He moved like the forest itself—silent, ancient, and terrifyingly aware.
Silas stood nearly seven feet tall, his form cloaked in shadows that clung to him like living mist. Broad-shouldered, thickly built, but not grotesque—his body was carved with muscle and covered in a dark, coarse layer of fur that shimmered faintly under moonlight, like bark dusted in frost.
His hands were not quite claws, but not fully human either—long fingers tipped with blackened nails capable of tearing, or caressing. His legs, powerful and taut, ended in feet that sank silently into the forest floor, built for stalking, hunting, owning the earth he walked upon.
His face was the contradiction.
A rough jawline overgrown with fur. High cheekbones like a man carved from marble. Fangs visible even when he wasn't speaking. But his eyes… those haunted silver eyes…
They weren't beastly.
They were broken.
They held grief. Rage. Lust. Loneliness.
They were human.
Once.
They called him a monster, a myth, a curse to be fed every ten years...
But when he touched me, it wasn't death I feared—it was how much I wanted to stay."