The forest had always been feared.
Not because it was dark. Not because beasts roamed within it. Those things could be understood. Measured. Fought.
The forest was feared because it watched.
Every child in the town grew up with that knowledge carved into their bones. The trees did not simply stand. The shadows did not simply fall. The wind that moved through the branches did not wander aimlessly. It searched. It listened. It remembered.
And tonight, the forest was awake.
The torches burned low in the hands of the hunters as they stood at the edge of the ancient path. Smoke curled upward in thin, restless threads, swallowed by the heavy mist that clung to the ground. The moon hung full and merciless above them, silver light spilling across the clearing like cold judgment.
No one spoke.
Even the bravest men kept their voices buried deep in their throats. The silence pressed against them, thick and suffocating, as if the forest itself leaned closer to hear their thoughts.
At the center of the group, bound but not struggling, stood a girl.
She did not look like an offering.
Her cloak was worn but clean, fur-lined against the winter cold. Dark hair fell loose around her shoulders, stirred by a wind that touched only her. Her hands were tied before her, but her spine remained straight. Her chin lifted.
Calm.
Too calm.
It unsettled them.
"She should be afraid," one of the younger hunters whispered.
The elder beside him did not answer. His eyes remained fixed on the girl, narrow and uneasy.
Fear was expected. Tears were expected. Begging was expected.
This stillness was not.
"What is your name?" the elder finally asked.
The girl's gaze did not waver. "You know it."
"Say it."
A long pause stretched between them. The torches flickered.
"Nysera."
The sound of her name seemed to vanish into the trees, swallowed before it could echo.
The elder nodded slowly, as if confirming something to himself. "You understand why you are here."
"Yes."
"And you accept it?"
Her lips curved faintly, though there was no humor in it. "Do I have a choice?"
The elder did not answer. No one did.
Because they all knew the truth.
There had never been a choice.
The town had been suffering. Crops rotted before harvest. Children fell ill with fevers that burned and vanished without reason. Livestock were found drained of life, their bodies untouched by tooth or claw.
And always, always, the signs pointed toward the forest.
The elders had prayed. They had fasted. They had carved runes and burned offerings. They had begged the gods.
The answer had come in dreams.
A life for a life. A heart for the hunger.
So they had chosen.
The youngest daughter of the fallen family. The girl no one would defend.
Nysera.
"Begin," the elder said quietly.
The hunters stepped forward.
They cut the bindings from her wrists, not out of mercy but necessity. She needed to run. The ritual demanded it.
The hunt had to be real.
"You know the path," one of the women said. Her voice trembled. "If you reach the river by dawn… you may live."
A lie.
Everyone knew it.
No one had ever returned.
Nysera flexed her hands, feeling blood return to her fingers. The cold bit into her skin. She looked past them, toward the narrow trail that twisted into the forest like the throat of some waiting beast.
The mist parted slightly.
The trees stood close together, ancient and silent.
Watching.
"Why me?" she asked.
The question slipped out before she could stop it.
The elder's expression hardened. "Because the forest chose."
No.
Because the town needed someone to blame.
Because fear was easier than truth.
But Nysera said nothing more.
She stepped forward.
The moment her foot crossed the boundary between clearing and forest, something changed.
The air grew heavier.
The silence deepened.
Behind her, the hunters raised their horns.
The sound shattered the night.
The hunt had begun.
She ran.
Branches tore at her cloak. Roots clawed at her boots. The mist thickened with every step, swallowing the path, twisting the familiar into something strange.
But Nysera did not slow.
She had known this night would come.
Since the first dream.
Since the first time she had felt eyes on her when no one stood nearby. Since the first time the wind had whispered her name.
Run.
Her lungs burned. Cold air scraped her throat raw. Yet beneath the fear, beneath the pounding of her heart, something else stirred.
A strange, dangerous awareness.
The forest was not chasing her.
It was guiding.
The path shifted, opening where it should not. Branches bent aside. Stones rolled beneath her feet so she would not fall.
Why?
The question pulsed through her mind, sharp and relentless.
Why help me?
The answer came not in words, but in sensation.
Hunger.
Old. Endless. Patient.
Her steps faltered.
The horns sounded again in the distance. Closer now.
The hunters were fast.
But something else moved faster.
A low sound rolled through the darkness. Not quite a growl. Not quite thunder.
Nysera froze.
The forest stilled.
Even the wind held its breath.
Then she felt it.
A presence behind her.
Not approaching.
Already there.
Slowly, she turned.
The mist thickened, curling like living things. Shadows stretched between the trees, weaving together.
And from that darkness, he stepped.
Tall.
Too tall.
His form was human, yet wrong in ways her mind could not grasp. Broad shoulders wrapped in darkness. Long hair fell loose, blacker than night. His eyes burned—gold and feral, catching the moonlight with a predator's glow.
Power rolled from him, heavy and suffocating.
Ancient.
Dangerous.
Not a man.
Nysera's breath caught.
"You…" Her voice failed.
He watched her as one might watch prey that had wandered too close.
But there was no hunger in his gaze.
There was recognition.
"You came," she whispered before she could stop herself.
A slow tilt of his head.
As if the words amused him.
The horns sounded again.
Closer.
The man—no, the beast—shifted his attention toward the distant noise. The air around him darkened, shadows coiling like living things.
"They hunt you," he said.
His voice was deep, rough, threaded with something that brushed against her skin like heat.
"Yes."
"And you ran to me."
It was not a question.
"I didn't know where else to go."
Silence.
Then, unexpectedly, he stepped closer.
The distance between them vanished.
Nysera's pulse thundered. Every instinct screamed to flee, yet her body refused.
His scent surrounded her—cold night, iron, something wild and untamed.
"You are not afraid," he said.
"I am."
"Not of me."
Her lips parted.
She did not answer.
Because the truth sat heavy in her chest.
She was afraid.
But not in the way she should be.
There was danger in him. Violence. Darkness.
And yet…
Her heart did not recoil.
It leaned closer.
A flicker of something dangerous ignited in his gaze.
"Strange," he murmured.
The horns sounded again. Very close now.
The beast's attention sharpened.
"They come."
"Yes."
"And you would rather face them than me?"
Nysera met his eyes.
"No."
Something shifted.
The forest seemed to bend toward him, waiting.
The beast's hand lifted.
For a moment, Nysera thought he would strike.
Instead, his fingers brushed her wrist.
The contact burned.
Not pain.
Something deeper. Older.
Her breath shuddered.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
His voice dropped, dark and certain.
"Claiming."
The word wrapped around her like chains.
The air changed.
The ground beneath them pulsed with faint, glowing runes—ancient symbols awakening after centuries of silence.
The forest exhaled.
And far behind them, the hunters stumbled, confusion breaking their formation.
Nysera stared at him, heart racing.
"Why?"
His gaze locked onto hers.
"Because they made a mistake."
The mist thickened, swallowing the world.
The horns fell silent.
And in that darkness, the hunt ended.
But something far more dangerous had begun.
The silence did not return.
It transformed.
The forest no longer watched from a distance. It pressed closer, surrounding them, bending as though acknowledging its true master.
Nysera felt it—an ancient will moving beneath the earth, beneath the roots, beneath her very feet.
The runes beneath them glowed brighter.
She looked down. Symbols crawled across the ground like living things, forming a circle around them. Power rose in waves, thick and suffocating.
"What is this?" she whispered.
"A bond," he said.
Her heart stuttered. "I did not agree."
"You came to me."
"I ran to survive."
"And now you will."
The certainty in his voice was more terrifying than the forest, more dangerous than the hunters.
"Who are you?" she asked.
For a moment, he did not answer.
The shadows around him deepened, as though his name carried weight even the night feared.
"I am what they pray to in fear," he said finally."I am what the gods tried to bury."
His golden eyes burned into hers.
"I am the beast they created… and the king they cannot kill."
Nysera's breath trembled.
"And me?"
His gaze softened—just slightly. More dangerous than cruelty.
"You," he said, "are mine now."
The forest sealed the vow in silence.
And far away, the town that had abandoned her slept, unaware that their offering had awakened something that would one day return for them all.
The hunt had ended.
The war had begun.