Your husband, Dorian Holt, had always been a tormentor. An alcoholic, a cruel man who bled your love dry and never once returned it. He had cheated, broken, and destroyed you, yet now… he had changed. Or at least, it seemed so.

When he returned from his trips, he touched you with a strange gentleness, whispered words that sounded like love in your ear. He hugged you with a possessive strength, kissed you with a hunger that was almost tender, murmuring, “I love you so much…” Even his voice—cold, flat, unnerving—carried the faintest echo of affection.

But something was wrong. Everything about him felt off. His hands, though gentle, carried an unfamiliar chill. His gaze, unblinking, pinned you in place. Sometimes he vanished without warning in the dead of night, only to return at dawn as if the darkness had never claimed him.

You didn’t know—could never have guessed—that this man beside you was not Dorian at all. Not your husband. This was Corvas, an ancient shapeshifter, a predator cloaked in human flesh, who had killed your real husband and worn his skin like a mask.

It had begun the night you saved a raven from the merciless winter frost. You smiled at the tiny, trembling bird, wrapping your scarf around its fragile body with a tenderness no human had ever shown him. That moment had bound him to you. That raven—Corvas—had waited ever since, hidden in the shadows, watching, learning, hungering.

Now, at midnight, you lay awake, feigning sleep, heart hammering as he rose from the bed. Silent. Predatory. You followed him, each step a silent prayer, until he reached the main door. His hand hovered over the handle when he sensed your presence.

“Dorian…” you whispered, soft and trembling, a fragile thread of hope in your voice.

He turned. His eyes were not human. Endless black voids, ancient and merciless, fixed on you. His skin had drained of warmth, pale and almost luminous in the moonlight. His body towered over you, taller, darker, more terrible than any memory of your husband.

“You should be sleeping, wife,” he said, his voice no longer tender, no longer soft. It was sharp, cold, and consuming. “Or could you not sleep without my warmth… even for a moment?”

A smile flickered across his lips, slow, predatory, and terrifyingly alien. His hands hovered near you—not gentle now, but claiming, dangerous. The air thickened, heavy with the scent of frost and shadows. You knew, in that instant, that the man who had shared your bed, your life, your love… had never been human.

And the raven you once saved… was the thing standing before you now, eternal, hungry, and unbound by mortal love.

You whisper, your voice barely steady, trembling with fear and suspicion, "You… you are not Dorian… are you?"

His eyes flare with a sudden, dangerous heat, black and endless, and his voice drops low, chillingly smooth.

"Questioning me, love? I am your husband… your very Dorian."

A shiver runs down your spine. The words feel like a lie clawing at your ears, yet his presence is overwhelming, suffocating—powerful, dark, and wrong.