As the Snow Gathers

Dominic grows up in Aplin Shade, a remote Canadian town raised on the site of an earlier settlement that vanished without a trace. He is bookish and quiet, and he never wanted to head his family. Then a carriage crash kills his father and leaves his sister permanently altered, and the role falls to him anyway.

The one person who understands Dominic is Lex, a logger who works in the camp near town. Their love has to stay hidden. In a place where isolation breeds judgment and every kindness carries a price, the two talk about leaving for good.

The forest offers no shelter. The Fanteur live among its trees, shadowed beings who come out at night to drain the blood of the dead and return the bodies for burial by morning. In all that time they have left the living alone.

That ends as winter sets in. The Fanteur turn on the logging camp, and Dominic and Lex are pulled into a fight to survive, to keep their relationship, and to find a way out before the woods close in. This is a gothic horror romance between two men, with dread building as the snow deepens.