Tonight the forest wasn’t mine.
I could feel it in the air—wound tight like a drawn bowstring. The wind tore through the canopy, rattling the bone charms along my ward-lines, ash-dark leaves whispering like teeth in the dark. Beneath it all was silence— thick, watching, waiting.
Something was hunting me—and it wasn’t clumsy.
My hand brushed over the hilts of my throwing knives counting their familiar weight. Seven blades. Seven promises. Seven chances. Each one an oath carved in steel: I survived, or they die trying.
The bow across my back felt heavier than usual, and though its curve fit perfectly against my spine, even its familiarity didn’t slow my pulse. Nothing did.
The air tasted different; metallic, like the sharp tang before lightning strikes. My skin prickled. Heat flickered low beneath my skin.
Not now, I hissed inwardly. It never listened. Not when it mattered.
And tonight something had unsettled it.
The wind shifted, carrying with it the scent of something foreign; warmth and smoke and faint sunlight, like something dragged from another world—things that didn’t belong in my night-soaked world. Every instinct screamed at me to vanish into the shadows.
I crouched low, pressing a palm to the ground. The earth trembled beneath it, like footsteps moving in careful formation. Whatever walked there moved like a predator. Controlled. Disciplined.
Not villagers.
Not beasts.
My stomach twisted.
Fae.
The thought sank into me like ice water.
The forest seemed to tighten its grip around me. Not protecting. Warning. Branches leaned close, leaves shivering in warning. Somewhere ahead, faint impressions in the snow. A heel, a boot print, too clean for a villager’s tread.
I followed anyway.
Each step was silent, each breath counted. I had walked these woods my whole life, but never had they felt so foreign, so on edge. Every shadow felt too aware—shifting when I wasn’t looking.
Then the light changed.
A pale gold shimmer broke through the fog ahead, faint and flickering. It danced through the mist like sunlight filtered through water. I froze. The glow faded, leaving behind the impression of something enormous and still; like something waiting for me to step closer.
The hair on my arms rose.
I slid my bow free and nocked an arrow, keeping low. The forest leaned into me, close and quiet, holding its breath.
That was when I saw movement.
A silhouette formed in the mist, barely visible between the trees. Tall, sure-footed. The faint gleam of metal at his side. Soldiers moved behind him—too disciplined to be human, their formation too precise, too practiced.
Fae.
The realization cut through me like cold steel.
What in the gods’ forsaken hells were they doing this deep in the Edgewilds? And why here?
The arrow trembled in my grip. A soft shimmer of light crept along the shaft. My breath caught; my magic turning traitor choosing visibility over survival. Light crawled along the arrow—wanting to be seen.
Through the fog, one of them stepped forward. Not the injured one. Someone worse. The air shifted, temperature spiking as though a storm had just broken above us.
Even at this distance, the air around him burned warmer like standing too close to a forge. Heat. Smoke. Something scorched. The others hung back, waiting.
I didn’t breathe.
Neither did they.
Neither did the forest.
No one moved.
Branches creaked overhead, bowing towards us. The wind surged again, scattering leaves across the ground in gray whirlwinds. The light from my small fire far behind me guttered and died, as if something had smothered it—swallowed whole by mist.
All that remained was the fractured moonlight filtering through the fog; silver and gold, shadow and flame.
Seven knives at my hip. One arrow drawn.
A line of unseen fae soldiers hidden in the dark.
None of us moved.
Not yet.
But soon.
Predator. Prey. Both.
Or something worse.
The woods held still.
Then, from high in the branches above, a crow screamed; a harsh cutting cry like something breaking that split the stillness wide open. It took flight, feathers scattering like ash.
Someone would break first.
I intended to make sure it wasn’t me.