I could hear the low babble of voices but the forest was so dense it made the climb almost impossible, and every time the tech crew I was following faded out of sight, I felt my stomach clench in panic. Getting lost out here really didn’t seem like a good idea, especially with a crazy Fae and the Wild Hunt on the loose.
Grabbing a tree branch, I tried to use it to leverage my body up over a particularly steep incline complete with fallen tree. The branch was wet and sticky with tree sap beneath my grip.
A face, its eyes dark, vacant holes, popped into view and I sucked in a deep breath, my body preparing to scream as the ghost from the cemetery placed her hands on my face. Panic washed over me, my mind suddenly convinced that the branch was soaked in sticky crimson blood.
Releasing my grip, I teetered on the edge of the fallen tree, my arms wind-milling as the ghost watched me. Images of bodies ripped apart flooded my head. Pitching backwards, I hit the ground with enough force to drive the air from my lungs, my legs rolling up over my head as I started a rapid descent back down the hill I’d been climbing.
My training kicked in and I grabbed the first sapling that whizzed past my face, wrapping my arms around it as my body jerked to a sudden halt. The force practically wrenched my arms from their sockets.
Winded, I lay on the forest floor and stared up at the canopy overhead, the dense foliage blocking the sky from my view. The ghost appeared once more, her expression one of desperate pleading as she stared down at me. She reached out toward me, and the urge to take her hand in mine nearly overwhelmed me.
“Amber!” Graham’s shout was enough to startle the woman standing over me and she faded as one bright shaft of sunlight broke through the trees overhead.
Tilting my head back, I searched for her, but she was well and truly gone. I hadn’t imagined her; she’d definitely been here, and the hairs standing on my airs was testament to that. But how she’d gotten here…. Ghosts didn’t travel, at least not on their own. They needed an anchor of some sort; the place where they’d died was usually a good place, the trauma holding them there until something happened to break the cycle, allowing them to finally move on.
But this woman … she was familiar, and yet I couldn’t put my finger on what it was about her that had me thinking I somehow knew her. Seeing her in the cemetery and now here, it couldn’t be a coincidence—there was more to it than that but I was blowed if I knew what in Hell it was.
And, well, I wasn’t going to figure it out lying on my back in the middle of the woods.
Chapter 13
Pushing up onto my feet, every inch of my body ached as though I’d been run over by a ten-ton truck. Perhaps falling down the side of a hill through dense forestry was the same thing?
“I heard your scream—and what are you doing down there?” Graham said, standing on the opposite side of the fallen tree I’d taken my swan dive from.
“Don’t ask,” I said, dusting myself down and beginning to trudge up to where he stood.
Without saying a word, Graham held his hand out toward me but I could see the faint smile hovering on his lips. Clearly, I had half the forest stuck in my hair. I could already feel some of the twigs I’d gathered on my way down scratching at my scalp.
Ignoring his grip and the grin that widened on his face, I placed my hands on the tree and climbed over it with ease, warily glancing around at my surroundings. The last thing I needed was for the ghost to pop out at me again, but I had a feeling she’d spent all the energy she had filling my head with images that could only be described as killing fields.
“How many this time?” I asked, falling into step next to Graham as he moved up the hill.
“Just the one, but it’s just as messy as the others…” he said.
“One—isn’t that kind of a big drop? Killers usually escalate, don’t they? Or are we thinking this is an old site?”
Graham shook his head and indicated for me to move ahead of him as we approached a gap between two trees that was far too narrow for us both to push through together. “You tell me,” he said, squeezing through the gap after me into a large clearing surrounded by a ring of trees.
“Graham, what is this?” I asked, magic tugging at me as it surged through the ground beneath my feet.
“Victoria reckons it’s some sort of Faerie Ring,” he said gruffly, and I could tell from the tone of his voice that Victoria was obviously holding certain important details back.
The smell of blossoms and copper tickled the back of my nose and I smothered a sneeze as I moved further into the circle. It was a place of power, I was certain of that, but….
The moment I saw it, my stomach dropped into my shoes. The faint fluttering of her gossamer wing against one of the tree branches—or at least what was left of one of her wings. Her face contorted in terror, the taste of her blood on my tongue. The dream I’d had came flooding back to me in a wave of emotion that threatened to drive me to my knees.
As though it could sense my weakness, the power beneath my feet surged up, willing me to come and meet it.
“I said no magic!” Victoria shouted from the other side of the Faerie Ring, her voice sounding distant and muffled beneath the roar of magic in my head.
A hand took mine, the fingers cold to the touch as they wrapped through mine. The second the woman clenched my hand tight, the power subsided, drifting back down into the ground and the tree roots below our feet.
“Better?” the woman asked. Her long pearl and blue hair fell down her back in the longest braid I’d ever set eyes on; her eyes were grey but the iris was swirled with what looked silver and I found myself drifting toward her as though beckoned by a call only I could hear.
“Whoops,” she said, a smile lighting her face so her alabaster skin glowed in the sunlight. The moment she spoke again, her eyes were simply grey, the silver swirls nothing more than an intriguing pattern.
“How did you do that?” I asked, staring down at the ground.
“It’s just one of my many talents,” she said. “You wouldn’t mind if I took my hand back now, would you?” she asked, her smile never wavering.
I jerked back, my hand feeling colder than it had before—but I couldn’t put my finger on why it even would. “What are you?” I asked then. Curiosity killed the cat, or so the saying goes, but I never was big on keeping my questions to myself.
“A harbinger,” she said. There was something in the way she said it that I knew it wasn’t the full truth.
“She’s a banshee,” Victoria said, her voice coming from behind me, her tone suggesting she’d just swallowed an entire bag of lemons.
I felt my eyes widen and I quickly scrambled to get my expression to a more neutral place. I’d heard a lot about banshees when I’d lived in Ireland, especially as both sides of my family were blessed by surnames that started with either a Mac or an O’.
“Changeling,” the stranger said, using the word more as an insult than anything else, and the hairs rose on the back of my neck.
“Who are you and what are you doing here?” I asked, hoping that by drawing their attention to other things, perhaps they wouldn’t attempt to kill each other.
“My name is Darcey Thorne. I work as a private investigator and enforcer for the Faerie Courts. I’m here to help with the investigation; the Courts of Faerie both agree that this,” she said, gesturing to the the Faerie Ring, “is not something we want out in the world.”
“I don’t think I’m following you,” Graham cut in. “What exactly are we talking about here?”
“The Wild Hunt have been summoned, used against their will to do unspeakable evils both against the Fae and humans. We cannot let this stand. The Hunt cannot be used in this manner; it is a thing of beauty and power and deserves more respect than what it has been given.” Her tone shifted as she spoke, as though the words were not quite her own but belonged to someone else. Someone with a heck of a lot of power.
“So what is this, then, and why did it try to eat me?” I asked, star
ing warily down at the ground once more. I could still feel the magic but it was subdued and far more polite.
“This is a Faerie Ring, or as you might understand, a grave marker,” Darcey said, indicating the trees. As she lifted her arm, I caught sight of the long, curved blade at her belt and my heart came to a shuddering halt.
“How do you have the Bone Blade?” I asked, tearing my gaze away from it.
The last I’d known of it, Lily had gotten her hands on it just before she’d decided to hand herself in. But I just couldn’t see her handing it over to a banshee.
“What do you know of Bone Blades?” Darcey snapped, the friendly demeanour fading as she took a threatening step forward.
“One turned up in a case I worked a while ago and I was just surprised to see you with a replica…” I said, trying very hard to hide what I was really thinking from her.
It wasn’t particularly clear whether Fae could read thoughts or not, but considering the one I’d been having issues with spent his time trying to mind-rape me, I wasn’t taking any chances.
She studied me, her grey eyes probing mine. The Fae weren’t that different from vampires. There was the daylight thing but their ability to bespell their victims was way too similar. Was it just a cosmic joke or were vampires and Fae closer than people realised?
“Where is it now?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.
“I don’t know,” I answered truthfully. I’d known where it was, but after Lily took it there had been nothing more about it and, well, I couldn’t exactly question her about what she’d done with it.
Seconds ticked by and finally Darcey nodded, evidently satisfied with whatever she’d seen in my face and read from my eyes. “If you come across it again, I would appreciate you returning it to me.”
“So are you going to tell me what it is and what exactly it can do?” I asked.
Darcey smiled and let her hand fall to the hilt of the blade. “You might call it an heirloom. Each family of banshees has one, and it gets passed to the eldest as we are the ones bestowed with the full power of a harbinger.”
“Where did it come from?” I asked, the question popping out before I could stop it.
Darcey’s smile widened but her eyes were cold and unforgiving. “There are seven blades in total, one for each family, and they were carved from the bones of the first banshee….”
Her words hung in the silence and I was suddenly glad I wasn’t a member of their family.
“And what might happen if someone was stabbed with one?” I asked, remembering what it felt like, the darkness that had spread within me, consuming every part of me.
“A human would be possessed by what you would know as a spirit, but really it is just the darkness left over from the Fae that have died at the end of the blade. Insanity would follow and the spirits would pass from one host to the next, slowly eating away at them….”
It sounded right and from what I’d felt of the darkness, it had been nothing but rage and despair.
“How many died?” she asked.
“A few—too many, in fact,” I said with a sigh, and Graham nodded in agreement. “But we at least managed to bring a few of them back….” I trailed off as soon as I watched her face change.
“There is no cure … not from the sickness caused by the darkness, so I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” Darcey said.
It was my turn to be confused and I folded my arms across my chest. I didn’t particularly want to explain to her how we cured the others. The number of people who knew my secret already was far more than I had ever counted on. Add to that the fact that I really didn’t know if I could trust her or not and I was pretty certain I didn’t want to just go spilling the beans.
“I was one of those who survived an attack,” Graham interjected, and Darcey instantly turned her attention to him. “I wasn’t possessed but I came as close as I want to get to dying….” He trailed off as Darcey continued to stare at him without a word.
Finally, she reached out toward him and pressed her hands either side of his face, her eyes rolling back into her head. Graham jerked in her grip and I grabbed her arms.
It was impossible to budge her; it didn’t seem to matter how hard I tugged and pulled at her arms, she refused to move, her grip on Graham unwavering.
“Victoria, help,” I said, gritting my teeth.
“She’s not going to hurt him; she will heal him if she can,” Victoria said, her expression blank as she watched Darcey work.
Finally, she released Graham, her arms dropping to her sides as she took a stumbling step backwards and panted as though she’d just run up several flights of stairs. “I am sorry,” she said, addressing Graham.
“Sorry for what?” he asked, rubbing his palms against his face and the place where she’d grabbed him.
“You were not truly one of the possessed, but there is darkness within you nonetheless. I am sorry there is not more I could do…” she trailed off.
“What are you trying to say?” I asked, my voice low and controlled.
Darcey shook her head and smiled kindly at Graham, a smile that sent shivers down my spine. “This is not what I am here for; I am here to help put a stop the ones committing atrocities like this,” she said, and the sadness in her voice was contagious.
As soon as she said it, I felt my chest constrict with pain and sadness, tears welling in my eyes as I fought to battle the grief that threatened to overwhelm me. Graham’s hand on my shoulder and his sudden sobbing told me he was feeling the same thing. Even Victoria’s eyes glistened with the onset of tears.
“Cut the crap, banshee,” Victoria said, the hitch in her voice diminishing the gruff, unfeeling effect she’d been aiming for.
Darcey closed her eyes and the sadness disappeared as quickly as it had arrived. I felt the air around us shiver and my ears popped; the bright sunshine we’d been standing in moments before disappeared. The world appeared colder, harsher, as the light shifted.
The trees were bare around us when just a few moments before they’d been covered in leaves. The ground beneath our feet was scorched and crisp with not one blade of grass standing.
“What happened?” I asked, staring around at the sudden change.
“I lifted the glamour. If we are to work together then you need to see the real crime scene and the not the pretty one you’d all been tricked into.”
“It’s a crime scene, why make it pretty?” I asked. The other scene had been far from pretty, so what made this one so different?
“Because the Fae are vain creatures. The one who did this did not set the glamour—she did,” Darcey pointed to something just behind me.
I turned slowly in the direction she pointed, and now that I knew where it was coming from, the pulse of magic I’d felt from the moment I stepped into the Faerie Ring grew stronger.
I picked her out instantly. She wasn’t scattered the way the other bodies had been but she’d still clearly been mauled by wild animals, her body open and shredded, exposed to the elements of the forest.
But it was her face that brought the tears back to my eyes. She was as beautiful as she had been in my dream, but I could practically taste her terror on the air like a bitter perfume. As I watched her, her expression contorted into one of agony and fear.
“She’s still alive,” I said, the words shocking me as much as everyone else.
Darcey nodded and started to move toward the girl on the ground. The one responsible had allowed the Hunt to rip her asunder but they had left her with just enough life to cling to.
“How?” Graham asked, his face a nasty shade of green.
“The Fae are immortal; there are only certain things that will kill us,” Darcey said. “The Wild Hunt is one such thing, but the one controlling it called it off before it had finished its job…. She will die eventually, but it is cruel to leave her in such agony.”
Darcey crouched next to the girl. Her petrified violet eyes turning up to stare into Darcey’s.
“I don’t want to die,” she whispered, her voice unnatural and wet. It gurgled with every word she spoke.
“You will live on in Mother Earth,” Darcey said, pulling the Bone Blade from her belt and taking it in both hands.
“Please don’t…” she said again, and I took a step forward.
Darcey glanced at me over her shoulder. Her eyes had taken on a storm grey appearance, the silver like tiny flashes of lightning that illuminated them with every breath she took.
Her pear-and-blue-streaked hair shimmered, the blue disappearing as the braid broke and fell around her body in a bright curtain that moved as though it had a life of its own. Her alabaster skin glowed with the inner light of her power and the urge to cower from her washed over me. She was both beautiful and terrible and my heart caught in the back of my throat.
“Do not interfere,” she said to me, her voice both melodious and sorrowful. She addressed the dying Fae: “I am not Death; I am his harbinger, but he is not here and I would not wish to see you in such pain…. I can take it away, give you back your eternal life to live on in the Earth and Air like we all one day will.” Darcey’s words had a ring of power to them and the Fae on the ground took a shuddering breath, pain contorting her face once more.
“Yes,” she said, although from where I’d stood, I hadn’t actually heard a question.
Darcey lifted the blade and brought it down. She didn’t drive it into the Fae’s body but rather halted before it touched the bloodied remains. Moving almost imperceptibly, Darcey pressed the tip of the blade over the Fae’s still-beating heart.
The grey spread out from the point of contact with the blade. The scene had been gruesome and macabre but there had still been something beautiful in the bright colours of the girl’s blood and her shattered body. I could imagine just how stunning she would have been had she not been little more than a broken doll on the ground. But I didn’t really have to imagine it; I’d dreamed of her, seen the happiness in her heart light the world around her.
Wild Hunt Page 7