She sincerely hoped the Duskwalker would protect her even though she had a feeling he would eventually end up being her demise.

“H-hey, slow down. You’re too fast for me.”

As if to demonstrate this, when she ran those few steps to catch back up with his strides, her dress twisted around her feet.

Reia fell palms down into the snow that was thicker in the forest since the trees shielded the ground from the heat of the sun. Her forearms sunk into white powdery coldness, sending a course of shivers throughout her body. Her dress wasn’t warm enough to keep the cold at bay, and her feet

were freezing, one of her slippers already stolen by the snow.

He didn’t assist her, and as she was getting to her feet, one of the nightmarish wolves – since they were more horrifying up close – barked at her. She stepped away from it in shock from the sound and fell into the other. Or rather, through it!

She gasped when its body broke apart like someone waving their hand through the wispy body of a ghostly figure. Darkness swirled before it came back together, and it snapped its head towards her when it was once again whole, snarling its muzzle silently.

“What the hell!?” Reia yelled, scrambling away from it on her hands and feet as her arse slipped across the ground.

“What are those things?”

Nobody had known what they were, but no one would have guessed they weren’t physical!

His voice was quiet with the growing distance as he continued to walk forward.

“You have discovered already that my companions are merely illusions.” He lifted one of his arms into the air to point towards his own head. “However, it’s not their bite you should have been afraid of to begin with.”

With an agitated growl through clenched teeth, she waved her arms through the wolven apparitions that were lies. She stomped back to her feet.

“What will you do if I don’t follow you?” she shouted at his back, refusing to step after him.

“I would come if I were you, snowy human.”

“Are you fast?” She already knew the answer to that question with just how quick he was able to walk without putting forth any additional effort.

He finally stopped walking and turned his head to the side, showing her the side of his wolven skull face jutting nearly a foot past his cloak. What is the point in wearing it if it doesn’t actually matter? It does little to hide his face. She

could just see the glowing orb that was partially hiding behind his cloak.

“I like the hunt,” he answered, yet his voice sounded darker and deeper right before that orb changed to red.

“But it makes me hungry.”

Reia gulped, knowing his eye colour change couldn’t mean anything good. Apparently, he eats humans and Demons. It would be wise if she didn’t make him... hungry.

Palming her forehead before running her hands up and then over her hair in frustration, she felt the floral crown around her head like a halo. She felt stupid in the attire she was in. The woven crown was tangled since she’d messed her hair by running so much, and she yanked it from her head before sprinting towards the Duskwalker while tossing it to the side.

He must have been watching her movements because his head turned to the side when she came up beside him. After a short while, he gave a huff, a small fog of breath leaving the nose hole of his tapered skull, before his eyes returned to blue.

He led their path once more.

“Did you lie in the village?”

“About?” Her heart squeezed, both in uncertainty of what he would do if he discovered she’d lied to him already, and having to force her body to keep up with his fast pace without tripping again in the snow.

She constantly had to lift the hem of her dress, causing the cold powder to press against her bare legs.

Her teeth began to chatter when her jaw jittered uncomfortably. She’d lost her other shoe, and her fingers and toes were becoming burningly cold. The backs of her knuckles were pink, and she had no doubt that her nose and toes were as well.

“About why you were offering yourself to me.”

“What will you do dependent on each answer?”

“Nothing. I do not care if you lied because you were unable to answer in front of the other humans.”

Reia blew a curl of her hair out of her face, wishing her nose didn’t feel like it was freezing over. It caused a drop of liquid to drip from her nostril that she constantly had to sniffle away.

“Yes, I lied. It was either I allow you to take me or be locked in one of the prison cells for the rest of my life.”

He brought his hand up to cup the end of his bony snout.

“I see.”

“Look. I’m following because I can tell it’ll piss you off if I don’t, but I was not a truly willing sacrifice.” Reia tripped once more. Letting out a groan, she slapped at the ground while getting back to her feet. “Since that is the case, would you be willing to let me go?”

“No,” he answered, moving his hand away to duck his arm back inside his cloak. She could see the vague imprint of his arm moving behind himself to clasp his hands behind his back. “You offered yourself. Your blood was taken as the price for the ward, and I only did it to obtain you.”

“So, you don’t care?”

Well, shit. There goes that plan.

“It’s not that I don’t care. The price has been paid, the bargain made, and I do not wish to go back or travel to another village to obtain a new offering. However, all you chosen humans are supposed to be with me by your choices alone, whether that is to protect your families or simply because you don’t care for your own lives.”

Reia’s brows drew together into a deep frown.

“You understand I was coerced?”

“Yes, although that does not change your fate. I am uncertain, though, if I am displeased or not by the trickery of the other humans.”

“I give you permission to go back and wreak havoc if it will allow me freedom.”

“No.” He turned his head to her, his eyes turning red once more.

Reia brought her lips into her mouth and bit her lips shut.

Okay, definitely need a new plan.

A cry was wrenched from her when she fell into the snow once more. Shit, I can’t do this for much longer. I’m already tired.

“Stop! You’re too fast, and I’m too cold. I can’t keep up with you.”

She heard the crunching steps of his feet as he stopped and turned around to her, but Reia was looking down as she pushed with her arms while shakily getting to her feet. She was already exhausted after what could only have been thirty minutes of chasing him, and the chill continued to creep deeper and deeper into her limbs, feeling as though it was freezing her very bones.