Chapter 1: A Dream of Ash and Starlight

Chapter 1: A Dream of Ash and Starlight

The dreams had started on the first night of the red moon.

Liora lay in bed, bathed in the bruised light of twilight that filtered through her narrow window. The dream still clung to her skin, her breath shallow, nipples pebbled beneath her thin shift, thighs pressed together. Not from the chill.

From him.

Every night now, he came to her.

Not with words. Never with words.

Just the ghost of fingertips down her bare spine, lips brushing the hollow of her throat, and the unmistakable heat of a body that didn’t belong in this world. Eyes like storm clouds and summer lightning. Hair that shimmered silver in the dark. A voice she’d never heard, but felt like thunder in her bones.

She didn’t know his name.

But her body remembered him.

And when she woke up, gasping and aching with want, the forest whispered his name on the wind, though she couldn’t yet understand it.

The village of Briarhollow had always called the woods cursed. Generations ago, the elders had woven charms of ash and bone to keep children away from the treeline.

But Liora had never feared the forest.

She belonged to it. Even when it shouldn’t want her.

That morning, as she walked barefoot across the dewy grass, skirt gathered in one hand and hair unbraided, the trees called to her like a lover’s sigh. She could feel him near. The man from her dreams. Or maybe… the one who had once been real.

The red moon would rise again tonight.

And with it, the veil between their worlds would thin.

She didn’t tell her mother where she was going. The woman wouldn’t understand. She still clutched her faith and clung to village gods who had stopped listening long ago. Liora knew better.

Magic wasn’t in temples.

It was in longing. In danger. In the pull of something you shouldn’t touch but couldn’t help reaching for.

At the edge of Myriath Forest

The silver path wasn’t there yesterday.

It shimmered now like a ribbon of moonlight winding into the darkness of the trees. She didn’t hesitate.

The moment her bare foot touched the first stone, a jolt surged through her spine—like a kiss, like a threat.

The air thickened. Her breath caught.

And then… the world shifted.

In the Heart of the Forest

He stood there, waiting. As if he knew she would come.

Caelan.

She didn’t know how she knew his name—but she did. Like it had been carved into her soul in another life.

His body was built like a blade: tall, lean, powerful, silver tattoos curling around his arms like starlight turned flesh. His eyes were cold. Dangerous.

And yet, when they locked onto hers, something inside him fractured.

"You came," he said, voice rough like stone scraping against velvet.

"I didn’t have a choice," she whispered. "You called me."

He stepped closer. “I warned the forest to keep you away.”

She tilted her chin up. “Then you warned it wrong.”

His eyes flared. “You have no idea what you’re walking into, mortal.”

“And you have no idea what I’m willing to give up to feel real again.”

A beat of silence.

Then he moved—fast.

One moment, he was a few steps away. The next, his hand cupped the back of her neck, breath mingling with hers.

“Say that again,” he growled.

Her lips brushed his. “Make me.”

And then he kissed her.

Gods, he kissed her.

Not sweet. Not gentle. It was hunger. Years of longing crashing into one furious, desperate kiss. Teeth. Tongues. Hands in hair. Her back slammed into a tree trunk, and she moaned as he lifted her like she weighed nothing.

His mouth traveled down her throat. “I shouldn’t be doing this…”

Her thighs clenched around his hips. “Then stop.”

He didn’t.

Later

Their breaths mingled in the silence.

She lay tangled in his arms, dress ruined, skin bruised in the most delicious ways. His fingers lazily traced circles on her hip.

“You’re not just a dream, are you?” she asked.

“No.” He kissed her collarbone. “But I may become one again. When the moons part, so do our worlds.”

“I won’t forget you,” she whispered.

“You will. That’s the curse.”

Her heart stilled. “Then break it.”

Caelan closed his eyes.

“It’s not that simple.”

End of Chapter 1

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