Silver Crescent Shadows

Meeting Him Emma POV The crystal vase had shattered on the wall, inches from my head, shards raining down like deadly ice. “You’re just a stain on this family!” My aunt’s voice dripped contempt as she pointed a shaking finger at me. Tears streaked her flushed face, smeared with mascara. “I should finish you like you finished my sister, you little witch!” Another crash. A thudded against the floor. I breathed out slowly, my pulse steadying, fingers squeezing tight around my phone and the knife I had pried from her hand minutes before. The steel was cool against my palm — a reminder of how fast our arguments had been escalating lately. "That's it—run away!" she growled, as I backed toward the door. “Just like your f*****g coward father. Giving it all up when the going gets tough!” Those words cut deeper than any knife ever could. I slammed the door so hard that it rattled the frame, my temples pounding with each thump of my heart as I laced up my tennis shoes. The park across Ravensvale Creek would serve as my bedroom tonight. Again. It would be a 45-minute walk, but the distance was worth it for the sanctuary that awaited. Over the past three years, the little glade in the woods had become more home to me than any four walls of my aunt’s. Twilight fell like the velvet curtain as I took the footprints whose footprints walked before me. With each step, bits of my former rage were cast away, filled instead with the hollow ache of familiar loneliness. The moon rose above scattered clouds — nearly full and glowing in the darkening sky. Just like that the lights of the town faded away as the forest opened its arms, enveloping me in the scent of pine and wild heather. I could hear my footsteps muffled by the soft earth, and for a second, all was well. Then I felt it — a subtle change come over the air, like the weird energy before a lightning storm. It was gone in an instant, and I wasn’t sure if I hadn’t just imagined it. A prisoner arrived—the silhouette of a bent figure huddled on a fallen log, shoulders bent, as if bearing invisible weight. Poor soul, I thought. Perhaps his demons are louder than mine, tonight. I had pressed on, intending to slip past unnoticed, when a voice, deep and distant as thunder, stopped me in my tracks. "You're trespassing." They weren’t shouting, but they reverberated through the whole clearing. I blinked as they went from being hunched over in their chair to towering over me. How had he moved so quickly? I tilted my chin up to meet eyes that glinted with something primal in the moonlight. “Same with you,” I shot back, finding defiance I didn’t really feel. I felt myself grip the knife in my pocket a little tighter. A flash of surprise crossed his features, which morphed into an arrogant smirk that knew how to light a fire inside my chest, hot and dangerous. Is he really entertained by this? “The last time I checked,” he said, and each word was spoken with care, “this territory was off-limits to humans. What brings you roaming so deep after dark?’” "Humans?" I repeated, incredulity trumping caution. “So what the heck does that make you — some sort of mythical beast? "Do I look human to you?" He tilted his head slightly, gazing at me with disquieting intensity. “You look just like all the other arrogant men I’ve had the unfortunate experience of meeting,” I snapped, irascibility oozing from my carefully built walls. "Look closer, chica." His voice went low, to a rumble. "There's nothing human here." Fatigue hit me suddenly like a bolt of concrete. Tonight was not a night for cryptic conversations with delusional strangers, however fascinating. "Right. Well, I will let you work through your identity crisis.” I gave a mock salute and turned to head on my way. “I’ve got my own existential dread to deal with.” “Some people don’t know how to introduce themselves,” I muttered under my breath, fording ahead. One moment the path ahead was open; the next, he appeared before me like smoke taking shape. My heart lurched. “That’s not exactly how you say goodbye to a new friend,” he said, his lips curling into something like a smile and a warning. "Friend?" I managed, arching one eyebrow with skepticism. "Unless you're afraid?" He spoke confidently with eyes that seemed to absorb the moon rather than reflect it. "Forgive my manners. I'm Elias. Elias Donovan." He reached out his hand, a dangerous kind of charm. "And you are?" Something told me there would be no walking away again. "Emerald Aliphronsto. Emma, if you are of the sort who would like to pronounce things correctly.” I took his handshake, startled by the feverish heat of his palm on mine. “Well, Emma,” his fingers tarried a heartbeat too long, “may I accompany you? I’ll try not to get in the way of your brooding.” He fell into step with me, his long strides slowing to match mine. Silence stretched between us, oddly okay given how strange our meeting was. Something about him — I don’t know if it was all the tension firing beneath his casual confidence — suggested a man not embracing responsibilities but running from them. *Tell me your story, Elias Donovan? * I wondered. *Girlfriend troubles? Or something darker? * Barely had the thought formed than vertigo crashed over me like a tidal wave. The ground tilted violently and my legs felt weak. My vision was clouded by dizziness as I pressed fingers to my temple and came away with something warm and sticky. "What the hell...?" Blood gleamed dark on my fingertips. "Emma?" Elias’s voice sounded like it was coming through water. "Are you—" Before he could finish, my knees buckled. As consciousness began to fade, I glimpsed a flicker of movement among the trees—twin crimson spheres burning in the dark, with a noise that could not have come from a human throat. A rumble that shook the ground under me. The last thing I heard was Elias’s tortured silence, his eyes shifting from an expression of worry to something wild and fierce and protective just as the darkness enveloped me entirely. “...already told you she’s fine, Alpha. She lost consciousness from bleeding and starvation. Give her a few more minutes." A quiet female voice cut through the fog in my head. Who was speaking? And who were they referring to as “Alpha”? I attempted to orient myself, yet my body felt unbearably heavy. Agony pierced my skull, my eyes exploded open as I gasped. The sun blasted through unfamiliar drapes, momentarily blinding me. “Elias,” I gasped, recognizing the figure at my bedside. His features flooded with relief, then settled into something more impassive. A woman in her late thirties, clinical assessment in her gaze, stood beside him. Panic rose in me as I saw how far up the sun had gone. “I have to go — my aunt will be worried sick!” The lie came automatically as I lurched from the bed, muscles protesting and the room momentarily spinning. I ran through the door before either of them could stop me, through strange hallways until I flung myself outside. My only intermission was when I reached the end of the street and looked back. Elias was standing in the doorway and he watched my retreat with an unreadable expression—something like confusion mixed with determination. Then I turned the corner and a simple thought pierced the daze: I really hope I see you again. Behind me, out of earshot, a howl rose up to meet the waning moon.