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A forest wight. They weren’t meant to even be on this continent. But it was unmistakable. Almost ten feet tall, skeletal. I couldn’t see from where I stood, but I knew its skin would resemble rotted bark and moss, stretching against protruding bones like flesh. Its hollow rib cage would open to consume souls. The shadows of large antlers hovered over its head, made from bone and petrified wood.

Glowing green orbs shone from the horrific shape hovering in the darkness. I squeezed my eyes shut. Even from that distance, staring too long into those eyes would show me my own death.

Or enough to make me go crazy. Easy pickings to have my soul eaten.

I already knew how I was going to die—in a messy, bloody, painful fight with a supernatural creature. But not on this night.

“Help!”

The scream carried through the woods, unnaturally loud—which was how they lured in their prey. They were excellent at sounding like a human in need of rescue. The perfect way to entice some well-meaning hero to come running and make themselves a meal.

“Help!”

My spine froze. I knew they could mimic voices of the dead. Usually, they were only capable of imitating those who died in the forest, usually after a fresh death. My parents did not die on the edge of a forest, and their murder was over a decade ago. The wight shouldn’t have had the ability to copy my mother’s high-pitched scream—the last thing I heard from her.

No, the last thing I heard from her was, “Hadley, run!”

But it had the exact tenor, pitch, and feel to my mother’s dying tone.

I snatched my gun from the round dining table then shoved my feet in my boots, running out the door before the creature could draw in a suburban dad with no fucking chance. And before it could bellow that horrifying reminder of my mother’s voice.

The air bit at me, rushing outside without my jacket on. A failing on my part, not grabbing it from where it was hanging at the front door, since it gave me an added layer of protection. Not just from the elements but from the enchanted wards stitched into the lining. But it was just a wight. Not native to the region, but globalization was hitting the supernatural community too, it seemed.

Historically, they used to guard land and forests, punishing those pillaging, hunting, or taking natural resources. Normally, only those responsible had to worry about the wrath of a wight. But that was all of us now, whether we were going to admit it or not.

They fed on regret, sorrow, and claimed souls, eating you alive if you were lucky. Turned you into one of them if you were not.

Not exactly hearts and rainbows kind of stuff, but I’d dealt with much worse.

Cocky.

I was being cocky. I was overloaded with the need to fight, to kill something. Not thinking clearly, clouded by ghosts.

Which is how you became one in my profession.

“Fuck.” I stared down at where my gun lay in the grass after the wight had proved faster than I expected, not only dodging my bullet but managing to knock the gun from my hand.

Embarrassing.

And meant I was standing in front of a pissed off wight with no weapons at my disposal except the one lying three feet to my left.

I’d come running out here thinking I’d be some cowboy, emptying a clip of silver bullets into the torso of the creature, watching it wilt away before my eyes, satisfying some bloodlust, and yes, maybe saving that suburban dad looking to be a hero.

Even though I, as a rule, fucking hated suburban dads. I didn’t want them to die or turn into a soul-eating monster, though.

Yet that was quickly looking like it would become my fate if I weren’t smart and quick.

The wight’s deep-set, green eyes were glowing and dripping sap, its face humanlike in shape but nothing else. Instead of a nose and mouth, it had a long, vertical opening that unhinged sideways to reveal rows of gnarled, uneven bark-like teeth and breath that smelled of decay and molding leaves.

“Gross.” I recoiled. “Did you miss your last cleaning? And you’re supposed to floss.”

I was trying to keep myself calm, trying to sound arrogant while not taking my eyes from the creature.

There was some debate as to whether or not they were entirely sentient, whether they could understand us, since they didn’t speak beyond mimicking human cries. But they were human once—someone who died at the wrong place, the wrong time—so I figured there was some reptilian brain lurking.

The way it peered at me, with a slight incline to the head, a sideways upturn of those horrible lips, told me it understood enough to know I was fucked and that it had the upper hand.

I jumped at the same time it did, going for my gun, my palm gripping the gloriously cold hilt. I rolled, bouncing upright on my heels before crouching to shoot. But my body was angled weird, so I only got it in the shoulder. It let out a hiss of pain, shrieking as its elbow slammed into my eye. Not at full speed or strength— hallelujah. If it had, my orbital bone would’ve shattered, and my eye would’ve exploded.