The Witch Who Brewed Moonlight

Moonlight lay on Elara’s doorstep like spilled milk, cold and pale against the dark stones. The Mondwaldes breathed behind her cottage, slow and damp, as if the trees listened. Elara had just set her kettle for a night batch when she heard the softest sound—leather sliding over wood—followed by a man’s sharp inhale, like he had run out of air.

She opened the door with her wand hand ready and her other hand still stained with herb pigment. A man sat on her threshold as if he belonged there, one shoulder slumped, hair dark and messy, coat torn at the sleeve. Moonlight pooled around him in a slow, shimmering shape, and for one stupid heartbeat her mind tried to call it beautiful instead of dangerous.

His eyes lifted to hers. They were storm-colored, bright in a way that hurt to look at, and his mouth tried to smile before his body remembered pain. “Elara,” he said, like her name was something he had tasted before. Then his smile faltered. His breath came in short pulls, and blood soaked his bandage in thin, spreading lines.