Check Mate

Prologue

❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥ATTENTION: This story is being rewritten. I began it more than 10 years ago, and my writing has since grown in both style and depth. I want it to reflect the way I create now.❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥

***
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this,
in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.

Pablo Nerudo

***

The woods swallowed me whole.

Branches tore at the hem of my dress, ripping black silk into ribbons that trailed behind me like smoke. The ground was slick with moss and damp leaves, every step a gamble that I might slip, fall, and end this chase with broken bones. The air was wet and cold, mist curling low and dense, clinging to my skin until gooseflesh rose in waves across my arms.

My lungs burned. My heartbeat slammed against my ribs, frantic, feral, as if it wanted to leap out of me and flee faster than my legs could carry.

And behind me—always behind me—was him.

"Running from me is like a game, Princess."

The voice carried through the trees, deep and unhurried, velvet wrapped in shadow. It slid under my skin and down my spine, turning my flight into something frantic, desperate, even though he hadn't raised his tone. He didn't need to.

Predators never needed to rush.

The sound of his steps—steady, measured—echoed through the night. No matter how fast I pushed myself, he was always just there, a ghost breathing at my nape.

I stumbled over a root, catching myself on scraped palms before launching forward again. My dress snagged on another branch, tearing further, baring one shoulder to the cold night. The skin prickled, not only from the chill but from the weight of eyes I could not see but felt.

Every inhale tasted like pine needles, iron, and wet soil. Every exhale came in clouds of steam that marked me for him to follow.

The mist thickened. The forest grew quiet. Even the crickets and owls had hushed, as if watching, waiting, unwilling to interrupt.

I pressed deeper into the dark, searching for anywhere to vanish. My breath sawed in and out, loud in my own ears, and panic clawed at the edges of my chest.

"Keep running," he murmured from somewhere close—too close. "The wolf enjoys the chase."

⸻

I broke into a clearing before skidding behind a massive oak. The bark scraped my bare back where the dress had shredded. I flattened against it, chest heaving, forcing myself to be still. To listen.

The mist drifted around me, curling white fingers along my arms. My heart thundered so loudly I thought it would betray me. I pressed both hands against my mouth to smother any sound.

The woods were silent again.

Then his voice curled between the trees. "You smell..." A pause. A soft inhale I swore I felt at my throat though he wasn't there. "...exotic. Thunder wrapped in skin. Storms caught in veins. I should mark you now, before the moon itself envies me. Make you mine. Only mine."

A whimper broke loose before I could stop it. I bit down hard on my lip, tasting blood.

The silence that followed was heavy, satisfied.