Chapter 10-Serena
A scream tore out of me before I knew it was mine.
The thing coming toward me was wrong in every conceivable way.
It was shaped like a woman from the waist up, but everything below that dissolved into a grotesque, undulating slug body.
Its flesh glistened wetly in the stormlight, translucent in places, veins pulsing beneath slick skin.
Its mouth opened far too wide, ringed with lamprey-like teeth that churned and flexed as if tasting the air.
Me.
It was tasting me.
My tears.
My fear.
My humiliation.
I froze.
Not because I wanted to—because my body simply stopped responding. All the self-defense lectures from the Institute’s welcome packet meant nothing in that moment.
All I could hear was the ocean slamming against rock and the wet drag of that thing sliding toward me.
Then he came.
Not like a person running.
Not even like something human.
He dropped from the sky.
Wings that cut through rain.
Large black wings that snapped open like blades.
Lightning forked behind him, outlining massive shoulders and spiraled horns and a body built like it had been sculpted for war.
He hit the Daemon mid-lunge.
The impact shook the cliff.
I stumbled backward and fell hard onto the stone, barely dodging the creature’s whipping tail. My palms scraped. My hip slammed into rock.
And then I looked up.
Oh.
Oh no.
He was beautiful.
Not in a safe way.
Not in a gentle way.
In a dangerous way.
His skin was black as a raven’s wing, but not flat—it shimmered with an undertone like polished obsidian.
Runes burned violet across his chest and shoulders, not tattooed, not inked, but alive.
Each mark pulsed with fire beneath the skin, as if molten light flowed through carved channels in his body.
He roared—deep, primal—as the Daemon struck him in the abdomen.
“Ooof!”
I flinched.
The second slug-thing was slithering toward him from behind, its circular mouth opening in eager anticipation.
He growled.
And I felt it.
Not heard.
Felt.
Two parts rage.
One part worry.
For me.
The sensation hit my sternum like heat.
How did I know what he was feeling?
Why did it feel like it mattered?
What was he doing here?
He didn’t know me.
I was nobody.
Just the chubby, weird girl who sees ghosts and blurts it out in a tavern full of supernaturals.
God.
Everyone knew now.
Roommates.
Dietrich.
The other dude—Olaf, I think.
Basically, Buckie’s entire clientele.
I had finally told the truth, and what did it get me?
Fear.
Judgment.
Distance.
Like always.
My chest tightened—not from magic this time—from abject humiliation.
The tears came again.
And that was new.
I don’t cry.
I stopped crying when I was twelve, and a ghost followed me home for six months, whispering about how she drowned in a bathtub.
Ghosts latch onto sadness.
They cling to it.
Feed on it.
I learned early that if I wanted quiet, I needed to be calm.
Cheerful.
Serene—like my name.
Yeah, right.
I just needed to fake it long enough, and maybe the dead would lose interest.
But tonight—tonight I’d cracked.
And the universe had responded with slug-women from hell.
“Get down and stay down!” the winged stranger barked.
I scrambled, grabbing the nearest thing—a loose stone from the parapet.
I hurled it.
It hit the closest Daemon square in the side of its head with a sickening thud.
“Fuck,” he growled as it pivoted toward me.
Oh.
Right.
Bad idea.
“Shit,” I whimpered.
I crawled backward.
My heel slipped on rain-slick rock and I went down hard again, landing squarely on my butt.
Thank God for curves.
The second Daemon lunged at him, its mouth closing over his shoulder.
He roared.
Not in fear.
In fury.
He didn’t let go of the first one.
He was fighting both.
For me.
Something inside me snapped into place.
No.
Not snapped.
Ignited.
My vision tunneled.
The world dimmed at the edges.
I wasn’t thinking about humiliation anymore.
I wasn’t thinking about Buckie’s.
I was thinking about him.
He cannot fall.
He cannot die.
That thought was not rational.
But it was absolute.
My gaze flicked toward the forest.
And I saw it.
A shadow.
Not a Daemon.
Not a slug-thing.
A spirit.
Blurry.
Dark.
Watching.
Waiting.
It felt curious.
Detached.
But aware.
My heart pounded so violently I thought it might split open.
I pointed.
“Help him!”
The words didn’t feel like words.
They felt like command.
Something exploded out of me.
Sharp.
Glittering.
Purple.
It burst from my chest in jagged waves, visible even in the storm light. I gasped at the sight of it—actual magic, streaming from my body like lightning made of amethyst.
The energy slammed into the waiting spirit.
And the ghost screamed.
Not in fear.
In purpose.
It surged forward like a banshee unleashed, wrapping around one of the Daemons and dragging it backward.
Its incorporeal hands became claws of shrieking wind as it shoved another of the creatures over the cliff.
The Daemon howled as it disappeared.
The last slug-thing barely had time to react before my savior tore it apart with savage efficiency.
Silence fell.
Just rain.
Just ocean.
Just my ragged breathing.
And then—nothing.
My strength evaporated.
My limbs went heavy.
My magic receded like a tide pulling out too fast.
I collapsed forward onto my hands.
“Serena,”
His voice was closer now.
Closer than it should be.
I looked up.
He was kneeling in front of me.
Worry radiated off him in waves.
I felt it again—that strange emotional echo—like his concern reverberated through my own chest.
I thought it odd he knew my name, and when I asked him about it he told me.
I asked more questions and his answers were clipped.
Normally, that tone would have set me off.
I don’t take well to bossiness.
But beneath the growl was fear.
For me.
So when he said follow, I did.
And when I asked him if he was coming too, he replied, “Soon.”
It shouldn’t have hurt—but it felt like rejection and my knees wobbled with each step I took until I collapsed under the weight of it.
“Fuck. You should have stayed hidden,” he growled, coming up from behind me.
“I’m no one’s damsel in distress,” I muttered.
“Foolish girl. Brave, but foolish.”
His arms slid under me before I could protest.
One behind my shoulders.
One beneath my knees.
And he lifted me effortlessly.
Princess-style—the secret wish of every plus size girl.
Heat enveloped me instantly.
His body ran warm—almost fever-hot—and the runes across his chest pulsed faintly through my cheek where I rested against him.
“What are you doing?” I asked weakly.
“Carrying you.”
“You knew my name and now you’re carrying me.”
“Yes.”
“How? Why?”
A flicker in his eyes.
Intensity.
Possession.
Something deeper.
“I heard it and it’s the polite thing to do.”
Liar.
Not malicious.
But incomplete.
“Your name is Raven,” I replied, fighting to stay awake.
“I am the Draugr.”
“We already said that’s just a title.”
Silence.
The storm wind tugged at his wings.
The runes flared brighter for half a second.
“Fine. Then yes, my given name is Raven.”
I gazed at his obsidian skin and hid my smile.
Raven.
It fit him.
Dark.
Sharp.
Beautiful.
“If you’re done with your questions, may I take you to the infirmary now?” he added, sounding irritated.
I frowned.
What was he annoyed about?
I could have died.
He could have died.
And somehow he was irritated?
Then I realized—he was irritated with himself.
With something inside himself.
That emotional echo hit me again.
Conflict.
Hunger.
Restraint.
It was dizzying.
“Sorry,” I murmured. “You already saved me from those slugs, you don’t have to carry me, too. I know it’s not easy—”
“First, I told you those were Algea,” he interrupted. “Three sister Daemons. Minor Greek deities. They feed on misery. Your tears drew them.”
Oh.
Yeah.
Well, that was comforting.
Not.
“So, you’re saying this is my fault?”
“Of course not, Unnasta.”
The word wrapped around me softly.
Unnasta.
It sounded ancient.
Private.
“And second,” he continued quietly, “you are wrong.”
“About what?”
“Carrying you. It is my pleasure.”
The words sank straight into my belly.
Heat pooled there.
Deep.
Low.
Dangerous.
My eyelids drooped.
The world tilted sideways.
Everything felt far away except him.
The rhythm of his breathing.
The steady thud of his heart beneath my cheek.
The faint hum of magic where our bodies touched.
“Okay, Raven. Thank you,” I whispered.
“You don’t have to thank me.”
“No, I do because I think I’m about to—”
But I didn’t finish the sentence because, right then—darkness.
But not the frightening kind.
Not the suffocating kind.
This darkness felt like velvet.
Like deep water.
Like something welcoming me instead of chasing me.
For the first time in my life—the dark did not feel crowded.
It felt quiet.
Safe.
And somewhere in that velvet stillness, I felt something thread between us.
Not hunger or fear.
Like a line.
A thread. Taut. Glowing faintly violet and ember-gold.
Binding.
And even as I slipped fully under, one thought burned steady and clear.
Whatever Raven was to me?
Meeting him tonight was not an accident.