Behind her, a row of crows landed on the ruined corpse of the castle, beady eyes on me. Unease spread like blood spilling.
“Old self?” I frowned. “We’ve never —”
She grinned at me, waving a hand in the direction we’d come. “Not in this lifetime, maybe. Not for you. As I said, you haven’t got a thing figured out, this time.” A fondness danced in her eyes. “Your companion however, knows better than most how powerful bonds such as this are. How rare to form. It is quite unheard of, the desire to break one, you know. Taboo, almost. And it would be better, his strength flowing through your tiny little limbs, when the time for war comes. Your enemy already watches you, in your dreams, in the daylight hours. He will never let you go, you know. But perhaps—” she shook her head, smile widening. “Oh, I am bad, aren’t I? I seem to be on the verge of breaking a promise. No more, then. Now go and get me my sword, pretty one—you’re starting to bore me. The portal will take you where you need to be, and bring you back once you have found what it is that I want.”
Silence.
Hunter said, haltingly, “I do, your Majesty. Know about bonds, that is. Still. . . .” His eyes drifted toward me, then snapped ahead again. “I assure you we’ll bring you the sword.”
“Unless we die, getting it.” I added, understanding very little of what I’d just heard.
“You just might. Werewolves have such tempers.”
“I get the feeling you and Werewolves have that in common.”
“I get the feeling you don’t know when to shut up,” Hunter said, at my side.
The queen tittered. “I must say I agree with you, young man. Take your beloved and go, before I change my mind and have you eat something poisonous. Or have something poisonous eat you.”
Beloved? This lady is out of her damn mind if she—
Hunter grabbed me by the arm so hard I actually cried out, drawing laughter from a few of the fair folk in the clearing behind us, and dragged me away. I looked back as I stumbled after him, searching for the queen.
The last thing I saw was her smile. Her knowing gaze locked on our retreating forms like a hawk watching two mice flee. She was trying to decide if she wanted to play with her food before she ate it. Then her court converged on her again, and the haunting flute music started up as the branches blocked her from view. The other fair folk began to dance, and then faded from sight entirely.
“Stop, I ca—”
“Shut up,” Hunter snapped. “Just stop talking.”
I did. If he was going to be an ass, then fine, there were more important things to worry about. Wolves and swords and riddles on the lips of women who wore thorned crowns.
Suddenly Hunter slammed me against a tree. My teeth shook with the impact. And then he was so close I could practically taste him. “Do you have any idea how utterly stupid that was?” he demanded. “You do not talk back to her, Sky! Ever.”
His body pressed against mine, luring heat and anger to the surface in waves.
“I talk back to everyone.”
He snarled. “That, I know. Around here it will end your life before it’s started.”
I want to lick your throat, I thought, but only before I bite out a chunk of it.
“I didn’t mean to!” I shoved him and he stepped back, still seething. I wished he hadn’t. God knows he was strong enough to fight my push. “It just popped out—and she obviously didn’t mind. She was too busy dropping those creepy hints. What did she mean? By any of that?”
“We don’t have time to worry about it. I want to get out of here as fast as possible. We can talk about it later. We can talk about what a fucking idiot you are later, too. Just stay by my side and don’t do anything else stupid or life-threatening before we can get this sword.”
Stupid and life-threatening aren’t actions, they’re fixtures of my personality.
“You want me to hunt down Excalibur with you? Here’s a tip: Stop being such a dick.”
“You liked my d—”
“Finish that sentence, and I end you.”
Hunter’s eyes narrowed, and he walked away.
Without another word he strode off so fast I could barely keep up. I followed him through the forest, simmering with anger. I knew that I’d upset him, scared him—I was scared myself. Who wouldn’t be scared shitless in this situation? But I was too concerned puzzling over what the queen had said to try and make a peace offering, not that I thought he’d accept one so soon. It wasn’t my job to make him feel warm and fuzzy on the inside, anyway. I didn’t need to reassure the asshole.
The queen wasn’t just some spontaneous, demanding ruler or a dangerous immortal. She was someone who knew something about me, something I might not know about myself, and she wanted me to think so. Why?
Your enemy already watches you, in your dreams, in the daylight hours. . .what did she mean? Crayton? Jackson?
So many mind games. . . .
By the time we’d reached the edge of the trees, I still didn’t have an answer. I was being wound tighter and tighter into the spider’s web.
TWENTY-ONE
WOLVES
“So what?” I asked Hunter’s back as we climbed the stairway back to our world. “Are you just planning to fight a pack of Werewolves?”
“Gosh golly gee, how did you know?”
Brilliant.
I kept on his trail, following him up into the light. When we stepped out of the doorway, we were not on the island anymore. Startled, I looked around, expecting things to become familiar at any second, but it didn’t happen.
We’d come out in the woods, but here the trees were thinner, younger, and spaced farther apart—more like a man-made reconstruction of a forest than an actual one. It was surprisingly Home Depot garden section, compared to the Faerie realm. Overhead the sky had turned a pale grey, a washed-out hue that hinted at rain later in the day, but for now the air was dry: it was the ground that was wet. As soon as we stepped out of the doorway, my feet were soaked.
“Disgusting.” I remarked at the ground.
It was loose and muddy, water gushing up through the loose soil to soak our feet wherever we stepped.
Hunter looked annoyed. “Of course it couldn’t let us out anywhere else. Fucking portals.”
“Where are we, anyway?” I asked, looking around.
Through the trees, off in the distance, I could see a thin gravel road, a driveway, and on the other side of it, a massive house with beige plastic siding that looked pretty much brand new. Somewhere nearby I could hear the gurgling of a stream—the source of the ground water, maybe? The air smelled like dirt, sap, and dead leaves.
“The pack house, I think.” He caught my expression and explained, “Werewolves don’t run in traditional packs—like I said at the restaurant, they’re more human than canine—but they do like to stick together. If several families area in one place it’s easier to manage themselves, easier to keep their secrets.”
“And, I’m guessing, easier to afford a huge piece of land to run around on as a big furry humanoid without being spotted.” I looked around at the land in a new light, half expecting a hairy monster to burst from the trees.
“Exactly. Let’s go find the sword.”
“Wait!” I grabbed his arm. “Can we talk for a second?”
His eyes closed off again. “Later.”
“No! Now!”
“Of course, Princess.”
I stopped walking and crossed my arms. Overhead the wind ruffled the blessedly ordinary tree branches, causing them to sway and creak dangerously. The sound of the wild, but a human wild, one that built a world I recognized.
“I’m serious,” I said. “We need to talk.”
He sighed, and then, in the voice an adult would use to humour an annoying child, “Fine, Sky, what do you want to talk about?”
“The dentures you’re going to need after I knock out your teeth, if you ever take that tone with me again,” I snapped, and then, “You’re mad at me.”
“
You just threatened to knock my teeth out,” he put in. “Yes, I’m mad at you. You could have gotten yourself killed back there. You have no idea how bad that could have been, how quickly things could have turned on us. You’re just lucky she found your insolence charming, or her riders would be hunting you through the forest like an animal right now.”
“You would have saved me.”
He sighed and ran a hand over his face. “I would have tried,” he said, “and then we would both be dead.”
I’m sorry, the words were on the tip of my tongue. It’s not exactly like I’m used to this. Faeries and mortal danger and reigning myself in. Not giving into the urge to say every stupid thing that pops into my head.
The image of the Seelie chasing me through that forest full of hulking shadows and magik plants shook me to my core.
I swallowed, trying to push that cozy image out of my mind.
He had a point. He was right, really. And I did regret making him worry, if nothing else. That was troubling enough in itself. Caring about his feelings was one of those off-limits things. Feelings, in general, were one of those off-limits things.
But at the same time, she’d goaded me.
And now Hunter was looking at me like he wanted to tear out his own hair—or mine. Not in a kinky way, either, but in an I can’t believe anyone could be so dense kind of way.
It kind of stung.
Since when did I care what he thought?
I watched him watching me, waiting for a reply. When had his opinion started to matter? When we’d gone from random hookup to unlikely partners? When we’d gone from that to. . .this?
And what was this? What were we? Magikal friends with benefits?
Nope.
A shock of anger filtered to me through the bond, hot and flowing and impossible to ignore. It wasn’t mine, but as the burnt of Hunter’s weariness and frustration hit me, my own fury rose up to meet his, righteous and all-consuming. My eyes narrowed, and fists clenching and unclenching at my sides, an old habit. I dug my fingernails into my palms to keep my hands occupied.
This—this real, burning, insistent rage filling my chest—would mean, generally, that I cared. Even though I knew I didn’t.
Why would I? Why should I?
Instead of snapping back, I did what I was good at. What I’d done hundreds of times with hundreds of people. The thing I did every day: I shut off. I schooled my features into an icy mask of bemused indifference and rolled my eyes at him like he was an annoying dog trying to hump my leg.
Both of us could be condescending, if that was how he wanted it.
“Whatever,” I said, in the most bored voice I could manage.
“Whatever?”
“That’s what I said.” I ignored his flat tone.
I brushed past him, hoping he couldn’t see my hands shaking like I thought they were. I came close enough to smell him, musk and coffee and cologne. “Let’s get this over with so we can break this stupid bond. I’ve had enough of you dragging me around.”
Hunter’s eyes flashed as I looked past him, and I forced myself to keep going forward. Whatever, I thought. Whatever, whatever, what the fuck ever. It’s not my problem.
Except somehow it was; I’d told myself I wouldn’t give in, wouldn’t fan the flames, and what had I done? Reached out and tried to stroke the fire. And I’d gotten burned. Again. Caught up in the power of this world like a kid in a candy store, I’d forgotten who I was, and who he was, and why this attraction between us couldn’t go anywhere. It didn’t matter if I stayed in this world or not, didn’t matter if I embraced or scorned the magik—it and Hunter were not a package deal, and I didn’t want them to be. I could still be a Charmer without allowing a boyfriend-shaped chink to exist in my armour.
Letting people in only gives them the chance to slice up your insides and steal pieces of you to take with them when they leave—and they will leave—they always do.
Besides. He was annoying. And angry.
He kept nearly getting me killed.
I thought of my father turning his back on us and the friends who’d stopped speaking to me when I left school, or even before that. Thought of the boys who’d trailed in and out of my bed, trying to force Hunter to make sense in a place among their rank. I thought of myself, looking at Melissa, and then looking ahead.
Even I left people, breaking them behind me like toys I didn’t care for. I would do it again, I thought, and the ugliness of it spurred me on.
“Fine.” Hunter said from behind me, voice cold.
“Fine.”
He knew exactly what I was feeling. Good. It should be someone else hurting for a change.
I was bad for thinking that, but it was what it was. Sometimes I liked making people hurt. It made it easier to forget I was hurting too. Passing the time by killing each other.
This was what caring about people did, how it ruined you. We try and try and try, give until there’s nothing left to take, until we’re shadows of ourselves. I don’t want to wake up someday and be that. I don’t want to realize I let the wrong person break me.
“Stay close,” he advised, “try not to get yourself killed.”
“Sure thing, boss,” I said. Then I froze.
There was a girl on the path ahead of us. She stood still as stone, ready to bolt.
Or attack.
Hunter bumped into me and started to sputter. “Shut up.”
He did shut up, so I knew he’d seen her too. She looked maybe sixteen, with creamy skin and a brown bob. She was standing there in the middle of the trail just watching us, fists tight at her sides. The white-painted woods around her creaked and groaned, the same breeze that ruffled the branches tugging at her short hair, and mine.
I took half a step closer, and there was a strange jolt down my spine, a burst of energy. The girl’s eyes flashed an unnatural yellow, and when I blinked the light shade was gone.
I’d just. . .was that what sensing someone’s signature was like?
“What do you want?”
I felt my eyebrow hitch and brushed off the sensation of her power touching mine. “Is that how you talk to all your guests?”
“It’s how I talk to Charmers who trespass on my land.” Could she sense us, too?
“Your land? Must be nice to have a rich daddy.”
I was assuming this girl was one of the wolves, but it was the way she snarled at me—as in, actually pulled her lips back over her gums like a dog, and snarled—just confirmed it. Okay, Werewolf or not, that was not a flattering look for her. Her eyes flashed from that soft brown back to a startlingly bright yellow, with slit pupils. I could see those same eerie orbs set into the face of a wolf, surrounded by fine, dark fur.
“My daddy,” she hissed, “is dead.”
“And mine walked out on me, and this guy’s is trying to kill us both. Life’s tough, kid. Join the club.”
At that, she growled harder.
“Let’s all just calm down here,” Hunter said, stepping forward.
Wolf Girl snarled at him, too. Good.
“Alright,” I said, stepping forward. Someone with more bite than him needed to take care of this if we wanted to be out of here before Christmas. “You’re an asshole, we’re assholes. Everyone’s an asshole. Glad we got that settled. Can we stop wasting time now? We’re not here to fight. Not unless we have to. We just need to talk to whoever is in charge around here.”
"Toby isn’t here right now. You’ll have to come back.” She didn’t sound too sorry about it.
And it was the truth. Fantastic.
“You see, that doesn’t really work for us.”
“Does this?” she flipped me off.
Well. I tried.
I glanced back at Hunter. “Can you. . .” I waved my hand in her general direction. “Take care of this? Because if I have to, I’m going to end up punching a teenage girl in the face.”
She smirked. “How old are you then, Polly Pocket?”
“Was that supposed to be an
insult?” I asked. “Because Polly was rocking some pretty fly looks last time I checked.”
Hunter sighed and stepped forward, bringing himself into the no-man’s land between us and the girl. “That’s close enough,” she told him, and he stopped.
What Hunter did next made me hate him a little: He told the truth.
Fucking. Handsome. Moron.
“We were sent here by the Seelie Fae,” he said. “We’re here to get back a sword that your pack stole from them.”
Shadows of Ourselves Page 21