Prologue
Some nightmares don’t fade with the morning light. Some follow you, waiting to claim you.
Run.
The instinct pulsed through Zoey as she tore through the forest, her bare feet striking the damp earth. The trees loomed tall and skeletal, their twisted branches clawing at the fog-heavy air. Shadows stretched unnaturally across the ground, shifting as if they were alive.
The growls came next.
Low at first.
Distant.
Then closer.
Something was hunting her.
The thick mist curled around her legs, dragging at her steps like unseen hands. She pushed forward, lungs burning, heart pounding. The forest thinned, the trees giving way to an open stretch of land…then nothing.
A cliff.
She skidded to a stop, the loose dirt crumbling beneath her heels. Below, the sea churned, a restless, inky black abyss. Waves crashed against jagged rocks, sending up ghostly plumes of white mist. There was no way forward. No way down.
The growls deepened.
The air thickened, charged with something unseen. The shadows behind her pulsed, shifting like a living thing. A presence loomed just out of reach – watching.
Then came the voice. Smooth, low, and taunting. “You belong to me.”
Zoey stiffened. Her breath hitched in her throat. “There is nowhere to run, little raven.”
The words slithered over her skin, curling around her like a phantom touch. The darkness presses closer. Her pulse hammered against her ribs. She turned, just as a force-cold and unseen-slammed into her chest.
She fell.
The wind screamed past her, tearing at her clothes, at her hair. Her own scream ripped from her throat, lost in the violent crash of waves below. The last thing she saw was the full moon, silver and merciless, glowing like an unblinking eye in the sky.
Then…
Darkness.
Zoey gasped awake, her body jerking forward in the seat. The phantom weight of the fall clung to her. Her skin damp with sweat. The world around her was different now. Too sharp. Too real. The low rumble of tires on asphalt, the rhythmic flicker of headlights cutting through the night. The car’s interior was dim, familiar.
A voice broke through the haze.
“You alright there, pumpkin?”
Her father.
She exhaled slowly. Forcing herself to loosen her grip on the water bottle she hadn’t realized she was clutching. The plastic crinkled under her fingers.
“Yeah” she muttered, voice rough. “Just a dream.”
But as she stared out the window into the passing darkness, she couldn’t shake the feeling that someone-something- was still watching.
Waiting.
so far so good