If I had stayed home that night, I wouldn’t have met him, and maybe my life wouldn’t have unraveled the way it did. Maybe I would still be living the same quiet, suffocating life I had always known. But staying has never come easily to me. It feels too much like slowly disappearing, like breathing without ever truly living, and I’ve never been good at pretending I’m content with that.
Morvanya is the kind of place where nothing changes unless something breaks. The streets are always the same, the people always watching, always judging, always expecting you to become exactly what they’ve decided you should be. Girls here don’t grow into themselves, they are shaped, softened, and silenced until they fit neatly into lives men chose for them. I felt that pressure every single day, like invisible hands trying to press me into something smaller. I resisted it in every way I could, even when it made my life harder.
That morning started like all the others, with the cold slipping through the cracks in the walls and settling into my bones before I even left my bed. I tied the ribbon around my waist slowly, staring at nothing in particular, already feeling the weight of the day ahead pressing down on me. Downstairs, the house was alive with quiet tension. My mother moved quickly, her footsteps sharp and restless, while my father sat with that same look of irritation, as if something about me had already disappointed him and the day hadn’t even begun. My siblings blended into the background, careful, controlled, everything I was not.
“Don’t be late today,” my mother said, not even glancing in my direction.
“I’m always on time,” I replied, reaching for a piece of bread, though I wasn’t really hungry.
“That’s not what I meant,” my father muttered under his breath, and something in his tone made my chest tighten, even though I refused to let it show. There was no point arguing. There never had been. With him, words only made things worse, and I had learned long ago that silence was easier, even if it burned on the way down.
The only softness in that house sat by the window. My grandmother’s silver hair caught the early light, making her look almost fragile, but there was nothing weak about her. When she looked at me, it felt like she saw everything, the frustration, the restlessness, the quiet anger I kept buried just beneath the surface.
“Come here,” she said gently.
I walked over without hesitation, and when her hand lifted to my face, her touch was warm, grounding in a way nothing else was. “You feel it, don’t you?” she asked, her voice softer than usual.
“Feel what?” I frowned, though something in me already knew what she meant.
“Something changing,” she murmured, her eyes drifting toward the pale sky beyond the window. The words settled uneasily in my chest, like a warning I couldn’t quite understand. For a moment, I felt it too—a strange pull, like the air itself was holding its breath.
“It’s just another day,” I said, more to reassure myself than her.
“No,” she whispered, her gaze returning to mine. “It isn’t.”
I didn’t respond. I didn’t know how to. Slinging my bag over my shoulder, I told her I would be back before dark, but the way her fingers lingered around mine made something twist inside me, like I was leaving something important behind without realizing it.
The market was loud when I arrived, full of voices and movement, but it didn’t feel alive. It felt desperate. People rushed, bartered, argued, all chasing coins like they were the only thing keeping them afloat. I slipped behind the stall, falling into the same routine my body knew too well, even as my mind pushed against it.
“You’re late,” my brother said, though I wasn’t.
“You’re dramatic,” I replied automatically, and the small smile he gave me was enough to ease something tight in my chest. He was the only one who didn’t make me feel like I was too much or not enough at the same time.
Hours blurred together. Faces came and went, voices blended, and I found myself drifting, imagining something more, something beyond this place, beyond this life. By late afternoon, the energy shifted. The announcement spread quickly: curfew would be enforced early. A blood moon was coming. Fear moved through the market like a ripple, subtle at first, then impossible to ignore.
I should have gone home the moment I heard.
Instead, I stayed.
“Go,” my brother said quietly, slipping a few coins into my hand. “Before they start looking for you.”
The weight of them felt strange in my palm. Mine, for once. I nodded, unable to find the right words, and turned away before I could overthink it.
Outside, the silence felt immediate, almost unnatural. The streets that were once crowded now stood nearly empty, the cold air pressing against my skin, sharper than before. I should have gone straight home. I knew that. But the thought of walking back into that house, of handing over everything I had earned just to be controlled again, made something inside me resist so strongly it almost hurt.
My steps slowed as I reached the edge of the road, my gaze drawn toward the forest just beyond the last line of houses. It stood there, dark and still, like it was waiting.
No one went there without reason.
I didn’t have one.
But something in me pulled anyway.
I stepped forward.
The moment I entered, the world behind me disappeared. The noise, the pressure, the expectations—all of it faded, replaced by a quiet so deep it felt like it was wrapping around me. The air was colder here, biting at my skin, but I kept going, drawn in by something I couldn’t explain. For the first time in a long time, I felt… free.
That feeling didn’t last.
By the time I turned back, the light had already begun to fade, and the path I thought I had followed was gone. I tried to retrace my steps, my pace quickening as unease crept in, but everything looked the same. The same trees. The same shadows. The same silence.
“I’m lost,” I said quietly, and hearing it out loud made it real in a way that sent a cold wave through my chest.
Panic followed quickly, tightening my breathing, sharpening every sound. I turned again, scanning desperately, until something caught my eye, thin strands of smoke rising faintly through the trees.
Relief hit so suddenly it almost made my knees weak.
I moved toward it quickly, pushing through branches that scraped against my skin, barely feeling the sting. When the trees finally opened, I stopped.
A house stood there.
Small. Hidden.
Wrong.
Something about it made my skin prickle, but I forced myself forward anyway, my options already gone. My hand lifted, knocking against the door, the sound louder than I expected in the stillness.
“Hello? I’m lost. I just need directions,” I called, my voice unsteady despite my effort to control it.
Nothing.
The silence stretched, heavy and suffocating, and just as I was about to knock again, a sound came from behind me. Close. Too close.
“Turn around slowly.”
The voice was low, controlled, and it sent something sharp down my spine.
I turned.
And everything inside me stilled.
He stood there like something pulled from a story I shouldn’t have believed in, tall and imposing, his presence overwhelming in a way that made it hard to breathe. His eyes locked onto mine, dark and intense, and I felt it, fear, sharp and immediate, curling tight in my chest.
Then I saw the blood.
Not just on his clothes.
On his mouth.
My breath caught, my thoughts scrambling as realization crept in slowly, unwillingly. When his lips parted slightly, the truth revealed itself in the worst way possible.
Fangs.
“...You’re not human,” I whispered, my voice barely there.
He stepped closer.
I stumbled back until the cabin door pressed against my spine, my heart pounding so hard it hurt. “Stay back,” I said, but it came out weaker than I intended, fear threading through every word.
He didn’t stop.
Only then did I notice the way his hand pressed against his side, the tension in his body, the uneven rhythm of his breathing.
He was hurt.
Badly.
For a moment, everything slowed. The fear was still there, strong and suffocating, but something else slipped in beside it, something quieter, more dangerous.
Curiosity.
“What are you?” I asked, my voice steadier than I felt.
His expression shifted, something dark flickering in his eyes, something that made my chest tighten for an entirely different reason.
And then, instead of answering...
He stepped closer...
