find the ground without hesitation, stepping around stones and ruts I know by heart. Doors remain closed. Windows remain dark. No one sees me pass.
The village loosens its grip with each step.
Houses fall away. Fences thin. The path softens beneath my feet until it is no longer a path at all, only earth yielding willingly beneath my weight.
Moss cushions my steps, cool and damp against my soles as I step inside the forest. Branches brush my shoulders, my hair, leaving behind beads of water that cling like small blessings. Wet leaves sigh beneath me, collapsing soundlessly as I pass. Thorns catch and release without scratch, as if they have forgotten how to draw blood.
The ache in my knees is gone. The tightness in my chest has unwound, thread by careful thread, until my breath moves easily again. Iwalk deeper, and deeper still, the trees parting just enough to let me through, shadows shifting aside as if they recognize my shape.
I walk and walk, and the night unfolds without boundary. Somewhere, water begins to speak—low at first, then clearer, the sound widening until it fills the spaces between my thoughts.
Finally, the lake reveals itself.
It lies open before me, its surface dark and unbroken, holding the moon in its depths like a secret kept willingly. Mist hovers low above it, drawing back just enough to show me my own reflection—pale, indistinct, wavering with every breath.
The water does not stir. It waits.
My head swims, the world tilting gently as if stepping too close to the edge of a dream. I feel no fear; only the sense that if I take one more step, I will not be cold. That I will not sink.
That the water already knows my name.
A pressure—soft, intent—settles against my back, between my shoulders, along the nape of my neck. The fine hairs there lift, one by one, under the sense of being held in a gaze, one that does not flinch or withdraw.
I am not alone, and I do not mind. I want to be seen.
The lake accepts me soundlessly, water curling around my ankles, then my calves. I wait for the shock of cold, for the sting that should bite skin and bone—but it never comes. Instead, warmth curls around me, sliding upward with slow intent. The water parts for me, then closes again, rising inch by inch, soaking through the thin white of my gown until it clings heavy and wet against my skin. Fabric molds to me, tracing the shape of my legs, my hips, my thighs, outlining the press of my body in a way I have never allowed myself to notice before.
I wade deeper, unhurried. The water laps at my waist and chest, pulling me into its rhythm. It presses close, intimate, knowing exactly how much to take and when to pause. Moonlight spills across the surface, breaking and reforming with my every motion. I lift my arms, letting the dripping sleeves fall away, and reach back until my fingers find the tie at my nape.
It resists for a heartbeat, before it gives way and slips free. My braid loosens, then unravels entirely, long dark strands spilling down myshoulders and into the water. I tilt my head back and sink my hands into it, letting the lake take it from me, letting it run through the strands I keep bound and hidden by day. They coil around my wrists like something alive.
This is mine.
Enchantress.
The word breathes against my ear, my body reacting before thought can catch it. I flinch, my hands flying to my chest to gather the sodden fabric, heart stuttering as I turn toward the shore. My pulse races. My skin burns.
The shadows at the far edge of the lake do not answer by moving. Instead, they deepen.
I sense it then—watching from the treeline, from the mist, from everywhere the light does not touch. The awareness of my bare skin strikes me, of the way my gown reveals me, the attention like a touch I cannot escape.
I try to cover myself, clumsy, breathless, but a low sound carries across the water—close and far all the same.
"You hide what was made to be seen."
The lake laps gently at my body, unbothered. The moonlight does not dim. The presence does not retreat. It is just here.
Then, a pale hand, emerging from shadow, water sliding from long fingers like spilled moonlight. A veil of dark hair against ivory skin, falling loose around a face I never fully catch, against a collarbone I glimpse and then lose. Bright teeth flashing briefly under the part of lips. Eyes—deep, endless—fixing on mine.
My breath shudders.
A single finger lifts the strand of hair plastered to my cheek. Knuckles graze my mouth to guide it aside, brushing my lower lip for the briefest, devastating instant. The touch is barely there, more suggestion than contact, yet my skin flares as if struck.
Heat floods me. I freeze—not stiff with fear, but caught, pinned by the weight of my own curiosity. My hands slacken against the soaked linen. My pulse hammers so loudly I am certain it can be heard.
