Chapter 1
1569 Words
Chapter 1 – The Mark Beneath My Skin
Selene’s Point of View
The dreams had been coming for weeks now. Always the same.
A forest bathed in red light. A moon so large it filled the sky.
And a boy with golden eyes, watching me from the shadows.
I would wake up gasping every time, the echo of his voice still whispering my name a name he shouldn’t have known.
“Selene.”
Tonight, the dream felt different. He wasn’t just watching.
He was reaching for me.
The moment his fingers brushed mine, I jolted awake.
My room was still half-lit by the faint glow of dawn. I could hear the wind rattling the windowpane and the distant bark of dogs from the neighboring houses. Everything looked normal my messy desk, my stack of sketchbooks, the old curtains that had long lost their color.
But my heart refused to calm down.
I rubbed my arm, trying to shake off the cold that clung to me. That’s when I saw it again the faint mark on my skin. It had appeared three days ago, just below my collarbone, a strange crescent-shaped scar that burned sometimes like it was alive.
Mom said it was nothing.
“Probably an allergy,” she’d told me with a tired smile. “You’ve always had sensitive skin, sweetheart.”
But I didn’t believe her.
Because no allergy pulsed like a heartbeat under your skin.
I swung my legs off the bed and went to the mirror. My reflection stared back same dark brown hair, same pale face that always looked a little too fragile for the world. But there was something off in my eyes.
Like something ancient was looking back at me.
I tried to shake it off. “Happy eighteenth birthday, Selene,” I muttered to myself. “You’re officially an adult. Time to stop being paranoid about… curses and weird dreams.”
Still, I couldn’t help tracing my fingers over the mark again. It throbbed faintly, as if responding to my touch.
Outside, the first light of morning spilled over the small town of Ridgeton quiet, unremarkable, the kind of place where everyone knew everyone else’s business. We lived on the edge of the woods, where the forest started to thicken and the roads got rough. My mom always said we stayed here because it was peaceful.
But lately, the forest hadn’t felt peaceful at all.
“Morning, sleepyhead.”
Mom’s voice pulled me back to the present. I found her in the kitchen, already making pancakes her way of pretending that everything was fine, that today was just another birthday. Her dark hair was streaked with silver now, tied back in a loose bun. She looked up at me with that same weary smile she’d worn for years.
“Eighteen,” she said softly. “You made it.”
“Yeah,” I said, sliding into a chair. “Barely.”
She laughed, but there was a flicker of something else in her eyes something heavy, like she was remembering something she didn’t want to.
“You didn’t sleep well again,” she said. “Another nightmare?”
I hesitated. Lying to her had become a habit. But today, something in her tone made me stop. “Yeah,” I admitted. “Same one. The forest. The moon. The—”
“The boy?” she finished quietly.
I blinked. “You know about him?”
Her hand froze over the pan for just a second before she forced a smile. “You told me once before, remember? When you were little, you said you used to dream about a boy in the woods. Maybe your brain’s just… nostalgic.”
“Right.” I didn’t believe that either.
Mom placed a plate in front of me and reached for the old silver pendant I always wore a crescent-shaped charm that she’d given me when I was ten. I’d never taken it off.
She brushed her thumb over it and said softly, “Keep this close today.”
Her words carried a strange weight.
“Why?” I asked.
She looked out the window, where the forest swayed under the wind. “Just a feeling,” she said. “Sometimes, when the wind shifts, I can tell when change is coming.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I let it go.
By noon, the town felt too small. The sun blazed down, warm and golden, but the mark on my chest ached as though someone had pressed ice to it.
I wandered through the marketplace with my sketchbook tucked under my arm. I liked drawing people it helped me focus, helped me forget the strange unease that had been building for days.
But today, I couldn’t focus.
I kept feeling like someone was watching me.
Every time I turned, there was nothing there just faces I knew, people selling bread or fish, kids running past with balloons.
Still, that prickling sensation never left.
Then it hit me. The air changed.
The chatter around me dulled, the scent of earth and rain replacing the usual smells of the market. I looked toward the forest and froze.
At the edge of the trees stood a figure.
Tall. Still. Dressed in black.
I couldn’t see his face, but even from here, I could feel his eyes on me.
My heart pounded. I blinked and he was gone.
Just like that.
The mark on my chest burned like fire.
By the time I got home, dark clouds were rolling in. Thunder rumbled in the distance. I closed the door behind me, breathing hard, trying to convince myself I was overreacting.
Mom wasn’t home yet. She worked late at the clinic most days. The house felt too quiet, the kind of quiet that made your skin crawl.
I went upstairs, trying to shake off the unease. Maybe I’d just take a shower, distract myself.
But as I passed the mirror, something caught my eye.
The mark.
It wasn’t faint anymore.
It was glowing.
A deep red, pulsing in rhythm with my heartbeat.
“What the hell…” I whispered.
The air around me shifted the lights flickered, the room dimmed. My reflection wavered in the mirror, and for a split second, it wasn’t me looking back.
It was him.
The boy from my dreams. Golden eyes, sharp features, the faint outline of fangs when he spoke.
“Found you,” he whispered.
I stumbled back, my heart in my throat. The light shattered, glass raining onto the floor as the mirror cracked from corner to corner.
“Selene!”
I turned Mom was at the doorway, pale, terrified. She rushed forward, grabbing my shoulders. “What happened? Are you hurt?”
“I— I don’t know!” My voice shook. “It just— it just happened! I saw—”
Her eyes darted to the glowing mark. “No,” she whispered, backing away. “Not yet. It’s too soon.”
“Mom?”
She grabbed my hand, dragging me toward the door. “We need to leave. Now.”
“Leave? Why? What’s happening?”
But she didn’t answer. She just kept whispering the same thing under her breath a name I didn’t recognize.
“Elias… forgive me…”
Before I could ask, the sound of howling ripped through the air.
Not dogs.
Wolves.
The windows rattled. The power flickered again, plunging the house into shadows. I felt something stir deep inside me something ancient, reacting to the sound.
Mom froze, eyes wide. “They found us.”
“Who—”
A crash cut me off. The front door burst open, wood splintering, wind roaring through the hallway. And in the doorway stood a figure tall, broad-shouldered, eyes glowing gold.
The same eyes from my dreams.
He stepped forward, rain dripping from his black coat, his gaze locked on me like he’d been waiting for this moment his whole life.
“Selene Ward,” he said, voice low and dangerous. “Daughter of the man who took what was mine.”
Mom stepped in front of me. “Stay away from her!”
The man’s gaze flickered to her, cold and sharp. “You hid her well, human. But the curse cannot be hidden forever.”
“Curse?” I whispered.
He looked at me again, his voice almost soft now. “You bear the mark of the Blood Moon. You belong to me.”
Before I could react, pain tore through me fire under my skin, the mark blazing like molten metal. I screamed, collapsing as visions flashed behind my eyes the red forest, the child’s blood, the Alpha’s roar, the curse binding itself to my soul.
I saw him the boy Aiden as he had been eighteen years ago, standing over his sister’s grave. And then I saw him now, grown, hardened, his eyes filled with the same fury.
The same grief.
When I opened my eyes again, he was kneeling before me. His expression unreadable.
“You were born under her blood,” he said softly. “And now, the Blood Moon calls you home.”
The thunder roared outside.
And I realized, as the mark burned brighter and my mother cried my name, that nothing about my life or who I thought I was had ever been real.
The curse had awakened.
And I was its price.
- Writer
