Page 20

I leave my headlamp off and let the moonlight do the work. Harsh light ruins night vision and pisses off everything trying to exist without human interference. This is their home; I’m just a visitor and need to respect that.

I move slowly, listening more than looking. An owl calls from the west. Something small moves through the brush and then goes still until I pass. Farther out, a fox screams, sharp and ugly enough that my shoulders jump despite knowing what it is.

“Drama queen,” I whisper, smiling despite myself.

The smile doesn’t last long when the Labrador tea scent reaches me, and I stop so fast that I scare something scurrying next to me.

My pulse doesn’t spike this time, but it changes. It slows and deepens in a way I don’t know what the fuck to do with. That scent slides through the trees, and my body recognizes it with embarrassing speed, causing my cock to kick up with interest.

“What the hell, body?” I whisper.

My hand tightens on the strap across my chest, and I think of the latest dream again. Bark under my palms, heat at my back, hand around my throat, voice in my head saying—

I shut that door in my head so hard it practically rattles. “Get your shit together, I swear to God,” I say under my breath.

Then the light appears, effectively shutting me up.

It’s about thirty yards out, the blue-white light way too high in the trees, unless someone is really committed to doing an impression of Edward Cullen.

Yes, I watched Twilight with my ex. What of it?

The light sways slightly, even though the air around me is still. Last night, it stayed far off, distant enough to pretend it could be anything. Tonight, it seems to wait.

My skin prickles.

Every lesson I’ve ever learned about wilderness safety lines up in my head and starts screaming.

Don’t ignore instinct.

Don’t approach what you can’t identify.

Don’t become the dumb missing persons case people discuss at the ranger’s station.

But my instincts aren’t telling me to run… that’s the problem. My fear exists, sure. I’m not stupid enough to stand in the middle of a forest staring at a floating light and claim I feel nothing. My mouth is dry, my heart is working harder than it needs to, and my fingers inch toward the knife at my belt.

Under the shock and tension, I feel that pull again—the same one I felt when I came home after my first day at work. It doesn’t feel like a command; it feels like an invitation.

Don’t follow any lights in the forest.

I take one step toward it, ignoring Tom’s warning. The light doesn’t move away, so I take another step, moss muffling my boots. It stays where it is, the distance between us shrinking with every pace I take rather than because it’s coming toward me.

My heartbeat snarls up the back of my throat, loud enough that I wonder if whatever’s out there can hear it. The scent grows thicker as I approach, filling my lungs until the forest smells less like spring and more like my dream. I have to swallow against the groan building up because of my swollen cock.

I move slowly, partly because I’m not eager to die and partly because some ridiculous part of me is afraid that moving too fast will make the light vanish.

I stop when I’m maybe eight or ten feet away—any closer and I would have to squint against the glare—and the shape behind the light becomes visible by degrees.

At first, my brain refuses to accept what I’m seeing. It tries its damnedest to make the impossible behave, but then the light dims, and all those borrowed explanations fall apart.

The light is coming from a lantern hanging from the curved tip of a black antler.

The realization drops into me with a clarity that cuts through everything else. It’s not a hook or a branch; it’s dangling from a rusted iron loop that’s been hooked over tines of bone.

The antler itself is massive; thick at the base, branching wide, pitted, scarred, and black as char. My brain, poor thing, tries yet again to make excuses for what I’m seeing, but my eyes drag over the rest of the creature, and it abandons all hope.

It’s standing on two legs and tall—taller than anyone I’ve ever stood this close to. Seven feet, maybe more; the top of its head almost brushing the lower branches. Its skin is slate gray where the lantern light touches, with black markings spreading over its arms and entire chest. They look similar to tree growth rings—slightly raised, darker, and roughly patterned.

Broad shoulders, long arms, hands covered in those markings and darkening at the tips where claws extend.