I stepped forward carefully, trying to remember how far away the monster was. His lamp-like eyes flicked downward, watching my progress.

“You aren’t going to kill me if I let you out, are you?” I asked, even if it was a little too late for those kinds of assurances.

Was it my imagination, or did those crimson eyes soften?

“I swear it,” he growled. “By the stars of the Void, by my own blood, I swear I will not harm you.”

I had no idea what the Void was, but he sounded deadly serious. And he was in fact bleeding everywhere.

I’d possibly gone insane, but I decided to trust him.

“Hold still, then.” I kept moving forward, scuffing my boots. I heard the monster sigh as I dragged my feet, annihilating the clean lines of the chalk circle, and he stepped out.

It wasn’t until I felt his warmth against me that I realized how cold I was, and that he was now close enough to touch, his breath stirring my hair.

I wanted to touch him. I wanted a memory that proved he was real, something more concrete than just a vision in the dark forest at night.

I felt him shift with surprise when I reached out, his eyes flaring bright enough that I could see for a bare instant.

“I said, hold still,” I told him. “You’re still bleeding.”

“And what do you expect to do about that, woman?” The brightness returned, the red glow saturating just the two of us in a little orb of light. The moth-monster wore a bemused look on his face.

I smiled, and was rewarded with another surprised flare of light from his gaze. It occurred to me that maybe this monster was just as nervous of me as I was of him.

“First off, stop calling me ‘woman’. My name is Elle.”

His tattered wings brushed the ground as he moved back a step.

“Second, why didn’t you fly away?”

The monster’s lips twisted sourly. His mouth was almost human, but his lips were too smooth, the shape just a little off. When he spoke, I saw the tips of pointed white teeth. “See for yourself.”

He spread those glorious moth wings wide, and my mouth fell open.

For a moment I was lost in a kaleidoscope of forest colors. The amber bled into the moss which grew over the ink which crashed into the midnight blue…

Then the spell was broken, and I saw the ragged holes punched through the shimmering tapestry of color.

“How…?”

“The Hunter.” The monster refolded his wings. “I was… foolish to come here, when I cannot fly.” He looked away, eyes squinted into narrow, glowing slits.

An odd feeling welled up inside me. I was feeling sorry for him, a creature of the forest trapped by human cruelty.

“Well, you’re lucky you found me, then.” I held out a hand. “I trusted you. Trust me.”

I never offered my bare hand to anyone. I’d spent years neatly side-stepping the politeness of handshakes, wearing gloves and getting sidelong glances for it. The feeling of skin contact horrified me now.

But it felt natural to offer my hand to the injured monster.

A new hope was rising in me, a hope I hadn’t felt for a long time. One that had been extinguished by my great failure.

The monster hesitated, then reached out, laying his large palm over mine.

I wrapped my fingers through his claws, closing my eyes. Energy crackled through my veins, and the sensation of something alive rushed through me and into him.

The monster made a sound like he was in pain, and I opened my eyes again, already horrified that I’d somehow ruined it—