Page 15 of Her Dark Promise

He barely paid me any mind as he started to walk toward me, barking orders, “Miss, please take a seat on that stump. I made an ointment that will heal your wound before it becomes infected. And—”

“Stop right there.” My voice rang out, cutting through his incessant rambling.

He stopped mid-step, supplies in his hand. His eyebrows knit together as he said, “I am not here to harm you. I apologize greatly for injuring you. I would never harm a woman.”

“Oh, how comforting,” I mocked.

“Honest,” he said. “I thought you were an animal.”I took a demanding step forward. “Stories your people tell children to scare them.”

“My people?” He gave me a guarded look. “Where are you from, miss?”

“Do you believe women are weaker than you? That they don’t have what it takes to fight? Is that why you would never harm a woman?”

Men were all the same. Useless. Never stopped to listen to what anyone with a cunt had to say.

“What? Of course not. I would never hurt anyone without just cause. Please, miss, we need to go to the castle that is just beyond these woods, it isn’t safe for us here.”

Interesting… I continued to entertain him, to see where he was going with this.

I widened my eyes as if his words scared me and asked in a hushed tone. “Not safe? And what are we not safe from?”

He scanned the area with that expert hunter's eyes, ready for someone or something else to jump out of the woods at any moment. “You know, there are rumors about this place.”

“Rumors?”

“Yes, they say that there’s a beast that prowls the woods, taking men who dare come unto these lands.” He looked back toward me. “There’s an infamous story about the first surviving hunter who spoke of a beast in these woods. In my village, they tell the story every year.”

“During the Reaping.”

He looked at me, confused. “You know about the Reaping?”

“Yes,” I confirmed. “I know about the hysteria of the beast, and your town thinking sacrificing innocent children to the woods will satisfy the monster’s hunger.”

He cringed with distaste. “It’s worked so far, has it not?”

Strangely enough, he had a point. Long ago, when I’d torn apart that hunting party, I’d only done it because they were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was one of thedays that I was using my magic against the barrier, and they attacked me. I ended up killing them all except for one.

I planted a fake memory in his mind and sent him home to hopefully keep others away, but it had the opposite effect. Others came to hunt down the monster that had mauled their friends, and I killed them as well. Resentment festered inside of me until one day, the men stopped coming and instead, there were children. They had deemed mela bête de la forêt—a god.

Never, in my wildest dreams, did I think they’d start feeding the forest with a child once a year to appease their new god. And in my silence, my lack of action, I’d given them all the reasons to continue their awful tradition.

I played demure. “You’re hunting a fairytale in the woods. In all my years here, I have never seen such a beast.”

“You are right. If there were such a mighty beast, then someone would have seen it by now, but here I am. If I find nothing, I’ll report back. If I find something, maybe I’ll end it all then…” he paused, leaving the words hanging. “Wait, all your years? Do you live out here?”

I turned my back to him and shrugged over my shoulder. “I needed a place to live, and it was empty.” Then I stopped because something he said struck me rather violently. I drifted back to Merrill, who’d uttered the same words.If there had been such a mighty beast, then someone would have seen it by now.Are my intruders connected? Was the hunter lying and looking for his friends?

He stepped closer, eyes narrowing. “Aren’t you afraid of the beast?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Maybe I am the beast.”

This time he laughed, and it made my blood boil. Though he wouldn’t be laughing for much longer.

He lowered his defenses, continued for a few more moments, and then took a deep breath, trying to calm down. “Thank youfor the laugh. I needed that. Now, if you would allow me, can we please go to the castle so that I may tend to your wound?”

He stepped toward me again, oblivious to my rising anger, and tried to grab me when I swatted his hand away. He took another step back.

“Miss, you must let me help you!” He growled in annoyance. Such a short temper.

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