Hearthway Hollow

Dexter & Darien

Female Reader x Male Monster

I was woken from an amazing sleep by my sister screaming and running through the house. I sat up in bed, my hair matted up along the back of my head like a crappy lion's mane asNiki slammed into the door and burst inside with a wild look in her eyes.

"What the hell?" I grumble.

"You need to come see this!" Niki races inside, grabbing me and yanking me out of bed.

"I don't have shorts on!" I whine.

Niki nearly picks me up as she pushes me outside. "No time!"

Usually, Niki gets up before me, has her coffee out on the porch while she reads the paper, then gets me up to make breakfast. That's been the routine since we moved to Hearthway Hollow. We had been asked to take over a friend's old art studio, which we were all too eager to do. So far, it's been great. We've opened up the studio for shows, classes, lectures, all sorts of things. Hearthway Hollow has been a dream come true.

Or well, until I saw the two dead elk on the back lawn.

Niki shakes me. "What the fuck? What the fuck?" She whispers in a low, uncertain panic.

"Let me go!" I slap at her hands and place my hand to my forehead. "Oh wow. This is...new."

"New?" Niki balks. "Chelsey! There are two dead animals on our lawn!"

"And?" I snap back at her. "You think I know what did it?" I sigh and go back inside. "Where's that number?"

"What number?" Niki comes inside and closes the blinds so we can't see the dead animals.

"That guy we bought the house from. The big scary looking one with the teeth?" I find the number taped to the fridge and dial it.

Niki cocks her eyebrow at me. "Billy?"

"Yes! Hi!" I gasp when he answers. "Yeah this is Chelsey, my twin and I bought the house on Lake Bridge-" I stall as he starts growling. "Well yes it's fine. But two dead elk are-" I stop again. "The butcher?"

There's a knock at the front door and Niki goes to answer it.

"Chelsey!" She calls. "The butcher is here?"

I stare towards the front. "I'll call you later, Billy." I hang up and quickly grab a pair of leggings to throw on. We then show Adam, the butcher, to the back where the elk are.

"Oh wow, two at once huh?" Adam chuckles. He looks like a Ken doll come to life and then mixed with an angel.

Niki and I exchange wary glances before looking back to Adam. "At once?"

"Not to worry, we'll get these taken care of. Do you want us to send you the meat or donate it to the shelter?" Adam seems unphased, like this is something normal.

I look to Niki, who hops in with the questions. "Does this sort of thing happen a lot around here? Are there giant monsters in the woods we should know about, or should we plan on moving back home now?"

"Nothing quite that sinister." Adam replies as a worker comes around to gather one of the elk. "It's a tradition here in the Hallow."

Niki and I exchange looks again. "We're not following," I grumble.

"Let's go inside, we can talk there." Adam leads us back into the house. We end up having a very long conversation about Hearthway Hollow and the secret it keeps. Hearthway Hollow isn't all that it seems; in fact its a stranger place than at first glance. It turns out it was founded in order to protect werewolves who were tired of the nomad lifestyle. Adam revealed to us the secrets and swore us to keep them. He then said that both of us were being courted by a werewolf.