THE STRANGER

The rain didn’t stop when the screams began.

It fell harder.

Thunder swallowed the sound of footsteps—frantic, wild, soaked in fear—as Evelyn darted through the woods behind the academy. Her breath hitched with each branch that scratched her skin, each whisper the trees seemed to carry. She didn’t dare look back.

Something was chasing her.

Or maybe… calling her.

She didn’t know which terrified her more.

Ten minutes ago, she was safe. Ten minutes ago, she was a normal senior at Windgrave Academy, buried in ancient Latin texts, seated under flickering chandeliers in a forgotten corner of the east wing. Her biggest worry had been whether her thesis on ancient blood rituals would pass.

But that was before the red moon rose.

Before the air changed.

Before she heard the scream that didn’t sound quite human.

She had looked out the arched window, expecting maybe a prank or some late-night dare.

What she saw instead was the sky burning crimson.

And something in the shadows—eyes watching her.

The librarian had vanished. One moment she was stacking books, the next she was gone, like the darkness swallowed her whole.

That was when Evelyn ran.

The storm seemed to follow her. Lightning flared like an angry warning, revealing brief flashes of the forest path she didn’t remember taking. Her ankle twisted on a thick root, sending her sprawling into the mud. She bit back a cry, forcing herself to her feet.

Somewhere behind her, branches snapped.

Closer.

Too close.

Then—silence. Complete, suffocating silence.

She stopped.

Her chest heaved. Her fingers gripped the bark of a nearby tree as she leaned against it, trying to calm the panic threatening to break her.

This isn’t happening.

Then she saw it.

A flicker of red through the trees.

A figure. Still. Waiting.

A man.

He stood in the center of a clearing, cloaked in crimson that shimmered under the storm like blood silk. The wind didn’t touch him. The rain didn’t soak him. He was impossibly dry.

Impossibly still.

Evelyn stumbled back, but the forest had shifted behind her. The path she came from was gone.

She turned back. He was closer.

She hadn’t seen him move.

Lightning tore across the sky.

That’s when she saw his face.

Pale. Beautiful. Eyes like molten ember, glowing with something ancient, something dangerous. He tilted his head slightly, like she was something he didn’t quite understand—or maybe something he knew all too well.

Then he spoke.

“I found you.”

Evelyn froze.

His voice didn’t match his appearance. It wasn’t youthful, wasn’t soft. It carried weight. Time. Pain.

He took another step, and this time, she stumbled to her knees. Mud clung to her legs. Her pulse pounded in her ears.

“Please,” she whispered. “Who… who are you?”

He crouched before her, close enough for her to see the vein pulsing beneath the flawless skin of his neck.

“You bear the mark,” he said, reaching for her hand.

She pulled away, but he caught her wrist—not hard, not rough. Gentle. Reverent.

Lightning struck again, and she saw it.

The symbol.

A scarlet sigil burned faintly beneath the skin of her wrist. A twisting, ancient rune that hadn’t been there before.

Her eyes widened in horror.

“What did you do to me?”

“I didn’t mark you,” he murmured. “Fate did.”

He touched the mark with his thumb, and Evelyn felt warmth spread through her entire body. Like fire and ice colliding in her veins. Like her soul had been yanked forward—drawn to him.

She gasped and tried to pull back, but he held her gaze.

“I’ve waited lifetimes to destroy it,” he said.

Then, just as her vision blurred, just as her body slumped from whatever power he awakened—she saw them.

Fangs.

White. Sharp. Glinting in the dark.

He wasn’t human.

Her eyes fluttered shut.

Darkness claimed her.

She didn’t remember dreaming.

Just heat. Voices.

And one name, whispered like a prayer and a curse:

Lucien.

Evelyn awoke in a bed that wasn’t hers.

Silk sheets. Stone walls. Candlelight.

Her head pounded. Her wrist burned.

The mark was still there.

She sat up too fast and winced. Her ankle throbbed, wrapped in gauze. A velvet robe had been placed over her soaked clothes.

“You heal slowly,” a voice said.

She turned.

He was there.

Lucien.

Leaning against the wall, arms crossed, those ember eyes studying her.

“Where am I?” she asked.

“Somewhere safe.”

“Why me?”

He walked toward her, each step controlled.

“Because the mark chose you.”

“What does it mean?”

He hesitated, then said darkly, “It means you’re cursed.”

Evelyn gripped the bedsheets.

“What kind of curse?”

Lucien looked away.

When he finally met her gaze, his expression was unreadable.

“It means if I don’t kill you,” he said quietly, “we both die.”