Moonlit Mirage

Chapter Three

Every instinct Xena had built over a lifetime of learning to survive screamed at her to run.

Instead, she stood her ground, keys clutched in one fist like a weapon that would do nothing against a man built the way this one was. Up close, he was even more unsettling than he'd been across a casino floor, tall enough that she had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes, broad shouldered in a way that suggested raw strength rather than gym vanity, and those amber eyes fixed on her with an intensity that made her skin feel two sizes too small.

"How do you know my name?"

"It's a long story."

"Try the short version."

His mouth curved, almost a smile, though nothing about his expression looked relaxed. "My name is Ragnar. I think someone broke into your apartment yesterday looking for something that belongs to your family. I think you're in more danger than you understand. And I think the man following you home from work last night wasn't human."

Xena laughed, short and disbelieving, the sound scraping out of her throat before she could stop it. "Okay. That's....no. I don't know what kind of con this is, but I'm not interested."

"It's not a con."

"Right. Of course not. The stranger who appeared out of nowhere in a parking garage and is now waiting outside my apartment isn't running a con, he's just here to warn me about monsters."

"I didn't say monsters." His voice stayed low, steady, unbothered by her sarcasm in a way that somehow made everything worse. "I said the man following you wasn't human. There's a difference."

"There really isn't."

"Xena." The way he said her name made something low in her chest tighten, an unwelcome, visceral reaction she didn't have the bandwidth to examine right now. "I'm trying to keep you alive."

"By stalking me?"

"By making sure you survive the next forty eight hours."

Something in his tone, not threatening exactly, but absolutely certain, the way a person sounds when they're stating fact rather than opinion, sent a fresh wave of unease crawling up her spine.

"I'm calling the police," she said, already reaching for her phone.

"Go ahead." He didn't move, didn't flinch, simply watched her with that same unnerving patience. "Tell them a man broke into your apartment and didn't take anything except looked through your mother's things. Tell them you've been having dreams about running through the desert as something other than human. See how that conversation goes."

Xena's hand froze halfway to her pocket.

She hadn't told anyone about the dream. Hadn't told anyone about the dresser drawer, about the pendant, about any of it.

"How could you possibly know that?"

For the first time since he'd appeared, something that looked almost like hesitation crossed his face. Like he was weighing how much truth a person could survive hearing all at once.

"Because the same thing happened to me," he said quietly. "A long time ago."

Before Xena could respond, before she could decide whether to run or demand answers or simply scream until someone called actual authorities, a shift in the air made the hair on her arms rise straight up.

Ragnar's entire demeanor changed in an instant, the careful patience replaced by something sharper, more alert, a predator scenting danger on the wind. He stepped between Xena and the street in one fluid motion, fast enough that she barely registered the movement until it was already done.

"Get behind me," he said, voice dropping into something that didn't sound entirely human.

"What...."

"Now."

A man emerged from the alley beside her building, moving with a wrongness Xena couldn't immediately name, too smooth, too quick, his eyes catching the morning light with the same unnatural amber glow she'd seen in Ragnar's, except colder, hungrier, missing whatever restraint kept Ragnar's gaze from feeling like a threat.

"Ironclaw," the stranger said, voice carrying something between mockery and warning. "Didn't expect you to find her first."

"Walk away," Ragnar said. "This is your only warning."

The stranger smiled, slow and unpleasant, eyes sliding past Ragnar to fix on Xena with an attention that made her stomach twist violently. "She doesn't even know what she is yet. Does she?"

"Last warning."

The man lunged.

It happened too fast for Xena to fully process, a blur of motion, a crack like a branch snapping underfoot, a pained, inhuman snarl that didn't belong in a quiet residential street at eight in the morning. When her vision caught up to reality, the stranger was on the ground, wrist bent at an angle that made her stomach lurch, and Ragnar stood over him without a single hair out of place, breathing steady despite what he'd just done.

"Leave," Ragnar said. "Tell whoever sent you that she's not yours to take."

The man scrambled backward, cradling his ruined wrist, and disappeared back into the alley with a speed that defied everything Xena understood about human movement.

Then Ragnar turned to face her, and Xena realized her hands were shaking, her breath coming in short, panicked gasps, every rational explanation she'd clung to since last night collapsing in the space of thirty seconds.

"I need you to trust me," Ragnar said, voice gentling.

"I don't even know you."

"I know. But that man wasn't going to stop, and the people he works for aren't going to stop either, and I am the only thing standing between you and whatever they want from you."

Xena's mind raced through every rational explanation and found none that fit what she'd just witnessed.

"What do they want?" she finally asked, voice barely above a whisper.

Ragnar's expression turned grave, something heavy and reluctant settling behind his eyes.

"The same thing I want," he said. "You."