Aurora's pov
"Is he coming to kill us all?" a woman cried.
"Has someone provoked him?" another cried.
"Shouldn't we leave the village?"
Matthew held up a hand, stopping them all. "We don't know his intentions. But we know his nature."
The elders shared a look, one filled with the kind of dread born from old memories.
Elder Mara's voice dropped low. "Long ago, before many of us were born, the Beast came looking for something. Or rather someone. And when he did not find what he sought..."
She inhaled shakily.
"...he left the bodies of hunters at our border. As a message."
Mama's hand flew to her mouth. Milo whimpered, still clutching onto the sleeves of my cloak.
I felt something-
a strange, electric prickling along my skin, like invisible threads tightening around me.
"You must all remain indoors tonight," Rowan said. "No one leaves their home after nightfall until we understand what he's after."
A voice from the back shouted, "What if he comes into the village?"
The elders fell silent.
No one had an answer.
Papa pulled me close, voice strained. "This is why we stay careful."
I barely heard him.
Because the prickling sensation along my arms had sharpened.
Focused.
Like something in the forest was looking for me.
And the wind whispered again-soft, hungry, ancient.
"Something is coming," one of the elders murmured. "I can feel it in my bones."
I could feel it too.
But unlike them...
it didn't feel like death.
It felt like destiny.
______________________________________________________
The meeting ended in chaos.
Villagers scattered back to their homes, clutching children and whispering prayers under their breath. Doors slammed shut. Bolts slid into place. The square emptied fast-too fast-like everyone feared lingering under the moon for even a heartbeat longer.
Papa led us home with a firm hand on Milo's shoulder, Mama close behind.
But I... I kept glancing at the tree line.
The shadows between the pines felt alive-breathing, shifting, waiting.
When we reached the cottage, Papa double-latched the door, checked the windows twice, then turned to me.
"Stay inside," he warned again. "I mean it, Aurora."
I nodded.
I meant to obey.
Truly.
But the moment I stepped into my room, something inside me shifted.
A tug.
A pull.
Like invisible fingers curling around my ribs, drawing me toward the window.
My breath hitched. "Not again..."
The wind rose suddenly, brushing my cheek through the thin crack in the shutters. It carried a scent I couldn't name-something wild, cold, and ancient. The smell of a storm that hadn't broken yet.
My heartbeat stuttered.
The pull intensified.
It wasn't a sensation.
It wasn't imagination.
It was a summoning.
"Aurora?" Milo called, standing by my door.
"I'm going to bed," I lied quickly, swallowing the rising panic-or was it anticipation?
I waited until the house grew quiet. Until everyone was fast asleep.
I crept to my window, pushed it open, and climbed out into the crisp air.
The moment my feet touched the ground, the pull nearly toppled me.
"Wh-what is happening to me?"
I wrapped my cloak tight and stepped toward the forest-every step slow, unwilling... yet completely inevitable.
______________________________________________________
Blackpine was darker than normal nights allowed. The moon veiled herself behind heavy clouds, leaving only faint silver threads between the branches.
But I didn't need the moon.
Something else guided me.
My feet knew the path even if my mind didn't. I moved deeper and deeper, past where my father always warned me to stop, past where the hunters laid their traps, past where the ground sank with soft moss so thick it swallowed sound.
Every instinct screamed turn back.
But another part of me-my bones, my blood-whispered forward.
And then the wind stopped.
Completely.
The stillness pressed hard against my ears. Even the night creatures were silent.
I realized only then that I had reached the clearing.
A wide circle of moonlight pierced through a break in the canopy-white, cold, breathtaking.
I stepped into it and shivered.
The air changed. Thicker, heavier.
Charged with something that made the hair on my arms rise.
A twig snapped behind me and I quickly spun around.
Nothing.
But the pull tightened around me like a rope.
"What do you want?" I whispered into the dark. "Why me?"
Another break of twigs.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Powerful.
Something-someone-was approaching.
Not rushing.
Not hiding.
Moving like a predator who had already cornered its prey.
My legs locked in place.
A shadow shifted between the trees.
It was huge, tall. It was the beast.
It's eyes glowed like molten gold.
My heart slammed into my ribs.
The stories the elders said about the Beast was the size of a nightmare, with claws that could tear trees from the earth.
None of the stories compared to the truth.
He stepped into the moonlight-broad shoulders, dark fur marked with runic scars, his claws long and sharp, glinting in the moonlight.
But his eyes-
Oh gods, his eyes. They burned.
Not with hunger.
Not with violence.
With recognition.
Like he had waited his entire immortal life for this moment.
His voice rolled through the clearing, deep and rough, as if unused for years.
"Mine."
The wind returned, swirling around us violently.
My breath caught.
Because even though I wanted to run, scream, deny it...
my heart answered him with a single, terrible truth:
I felt it too.