Moonbound Vow: The Alpha, the Mask, and Our Child

The forest was breathing. Every rustle of leaves carried a secret, every whisper of wind sounded almost human. Moonlight fell like shards of glass through the canopy, turning the path ahead into silver bones. I pulled my jacket tighter and tried not to imagine teeth glinting in the dark. "Easy, Emily," I muttered under my breath. "You're a biologist, not a ghost hunter." Still, my heartbeat refused to obey reason. It thumped against my ribs like a trapped bird. The recorder hanging around my neck blinked red—each pulse marking the sound of nocturnal wolves I had come to study. Except... the forest of Blackridge didn't have wolves. At least, that's what every official record said. A low growl sliced through the night. I froze. Not a coyote. Not a bear. It was deeper, older—something primal that reached inside my chest and twisted. When I turned my flashlight toward the sound, the beam cut across a pair of eyes. Gold. Luminous. Intelligent. The creature didn't move. Neither did I. For a moment the world shrank to the space between those eyes and my trembling breath. Then— It stepped forward. I stumbled backward, tripped on a root, and landed hard on the damp ground. My flashlight rolled away, its beam spinning crazily until it died against the moss. The forest plunged into shadow again. I could hear it coming closer. Leaves crushed under heavy paws. The scent of rain and pine mixed with something richer—something that felt like heat itself. I should have been terrified. Instead, my skin tingled. A flash of movement—and suddenly, a man stood where the wolf had been. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Bare-chested beneath the rain. His eyes glowed faintly even in human form. For one impossible heartbeat, I thought I was hallucinating. He looked at me the way storms look at trees—like he could break me or spare me. "You shouldn't be here," he said, voice low, rough around the edges. My throat worked, but no sound came out. "You—You were—" He took a step closer. "You saw something you weren't meant to see." His accent was strange—ancient almost—but his words hit with perfect clarity. My scientific brain screamed for logic, for explanation, for the safety of definitions and categories. There were none. "I was studying the howls," I said finally, breathless. "I didn't mean to trespass." His gaze flickered to the recorder around my neck. For a split second, something like amusement softened his expression. Then it was gone. "Blackridge doesn't welcome strangers," he said. "Especially ones who record what they don't understand." "I'm not afraid," I lied. He tilted his head, as if testing the weight of my lie. The corner of his mouth twitched. "You should be." Lightning flashed above the treetops, and in that white-hot instant, I saw the faint trace of scars across his chest—claw marks, long healed but never forgotten. My breath caught. The storm broke open. Rain poured down in sheets. He didn't flinch. "Go home, little scientist," he said. "Forget tonight." "I can't," I whispered. Something unreadable flickered in his eyes. He reached out slowly, his fingers hovering inches from my face, not touching—just enough that I could feel the heat radiating from his skin. "Then you've just changed everything." Before I could ask what he meant, he was gone. A blur of motion, swallowed by the trees. The forest went silent again except for the rain. I sat there until my clothes clung to my skin and the night swallowed the last echo of his voice. Back in my cabin, I tried to write down what happened. The rational part of me—trained in biology, data, and reason—fought to find an explanation. A hallucination? A dream triggered by exhaustion? But the scratches on the back of my hand said otherwise. Three faint lines, too even to be from a fall. And the air still smelled like pine and wild heat. I replayed the audio file from my recorder. Static. Wind. Then— a single, low howl. Not the kind of howl a wolf makes. It sounded like grief. I closed my laptop and wrapped myself in the thin blanket, but sleep refused to come. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw those golden eyes again, burning through the dark. Who was he? Or... what was he? At dawn, I drove into town. The rain had stopped, leaving the road slick and silver. The town of Blackridge looked harmless enough—wooden houses, a diner, a post office that probably hadn't seen new mail since the '90s. But there was something off in the air. People watched strangers too closely here. Inside the diner, an old man behind the counter raised an eyebrow as I walked in. "You must be the researcher renting the Miller cabin." "Emily Carter," I said, trying to sound normal. "I'm with the Wildlife Institute. Studying predator migration." He poured me coffee without asking. "Predators, huh? Hope you brought more than a camera." "Why?" He leaned in. "Because the forest has its own rules. City folks forget that. Some things out there... they don't like being studied." I forced a laugh. "Are you saying the wolves will sue me?" He didn't smile. "I'm saying there are no wolves in Blackridge." The coffee suddenly tasted like ash. "Then what did I hear last night?" The old man's gaze slid to the window, where fog was curling through the trees. "You heard what this town has been trying to forget." A bell jingled above the door. A gust of cold air swept in—and with it, him. He was no longer bare-chested, but the same impossible presence filled the room. Black shirt. Leather jacket. Storm in his eyes. When those eyes met mine, the world tilted again. The old man went pale. "Alpha," he murmured, barely audible. My pulse stuttered. Alpha? The man's gaze never left mine as he spoke. "You shouldn't be here, Miss Carter." He said my name like he'd known it forever. "I'm just doing my job," I managed. "Collecting data." "Then collect it somewhere else." His tone was final, but beneath it, something flickered—concern? Curiosity? He turned to leave, but stopped at the door. "The forest remembers everyone who steps into it. Be careful what you wake." Then he was gone again, leaving silence and the faint scent of rain behind. That night, I replayed his words until they blurred together. Be careful what you wake. The rain returned, tapping against the windows like restless fingers. I stood by the glass, staring into the darkness that had once swallowed him whole. Somewhere out there, a wolf howled again. And for reasons I couldn't explain, my heart answered.