The forest had stopped whispering.
No wind. No movement. Just moonlight slicing through black branches, cold and silver against Jasmine’s bare skin.
She had wandered too far from the torches. Or maybe they had let her. Let her walk right into the mouth of something that had been watching her since she crossed the gate.
She turned slowly in the clearing, cloak loose around her shoulders, eyes sharp. Her pulse thrummed under her skin like a second heartbeat, thick with the scent of moss, loam......and something hotter.
The air shifted.
A low sound behind her. Not growl, not breath. A vibration. Animal.
She turned—
Too slow.
The body hit her like smoke and thunder, powerful and silent, knocking her flat into the earth. The cloak tangled around her arms, her back pressed into the fores
