Chapter 2 Selene
TWO
SELENE
Morning light filters through the cabin windows, pale and watery. I’ve been awake for hours, watching the shadows retreat across the floor.
I shove off the couch where I’d eventually collapsed, baseball bat still within arm’s reach. Every muscle protests. My neck has a crick from sleeping upright, and my eyes feel like someone poured sand in them.
Coffee. I need coffee. And cell signal. And possibly a psychiatrist.
The kitchen provides the first. I find a French press and grounds that smell recent enough. While the water heats, I stare at my phone. Still no signal. The landline is still dead. I’m completely cut off from the outside world.
There has to be higher ground somewhere. A clearing. Something.
I pour my coffee, drink it black and scalding, and make a decision.
I’m not spending another day trapped in this cabin waiting for talking shadows to make good on their threats. When the sun is fully up, I’m going to find a cell signal, call for help, and get the hell off this mountain.
The hidden compartment in the living room yields more than just journals. Behind a false panel, I find a hunting knife in a worn leather sheath. The blade is old but sharp, the grip molded to fit a hand. Grandma’s hand, maybe. Or someone who came before her.
I strap it to my belt and feel slightly less like prey.
Bears I can handle. I pull on my boots, still damp from last night’s rain. Talking shadows, we’ll see.
The forest looks different in daylight. Less menacing. Almost peaceful.
Birds sing in the canopy. Sunlight dapples through the leaves, creating shifting patterns on the forest floor. A light breeze carries the scent of pine and damp earth.
I follow a trail that leads away from the cabin, phone held high, searching for a single bar of signal. The path winds uphill through old-growth pines, their trunks wide enough to hide behind. Not that I’m thinking about hiding. Not that I’m cataloging every potential escape route.
Okay, maybe I’m thinking about it a little.
The sound of water reaches me first—a stream, somewhere ahead. I quicken my pace. Higher ground often means clearer signals, and streams usually flow downhill from somewhere elevated.
The trail opens onto a small clearing where a stream cuts through the rocks, crystal clear and achingly cold when I dip my fingers in. I splash some on my face, letting the chill shock away the last cobwebs of exhaustion.
For a moment, everything is quiet. Peaceful. Normal.
Then the hair on the back of my neck stands up.
I’m being watched.
The sensation is immediate and undeniable—that prickling awareness on my back, the weight of unseen eyes. Focused.
My hand moves to the knife at my belt. I rise slowly, scanning the tree line.
Nothing moves.
“I know you’re there.” My voice comes out steadier than I feel. “Show yourself or leave. I’m not in the mood for games.”
Silence. The birds have stopped singing.
I draw the knife as a figure emerges from the shadows.
Holy hell.
That’s my first coherent thought. My second is somewhat less flattering.
He’s probably a serial killer.
The man is massive. At least six and a half feet tall, with shoulders broad enough to block the sun filtering through the trees.
His hair is golden, cropped short, and his jaw could cut glass.
He moves with a fluid grace that seems impossible for someone his size—each step deliberate, predatory, closing the distance between us without seeming to hurry.
But it’s his eyes that stop me cold.
They catch the morning light and seem to glow from within. Not natural. Not entirely human. Something about them makes my pulse spike and my skin flush with heat that has nothing to do with fear.
Down, girl. Hot strangers in the woods are never good news.
I grip the knife tighter, hoping he can’t see my hands trembling. “Stop right there.”
He stops. Twenty feet away. Close enough for me to catalog every detail—the worn leather of his boots, the way his clothes stretch across muscles that look carved from stone, the faint scars marking his forearms. Close enough for me to smell him on the breeze.
Woodsmoke. Something wild. Something that makes my body pay attention in ways I absolutely do not have time for.
“You’re trespassing.” His voice is deep, rough, with an accent I can’t place. It rumbles through my chest like thunder.
I raise an eyebrow. “Funny. I have paperwork saying otherwise, Ranger Rick.”
Something flickers across his face. Surprise, maybe. Or amusement. It’s gone before I can identify it.
“This land is dangerous for your kind.”
“My kind?” I tilt my head. “People with functioning brain cells? Because I’m starting to think those are rare around here.”
His mouth twitches. Almost a smile. “You don’t understand what you’re dealing with.”
“Then explain instead of lurking like some mountain Sasquatch.” I gesture with the knife. “Were you the one watching me last night?”
The almost-smile vanishes. His jaw tightens. “That wasn’t me.”
“Then who was it?”
“Creatures you’d be better off never meeting.”
I keep my grip firm on the knife. “Well, unless you want to tell me what the hell is going on, I suggest you back off and let me find cell signal so I can call the police, the National Guard, or whoever handles giant monsters in the woods.”
He takes another step forward.
Heat rolls off him—actual, physical heat, as if he’s running a fever that should have killed him hours ago. It washes over my skin, makes my breath catch in my throat.
I take another step back. Water soaks into my boots.
He follows. Stalking. That’s the only word for it. Every movement controlled, purposeful, his gaze locked on mine with an intensity that makes my stomach flip.
Stop looking at his mouth. Stop wondering what he’d feel like pressed against—
“There is no cell signal for miles.” His voice drops lower, more intimate. “No police. No National Guard. Nothing that could help you against what’s coming.”
“That’s reassuring. Thanks for the pep talk.”
“Leave.” The word is clipped. Final. “Tonight. I’ll escort you to the main road.”
“Or what?” I force my voice to stay steady despite the heat flooding my cheeks. “You’ll glower me to death?”
“You have no idea what I’m capable of.”
“Try me, caveman.”
The challenge hangs between us, loaded with something neither of us acknowledges. His jaw works. His hands flex at his sides—large hands, capable hands, the kind that could break bones or cradle something precious with equal ease.
What is wrong with you? He’s threatening you. Stop finding him attractive.
But my body doesn’t seem to care about logic. My heart races. My skin tingles where his heat touches it. Something deep in my chest pulls toward him, inexplicable and insistent.
His eyes flash. Actually flash—a flare of something bright behind his irises that’s gone before I can process it.
Definitely not normal human eyes.
“Who are you?” I demand. “What are you?”
He’s close now. Too close. I can see the faint stubble on his jaw, the individual strands of gold in his hair. His scent fills my lungs with every breath—smoke and pine and something underneath that makes me want to lean closer.
I do the opposite. Back up until I’m standing in the stream up to my ankles, water seeping through my boots. The cold is a shock, a reminder that I need to keep my head.
“Someone who’s trying to keep you alive.” His voice is strained. Controlled. As if he’s fighting something. “Despite your apparent determination to get yourself killed.”
“I didn’t ask for your protection.”
“No. You didn’t.”
We stare at each other. The stream rushes around my legs. His heat pushes against me even from this distance, impossible, intoxicating.
Kiss him, something whispers in the back of my mind. Stab him. Same thing.
An inhuman roar shatters the moment.
It tears through the forest from somewhere to the east—a sound that vibrates in my bones, primal and furious. Not an animal. Nothing that belongs in these woods. Nothing that belongs anywhere in the natural world.
The man’s entire demeanor transforms in an instant.
Gone is the controlled tension, the careful stalking. He whirls toward the sound, his body coiling with a predatory readiness that raises every hair on my arms. His hands curl into fists. Something ripples under his skin—something not human, straining to break free.
“Get to the cabin.” His voice is different. Deeper. Rougher. Animal authority bleeds through every syllable. “Lock the doors. Don’t come out until I return.”
“But—”
“GO!”
The command hits me with physical force. My legs move before my brain catches up, scrambling out of the stream, slipping on wet rocks. I look back once and see him moving toward the sound, his stride lengthening, his body seeming to grow as he disappears into the trees.
I run.
The trail blurs past me. Branches scratch my arms. My lungs burn. But I don’t stop, don’t slow, don’t let myself think about anything except reaching the cabin.
Behind me, something roars again. Closer this time. Answered by another sound—a different roar, deeper, resonant, that shakes the trees.
Two of them. There are at least two of whatever the hell is out there.
The cabin appears through the trees. I burst through the door, slam it behind me, throw the deadbolt. Shove a chair under the handle. Grab the baseball bat from where I left it by the couch.
My hands shake. My whole body trembles.
Through the window, I can see nothing but trees and morning light. No monsters. No mysterious strangers. Just the peaceful mountain forest pretending it isn’t hiding impossible things.
I sink onto the couch, bat across my knees, and try to process what just happened.
Great, Selene. I press my palms against my temples. Attracted to the possibly dangerous mountain man. Your judgment in men hasn’t improved.
But even as I mock myself, I can’t shake the image of him stepping between me and that sound. The way his body had tensed, ready to face whatever was coming. The protective fury in his voice when he ordered me to run.
He knew what was out there. He wasn’t afraid of it.
No—that’s not quite right. He wasn’t afraid for himself. But when that roar echoed through the forest, his first thought had been to protect me.
Why? He doesn’t even know me.
I think about his eyes. The way they’d flashed with that otherworldly light. The heat that rolled off him in waves. The predatory grace of his movements.
Dragon bloodlines, Grandma’s journal had said. They walk among us, hidden in plain sight.
No. That’s insane. He’s just a man. A weird, intense, frustratingly attractive man who lives in the woods and makes cryptic threats.
Another roar splits the air, followed by a crash that shakes the cabin walls.
I grip the bat tighter and wait.
An hour passes. Then two.
The sounds from the forest fade. The birds start singing again. Sunlight creeps across the cabin floor, marking time in golden stripes.
I pace. I check the windows. I read more of Grandma’s journals, searching for anything that might explain what I’ve stumbled into.
The Guardians protect our kind, one entry reads. They are the warriors, the protectors, the ones who stand between our world and those who would destroy it. They are dangerous, yes. But they are necessary.
Guardians. Is that what he is?
I flip to another page.
Fire-Bringers are rare. Most go their whole lives without knowing what they are, their power dormant, their blood unremarkable. But when a Fire-Bringer awakens—when they find their dragon—everything changes.
Their dragon.
I close the journal and stare at the door. A knock rattles the wood.
I’m on my feet instantly, bat raised, heart hammering. “Who’s there?”
“Open the door.” That deep voice, rough and commanding. The mountain man. “It’s safe. For now.”
I hesitate. Every sensible instinct screams at me to keep the door closed, to wait until he leaves, to barricade myself inside until help arrives.
But help isn’t coming. He was right about that much. No cell signal. No landline. No way out except on foot through monster-infested woods.
I move the chair. Undo the deadbolt. Open the door.
He’s standing on the porch, looking like he just fought through hell and won. There’s blood on his forearm—his own or something else’s, I can’t tell—and a fresh tear in his shirt. His hair is disheveled, his breathing slightly uneven.
But his eyes are clear. Focused. Fixed on me with an intensity that makes my stomach drop.
“You’re hurt.” The words slip out before I can stop them.
“It’s nothing.” He dismisses the blood with a glance. “You need to leave this mountain. Today.”
“My car is dead.”
A flicker of something crosses his face. “I’ll take you to the main road. There’s a town fifteen miles south. You can get help there.”
“And if I don’t want to leave?”
He goes very still. “Then you’re a fool.”
“Maybe.” I lean against the door frame, refusing to be intimidated.
“But this cabin belongs to me now. My grandmother left it to me. And according to her journals, I’m something called a Fire-Bringer, which apparently makes me valuable to whatever creatures are stalking these woods.
” I cross my arms. “So unless you want to explain what’s actually going on—what you are, what they are, why everyone seems so interested in my blood—I’m not going anywhere. ”
He stares at me for a long moment. Something shifts in his expression—frustration, respect, something darker I can’t name.
“You’re stubborn.”
“I’ve been told.”
“And reckless.”
“Yup.”
His jaw works. His hands flex at his sides. For a moment, I think he’s going to argue. Then he exhales—a controlled release of breath that seems to cost him something.
“Drayke.”
“What?”
“My name.” He meets my gaze. “Drayke. And you’re right to be afraid of what’s out there. But you should be equally afraid of me.”
He turns and walks off the porch, disappearing into the tree line without looking back.
I watch him go, my heart still racing, my skin still tingling from his proximity.
Drayke. The name echoes in my mind. Guardian or monster? Protector or threat?
I close the door and lean against it, pressing my hand to my chest where my heart pounds against my ribs.
Whatever he is, he stepped between me and danger. Whatever he is, he came back to check on me.
And whatever he is, my body responds to him in ways I can’t control and don’t understand.
You should be equally afraid of me.
The warning lingers. But as I move back to the couch, Grandma’s journals spread around me, I realize something troubling.
I’m not afraid of him at all.
And that, more than anything, terrifies me.