1. Alec

Chapter 1

Alec

T he orange of the explosion was almost indistinguishable from the fiery sunset, the light from both cutting through the forest and blinding him for a long moment. Blinking away tears, Alec shielded his eyes, waiting for his vision to clear, listening for signs of pursuit. While this gave him an advantage in avoiding pursuers, the reverberating booms of the initial explosion and subsequent smaller chain reactions left his ears ringing, and waiting to move until his hearing recovered was wasting precious time. The forest floor was covered in a thick layer of leaves, the bare branches and the absence of undergrowth making it easier for sound to travel farther. It would make anyone chasing him easy to hear, but would work against him when he decided to move from his hiding spot.

The forest itself was deathly quiet, the fading echoes of the distant explosion having frightened the few remaining birds and critters in the woods into silence. A spattering of debris from the explosion fell like rain, pinging off trees and disturbing the dry leaves. Nothing larger than a marble fell near him, but he stayed under the fallen tree for a bit longer to make sure he wasn't taken out by a random, unseen chunk of concrete falling from the sky.

Not even the wind stirred in the deafening silence left in the wake of the explosion, and Alec held himself as still as he could manage, ears straining to catch any sounds of pursuit.

Nothing.

He all but collapsed to the cold, damp ground, glad he was already crouching. His limbs trembled and he curled under the felled tree, the old oak a sturdy shelter even decades after lightning set it aflame and it tumbled to the earth. The tree was scorched in the center along the core, the inside hollowed out, and the trunk was split higher up from the lightning strike. The ground around the roots was barren and the ends of a few roots remaining in the earth were blackened by fire where they once connected to the main root ball.

His senses were recovering from the bespelled shackles he had worn the last few weeks, and the raw, slow-healing scars on his wrists stung from sweat and dirt. Cold, aching, hungry, and terrified, he was miserable, but none of it mattered—he was free.

Alec waited until the shadows were longer, the night around him still and quiet, before he limped out from his hiding spot and headed deeper into the woods, in the opposite direction of his former prison.

Leif

An explosion rocked the woods, and Leif growled instinctively as he swung his head in the direction of the disturbance, ears flattening to his skull to protect them from the painful noise.

He crouched low, and despite his massive size, found cover in a dense raspberry bramble. The many thorny vines were bare of leaves but the sheer number of them was more than enough to conceal a massive werewolf, the gray and brown of the dormant bramble blending perfectly with his coat. The evening air was cold, but as long as he breathed at a measured pace, not even a puff of his warm breath would betray his position. He had no idea what was going on, and while he healed incredibly quickly, he hadn’t yet tested his resilience against an explosion and wasn’t keen to try.

Not even a half-mile away, his sensitive ears picked up the sounds of fire and humans shouting, and his nose caught hints of scalding smoke, charred concrete, and heat-warped metal. In the direction of the explosion lay a compound run by the local crime syndicate, a relatively small operation of the mountain mafia that nonetheless was dangerous enough that Leif steered clear of the property and its people, not wanting trouble. It was the only structure within miles of his territory large enough to account for the amount of debris falling in the woods.

He wasn’t afraid, he simply hated dealing with people, and mob types were nearly as territorial as werewolves; he had no interest in that drama. As far as he knew, the humans had no idea he was out here in the woods, and they never entered the forest, aside from tossing trash into the treeline behind the buildings that were in use. Not the type to care about the environment, and that disgusted him, but he wasn’t going to alert them to his presence by making a fuss .

Unless they encroached farther into the preserve—then he had no problem handling trespassers… with his teeth. His territory was old, well-established, and the locals knew better than to trespass. Most of the locals avoided the illegal operations going on at the old gravel factory, which once crushed down the massive rocks quarried from farther up the mountains. The area had been abandoned back in the late 1970s, and no one was around to raise objections when the shady group using it now moved in about a decade ago.

Leif waited until the distant furor calmed before he lifted from his crouch in the brambles, shaking out his heavy coat and grumbling at the damp earth stuck to his paws. The cold didn’t bother him, not with his background, but mud was an annoyance he could do without. He aimed his nose for home and set out at a lope, ears pricked, eyes accustomed to the deep shadows of the woods.

Twilight deepened, the sky overhead clear and the stars out already. The wind was brisk, carrying hints of fire and some acrid chemicals that must have caught fire as a result of the explosion. Thankfully, the wind had shifted with nightfall and the scent cleared out, saving his nose from the stench.

He lived farther up the mountain, on a steep hillside overlooking part of the narrow valley below. The only path up was full of tight switchbacks and random drop-offs from granite and shale cliffs. His cabin sat in the mouth of an abandoned mine, the main shaft only penetrating into the mountainside about a hundred meters before stopping at a wall of bedrock with abandoned support timbers stacked along a wall and the rusted-out heads of pickaxes the only things to be found in the depths when Leif first explored the area.

His cabin hid the mine, a tiny little shack in truth, at least from the outside. From within it was far larger, owing to the wide mouth of what must have been a natural cave before miners in the early 1800s tried their luck at digging for gold. Too bad for the miners, but good for Leif, that they found nothing and cleared out, leaving behind plenty of cut hardwood beams from the old-growth trees that once covered the entire span of the Appalachians. The beams were dry and protected inside the cave, even two centuries later. Leif managed to build himself a respectable cabin at the mouth of the mine and shore up the majority of the mine shaft, not wanting a cave-in to ruin a good night’s sleep.

He was nearing the secluded entrance to the path up to his cabin when instinct had him stopping, and he crouched, senses narrowing in on the sound and scent of a warm body nearby.

Blood and iron in layers that came in varying waves of density as the person moved and the air currents pushed the scent particles ahead of the stranger. Ears twitching, he zeroed in on the direction of the person approaching, and his nose told him plenty about the intruder before his eyes even made out the struggling figure leaning on a tree not far from the hidden entrance of the cabin path.

Young, lean, pale skin streaked by dirt and sweat, and blood crusted on both wrists. Light blond hair stained by sweat and grime—the whole bedraggled picture punctuated by ragged breathing and a racing heart. Denim pants torn at the knees, less about fashion, as the scratched knees beneath told Leif that the stranger had fallen, or perhaps been pushed, injuring themselves more than once. Shoes more suited to a trip to town than hiking in dense woodlands in unfriendly terrain—whoever this was, they had not intended to be out in the woods, bedraggled and spent.

Wildflowers.

It came slowly, his nose registering the sweetness just before the stranger lifted his head and gray eyes flashed with inner light. This one was magic, a type found in the heartbeat of the natural world.

Fae.

“I know you’re out there,” the stranger spoke, voice a bit rough from exertion, but its gentle tenor spoke of youth. Not a child—grown, but definitely still quite young. Not that a youthful appearance was a true indicator of age with fae. Some fae were far, far older than they looked, but Leif had plenty of experience telling supernatural creatures’ ages based on a multitude of clues. “Whoever you are, or whatever. But I’m guessing who, since I’m not being eaten alive. Am I right?”

Leif huffed, a white puff of breath rising from his nose, and those gray eyes tried to find him in the shadows. Even scared, injured, and alone, this young fae displayed a rare humor and bravery in calling out to the predator lurking in the dark. He reminded Leif of one of his own people from so very long ago. Laughing even when death hovered on the edges of the shadows closing in, grinning and fearless in battle.

“I’m not a threat,” the stranger said, pulling Leif from his haunting memories. The young fae groaned quietly as he slid down the tree he was leaning against, all but collapsing on his rear, grimacing. Hands dirty with mud and blood shook before he tucked them under his arms, squinting a bit as he stared with increasing accuracy to where Leif was in the shadows. “Perhaps you can point me toward the nearest road? I don’t know the immediate area, and I’m a bit of a mess right now. I couldn’t hurt you if I wanted to.”

Leif snorted in amusement, and the stranger even managed a tiny smile at the sound, and Leif was thoroughly charmed despite his wariness.

Whoever this stranger was, Leif sensed no weapon, and the magic inherent in all fae was so varied that trying to predict what offensive capabilities someone of fae ancestry had was nearly fruitless. Instinct told him the young fae was no threat, and he hadn’t lived as long as he had by ignoring his instincts.

He stepped out from the deepest shadows, and a hint of silvery light from the sliver of moon breaking the horizon was enough to illuminate him for the fae. The way those gray eyes went wide, and the freeze response in that lean form, told him the fae saw him well enough despite the limited light.

The youngling was beautiful, but it was the wary, pained, and yet somehow resigned strength in those lovely eyes that lured Leif from his long-standing resolve to remain apart from the world. He saw himself reflected in those eyes, not as he was now—but as he could be, should be, had a witch not destroyed his life and pack over a thousand years ago, Leif literally cursed to be alone. The fae gazed at him in admiration, some awe, and the appreciation had him lifting his head higher, legs straightening to his full height.

The moon rose enough in that moment that the silver light gilded the young man and the tree he leaned on, and Leif struggled not to show the impact it had on him. Soul-deep and as inevitable as the travels of the celestial bodies high above in the ink-black sky, Leif succumbed to Fate’s whimsy and capricious cruelty—a soulmate, centuries past his decision to stop hoping, and one curse too late for love.