Huntsman's Prey

by Marie Hall

  So much goes into the writing of a book and I seriously wouldn’t be where I am without the support of my fans. My wonderful street team that is always there to encourage me and makes me laugh. To my betas who give me such amazing ideas to make the book even better! To my assistant Grace who’s so amazing and I know I couldn’t accomplish half of what I do without her. To those of you who refused to let Kingdom die and made me dig deeper to discover new characters who lived and breathed in this fascinating world. To my husband, who’s like my rock and doesn’t get annoyed when the laundry piles up a little. You’re epic and I love you. To all those who’ve given me encouragement and who I think might even secretly love this world more than I do (which seems practically impossible as I’m a hardcore Kingdom fan)… thank you!

  About Marie Hall

  Marie loves books that make you think, or feel something. Preferably both. And while she’s a total girly girl and loves glitter and rainbows, she’s just as happy when she’s writing about the dark underbelly of society. Well, if things like zombies, and vampires, and werewolves, and mermaids existed. (Although she has it on good authority that mermaids do in fact exist, because the internet told her so.)

  She’s married to the love of her life, a sexy beast of a caveman who likes to refer to himself as Big Hunk. She has two awesome kids, lives in Hawaii, loves cooking and occasionally has been known to crochet. She also really loves talking about herself in the third person.

  If you’d like to know more about Marie then you can contact her at mariehallwrites@gmail.com Or, if you’d like to check out her latest offerings go to mariehallwrites.blogspot.com If you just want to stop by and say hi, she has a Facebook page and a twitter handle @mariehallwrites, also if you’re interested in really getting to know her and maybe winning some cool prizes from the contests she runs throughout the year, sign up for her newsletter and if you still can’t find ways to contact her then I don’t know what else to do. She does have a pinterest page, but hey… that stuff is kinda boring, just Marie being goofy and posting sexy pics of her couples and nails and food stuff… totally boring.

  Also, she reads any and all emails and you’ll get a response from her, so if you don’t want to go public, she’s cool with that. Slip her a note on the low low and she promises not to blast your thang all around the net. And whether you liked the book or not, leave a review. Please, those things are like gold in her world.

  Marie Hall Books

  Kingdom Series (Fairytale Romance)

  Her Mad Hatter (Free everywhere! Book 1 based on Alice and the Mad Hatter)

  Gerard’s Beauty (Book 2 based on Beauty and the Beast)

  Red and Her Wolf (Book 3 based on Little Red Riding Hood)

  The Kingdom Collection (Books 1-3 with bonus deleted scenes)

  Jinni’s Wish (Book 4, based on Arabian Nights)

  Hook’s Pan (Book 5, Based on Peter Pan)

  Danika’s Surprise (Book 5.5, novelette and first introduction to the upcoming Dark Princess Series)

  Moon’s Flower, (Book 6 based on the legend of The Man in the Moon)

  Huntsman’s Prey, (Book 7 spinoff Dark Princess Series)

  Rumpel’s Prize, (Book 8 coming in April!)

  Moments Series (NA Contemporary Romance)

  A Moment, Book 1 (Ryan and Liliana’s Story)

  Right Now, Book 2 (Alex and Zoe’s Story)

  Tor and Jaime’s Story, Book 3 COMING SOON!

  Night Series (Urban Fantasy)

  Crimson Night,- Book 1

  All Hallows Eve,- Book 2 (Coming March!)

  Chaos Time Serial

  Sable

  Slayde

  Synnergy

  Eternal Lover’s Series

  Death’s Lover (Book 1) From Grand Central—Forever Yours—Publishing

  Previously published under the title The Witching Hour

  Death’s Redemption (Book 2) Coming JUNE, 2014 from Grand Central!

  Sneak Peek: Rumpel’s Prize (Coming April, 2014!)

  Prologue

  “You failed.” Rumpelstiltskin looked at the girl dressed in red standing before him with her chin notched and her spine rigid, her hair was long and brown and gleamed. Her face was elfin, long and thin with striking cheekbones. She was pretty in a banal kind of way.

  Angelica glared at him with eyes as cold as steel. Her ruby red lips thinned. “You lie!” Her body quivered with fury.

  The volcanic mountainside rumbled as the slide of heated magma ran slowly down the black rock between them. The sky was an angry shade of gray and against that dreary backdrop he could almost believe her to be a warrior goddess the way she stood barefoot on the jagged shards of rock, feet torn and bloody, with the sulfuric tinted breeze whipping through her tresses. Her face was covered in angry red scratches and her once luxurious gown was now little more than shreds of ribbon clinging to her.

  The woman knew what she was about. He smirked.

  Snapping his fingers, Rumpel made her oath manifest. A scroll of parchment that gave him the right and authority to do with her as he willed, she’d sealed her acceptance of his every whim in a bloody signature. Her blood, to be more precise.

  The crackle of fire curled around the edges of the brown sheaf. “See this?” He pointed and smirked when her eyes widened, he could practically taste the slick slide of fear ooze from out her pores. “This here is an oath, a binding one, my dear. One that gives me absolute power to do with you as I will.”

  “I hate you,” she glowered.

  “Oh come, Angelica, honestly. I gave you what you craved. Beauty, power. You struck the deal.” Crossing his arms, he rested his weight against his chrome and steel stead.

  Her lips trembled as her fingers clenched tight to her sides. “You know the future, how can you say I lost?” she spit out. “I passed each one of your tests, easily. I found the treasures, each time. You simply refuse to acknowledge it.”

  Gods, give a woman a little beauty and they became such a pain in the arse. He rolled his eyes. “You know, I much preferred you when you were just a simple country mouse. And what do I honestly stand to profit by claiming you’ve lost? Accept facts, chameleon, you may now be a beauty, but your brain is as it always was. Empty and dull.”

  She gasped, daring to take a step toward him.

  He chuckled. “You bore me. Our contract is terminated.”

  “No! Wait!” She held out her hand, the heat of fire completely banked in her desperation that he should not take it all away. “I can do anything, I will… I would…” Nibbling her lip, she stared at the ground then back at him. “I will sleep with you. Yes!”

  She smiled and it was so uninspired, so put on, that his lip curled in instant revulsion.

  “You made me thusly, surely this body,” she traced a slim hand down the length of her svelte form, “tempts you.” Her voice dropped an octave, becoming huskier and what he could only assume she meant to be sexy—problem was it merely sounded to him like a woman straining from constipation. Her fingers plucked at the threads around her breasts.

  “Stop.” He shook his head. “I can promise you you’re doing nothing more than embarrassing yourself.”

  Now there were tears shimmering in her eyes. Nausea rolled like bile in his gut at her theatrics, her fun had run its course and he was well beyond the point of caring.

  “You cannot do this to me, you promised—”

  “And I delivered.” Jerking upright he nodded. “I kept up my end of the bargain, you did not. The contract is now null and void.”

  The moment the words were spoken a shimmering wave of incandescent light rained upon her. She shrieked, dropping to her already gashed up knees as her hands flew to her face. Her skin shifted like melting wax, reforming and reshaping her from what she now was to what she’d once been.

  When the light died she blinked up at him. Her face was plump, hardly fat, but definitely fuller. Her skin dull, her hair greasy and lifeless. The chit wasn’t the foulest creation known to man, but those who came t
o him rarely believed reality, but rather the perception of their own belief.

  She saw herself as hideous to behold and had been willing to trade her soul for a chance at comeliness.

  Shrieking, she covered her eyes with her forearm. “You’ve ruined me,” she cried, “you swore to me, Rumpel, you swore and I did all that you asked me to do. I won this gauntlet.”

  With a scoff he straddled his bike. “You can find your own way home.”

  “What?” She shot to her feet, the dress that’d fitted her so well just a day earlier now had to be held in place so as not to expose more of herself than was seemly. “I’m several days walk from home. At the very least—”

  “I owe you nothing more, be grateful, mouse, that I didn’t kill you for wasting my time.” With a final glare in her direction, he revved his stallion and left. Her screams echoed behind him.

  There were only a few names left on his list, his heart clenched as the muscle in his jaw ticked. The blast of wind against his face as he rode failed to calm his nerves as they normally did.

  Riding pockets of air currents, he streaked across the sky like a hellish blaze of fire and brimstone. Somewhere in Kingdom was a woman who’d end his curse, it seemed impossible to believe that she might possibly come from the loins of one Gerard Caron, but if she was, there would be nothing and no one that would prevent him from doing any and all manner of vile things to possess her.

  No matter how, he meant to see this nightmare come to an end.

  “The devil’s come to collect his due, Caron,” he laughed and his bike roared.

  Chapter 1

  “I forbid this!” Danika shrieked, gazing her fury at a smirking Rumpelstiltskin. The blond demigod was lounging on his steel stallion from hell with his hands clasped firmly behind his head looking for all the world as if he were the cat that ate the canary.

  The black leather pants he wore fitted to him like second skin, the white shirt outlined the sharp planes and grooved demarcations of a body honed by a master sculptor. No one was really sure whether Rumpel really was as devastatingly wicked as he appeared, or whether the demonic little imp had simply glamoured himself to appear thusly, but one thing was certain, he was as evil as he was beautiful.

  The ground beneath her feet rumbled as his bike purred, the clouds were gray and gathering with the first stirrings of an apocalyptic storm, a bolt of lightning struck a massive oak not ten yards from them. An unmistakable odor of ozone permeated the air, making her fight an urge to sneeze. Holding her ground, refusing to be cowed by his garish display of power, she balled her hands into fists and gave him a withering glare.

  Thankfully, she’d managed to route the imp on his way into Gerard and Betty’s village, otherwise his show might have actually succeeded in scaring off the townsfolk. Danika herself was merely cross, she too had magic and could wield it just as sharply as he if she so desired.

  “Oh come now, godmother. You’ve no business being here. In case you’ve forgotten, you don’t actually get to tell me what to do.” His gleaming ride spewed a tail of fire from its chrome pipes. Red headlights seemed to almost blink back at her.

  While Rumpel himself did not frighten her, she had to admit that the sentience of that contraption did make her knees knock together like rolling marbles. Thankfully she was wearing a dress of woven starlight that covered her to her ankles.

  His smile was lascivious with a hint of cruel intentions twisted up in it. “Mmm, Danika, truly you’re a sight to behold little fairy. Quite lovely you’ve become since that horrid affair ended with the sun and Hatter’s daughter. Which I myself, I might add,” he lifted a finger, “helped to negotiate. No?”

  His brows quirked and Danika huffed with indignation. “You were never good enough to kiss the soles of my muddy shoes, old man, and had you not interfered in my business,” she stressed, “I can assure you I still would have found a way to—”

  He scoffed, making that damnable dimple appear. God goddess but she hated the reactions that man elicited from her. She did not want to like him, did not want to enjoy looking at him, and yet she was as helpless as iron shavings to a magnet, he had the sort of evil pull about him that simply demanded a woman stop and stare.

  Blinking, screwing up her courage, she averted her gaze and realized she could breathe just a little easier when she did it.

  “You do think highly of yourself, Danika, and should Jericho ever cease to divert you, I’d willingly step up to the plate. But come, come, fairy, will you not at least look at me?”

  The devil was in that man’s tongue.

  “Nay,” she glowered, “I will not. And I still say you are to leave my charge alone.”

  From the corner of her eye she saw him stand from his perch and shake his head with a semi-bored look. “Technically, she is not that either. You see, I know these things. Her father is your charge, Shayera doesn’t even have a godmother yet. Tsk. Tsk. I mean,” he scrubbed his lightly blond stubbled jaw with strong, blunt fingers, “you’ve as good as invited the Big Bad Wolf to come and snatch her up.”

  Jerking her gaze up, she glared at him. “One, I know the Wolf and he’s an honorable man. Two—”

  He sighed as a glittering sheaf of parchment crackled to life before him. Her heart sank; Rumpel’s deals were legendary and binding, her dragonfly wings buzzed in agitation.

  “What is that?” she hissed, squinting her eyes against the blinding flame curling at its edges.

  “What? This?” He pointed at the sheet with a smile that only be called supremely satisfied. “Why, only a binding, legitimate contract between one: Rumpelstiltskin, that’s me,” his brows waggled, “and one Gerard Caron. Hmm.” He stared at the sheet with a perplexed sort of frown. “Did he not tell you? Did you not know? Why, I thought your bad five had reformed their ways. How very naughty of him.” His accent was a mix between Gaelic and British and made her inside curl with fronds of heat to hear it, feel it almost like a lover’s stroke against her flesh.

  She hated that man, truly she did, bastard was most definitely glamouring himself.

  The parchment rolled up, disappearing in a bright flash of flame as he sat back down on his rumbling beast.

  Danika shook her head. She would have never known what Rumpel had been up to if the Huntsman’s hadn’t whispered in her ear about a certain prophecy the imp worked obsessively to stave off. A prophecy that he was sure involved the Caron’s wild beauty, Shayera.

  “Why do you want her?”

  Frowning, Rumpel gunned the throttle, the machine came to life. Roaring so loud she felt the wave of sound rush through her. His smile was grim. “Why I want her is none of your concern. She’s an unchaperoned denizen of Kingdom.”

  Meaning he didn’t need to explain himself to her and well she knew it.

  Twisting his hair in a knot behind his head, he clipped a nod at her.

  “Wait!” She held out her hand, rushing to his side. “You must vow to do her no harm, swear it, Rumpel, or I’ll hide her from ye.” She trembled, but not with fear now, no… with determination to do what was right.

  “Oh, come now, godmother,” he whispered with that shivery burr of his, “you know that’s against the pale. You hide her, I tell the fairy council of your abuse of power and your wings will be stripped. Is one lone girl really worth all that?”

  He was absolutely right. Paragraph one-thousand two-hundred and eleven of the book of lore said: Interfering in the good work of another magical entity is punishable by law to the very severest penalty.

  She clapped her hand on his wrist and narrowed her eyes. “The law says ‘good work’ I don’t trust you, devil. In any case, I’ve never much cared for laws or rules, if you know me at all you’d know that to be a statement of absolute fact. I’ll do what I must, I always have.” She punctuated each word, daring him to deny it.

  Everyone in fairy knew she’d often danced across the lines of black and white, and though she’d now managed to firmly reclaim her true form thanks to Siria’s du
plicity being found out, she’d gladly and willingly accept any curse when it came to protecting the lives of those she loved.

  The only reason Shayera had never been assigned a godmother was because of a horrendous oversight by the assigning manager of Godmother Inc. A technicality Danika believed they’d have time to work out. She’d never meant for the girl to be unprotected and well Rumpelstiltskin knew it.

  A blast of white heat exploded beside her foot, shooting up sparks and making her momentarily loosen her grip on him.

  His visage was as equally menacing and hateful now as it’d been jovial just seconds ago. “Do not goad me, woman, for I swear you shall lose and I’d hate to think of a world without you in it.”

  Then without a backwards glance, he pealed off, kicking up large chunks of red dirt and debris as he drove the last distance into the normally quiet hamlet.

  Danika gathered her hands to her breast and hugged herself as the sky cleared and the birds once again filled the woods with the sound of song, a sense of dread filled her bones.

  “Oh, Gerard, I fear I cannot help you this time.”