For the Hunt

by Debbie Cassidy

  “She betrayed me,” he continued softly. “She betrayed me because she didn’t want a rival for her popularity. The power we siphon could have done so much good, but now we’re forced to feed on it, to use it as sustenance to survive. She could have used our method to continue to help the people, but she chose to shut it down simply because the idea hadn’t been hers. She turned us into living ghosts, and now she wants our help.” His lip curled. “Fuck her.”

  “Did you?”

  “What?”

  “Fuck her?” Why in the hell was I asking that?

  He locked gazes with me. “No. I didn’t. But she wanted me, I knew that much. I respected her too much to act on it. I was a fool.”

  “No. You were a good person, and it sounds like she acted out of fear for her position. Even monarchs can be dethroned if the people wish it.”

  “Yes,” Caister said. “She was a queen by right because she created this world, but that doesn’t mean that the people couldn’t choose another leader. I suppose she was threatened by my actions, especially when the people started to talk about the existence of a governing council to aid the queen in decision-making.”

  Yeah, that would have done it. The thought of splitting her power, of being accountable to a council. “I get why you’re pissed. But when we meet her, you’ll keep your emotions in check. We need her, whether we like it or not.”

  He fixed me with his habitual narrow-eyed stare. “You think I’m incapable of being civil?”

  I snorted. “Have you met you?”

  His shoulders relaxed. “I suppose I haven’t given you a reason to think any less.”

  “You’ve been an ass. But…I get it.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah. The Hunt is more than a construct. It’s the blood in your veins. It’s who you are, and I…I haven’t exactly been committed. I wanted to straddle the worlds, and I realize that may not be possible.”

  He frowned. “You’d give up your lovers for us?”

  The thought sent a lance of pain through my chest. “If they can’t accept what I am, then I’ll have no choice.”

  “And what are you, Eva?”

  I’d said so many times that the Hunt was a part of me, but the truth was more than that. “I am the Hunt.”

  His lips curved in a smile that was neither sardonic nor mocking. In fact…Fuck, it was stunningly beautiful.

  “You’re gaping, Eva,” he said softly.

  I snapped my mouth closed.

  “It was never about choosing, you know,” he said. “It was about accepting who you were.”

  That’s what Dia had said. “You haven’t exactly made it easy.”

  “You refused to come with us. You chose them over yourself.”

  “They are a part of me too. They deserve to be happy, and if happiness isn’t with me…”

  He sighed. “I know that now. I see how much they mean to you, but…the Hunt should mean the same.”

  “One big happy family?”

  His expression sobered. “Not unless we can get the others back.”

  I pulled myself to my feet. “Let’s get moving.”

  Three hours later, it was time to take another break. The terrain had shifted from flat to hilly and wilderness was closing in. The stars and the map were our only guides. Howls ripped the air to the east, too far away to bother us, thank goodness. But my body went into hypervigilant mode regardless. Years of fighting Feral, years of running weren’t so easily wiped. Dying and being reborn had taken the edge off the memories, but with the Hunt gone the old instincts rose again.

  I veered west away from the howls just as a rumble of thunder tore the night air.

  “We should find shelter,” Caister said. “A storm is coming.”

  “We can handle a little rain.”

  “This will be more than rain, this will be thunder and lightning, and the spriggans will come out to play. Trust me, we don’t want to catch their eyes. They’re mischief makers, and their games can be sadistic.”

  I scanned the map in the moonlight. “There should be a farmhouse half a mile to the west. Maybe we can beg shelter there.”

  A fat raindrop landed on the map and the trees around us began to whisper.

  “We need to hurry,” Caister said.

  We jogged west out of the woodland, where the whispering was getting louder and laughter drifted on the wind. Long minutes passed, and the rain began to fall in earnest before the lumpy, shadowy form of the farmhouse came into view. We broke into a sprint as lightning tore the sky in two. The farmhouse flashed bright and warm before us, and then we were banging on the wooden door.

  It flew open to reveal a slender man wearing overalls and a baggy cream shirt. His dark hair flopped into his brown eyes as he looked us over.

  “I suppose you be wanting shelter,” he said.

  “Until the storm passes, if you’d be so kind,” Caister said.

  Who knew he could be so polite?

  The man stepped back and ushered us over the threshold. We stepped into a cozy kitchen where a fire was crackling cheerfully in a hearth and a kettle was whistling on the hob.

  “Tea?” he offered.

  “Not for us.” Caister pulled out a chair for me and then took the one beside me. The young man sat opposite us, nursing a cup of what looked like herbal tea.

  He sipped. “Travelers?”

  “Yes,” Caister said. “We got caught in the storm.”

  “Yes, the storms can be violent in this region. And sometimes deadly, when the hidden fey come out to play.”

  My curiosity got the best of me. “The hidden fey?”

  The man smiled. “The spriggans, the Buggane, and the rednaps. They revel in this type of weather, like worms coming up for air. Some even say the long lost ride the storm, beings that have fallen into myth, even for us.” He reached under the table, pulled out what looked like a tiny guitar, and began to strum it. “Did you know it was on a night like this, stormy and wild, that the fomorians first entered Tuatha lands? They came via the Seas of Trinity, across the dimensions, riding the rainbow bridges until they docked on our shores. They tore into our world and then they tore through it.” The music rose and fell with his words. “They fought us for reign over the mortal realms, but we resisted and prevailed. They retreated but left their mark. Many of the lesser fey carry fomorian blood in their veins. Many of the long lost hold fomorian power. The power to raise emotions. To elicit thoughts and wants and needs.”

  The music was rising and flowing through me, prickling at my mind and body, provoking heat in places it had no business blooming. I shifted in my seat, and unease gripped the back of my neck.

  “Enough.” I snapped the word and he stopped playing, a small smile on his lips.

  “You don’t like my music?”

  “I have a headache.” The lie would have to do, because I had a sinking suspicion that his music was dangerous, possibly even alive. Whatever it was it had been doing things to my body, and I had a feeling he knew it.

  If he meant us harm, then I needed to be clear-headed to deal with him.

  There was a thud from upstairs, but the man didn’t even flinch.

  “Who else lives here with you?” Caister asked, his voice thick and raspier than usual.

  The man shrugged. “No one.”

  The thud came again, and the man began to play his little guitar once more.

  I opened my mouth to say no, to tell him to stop, but Caister’s hand was on my thigh—high enough for a shockwave to lance through my core—and then he was turning me to face him. His lids were hooded, his eyes dark, and my mouth ached to taste him. I kissed him, lips brushing his and then latching on in sweet abandon.

  What were we doing? Why did this feel so good? Why was I still thinking?

  The chairs clattered and we were on the floor, rolling, mouths fused in deep, soul-sucking kisses. Someone moaned, but it wasn’t me, or Caister. And then Caister’s hands were in my hair, his mouth was on my neck, his ha
nds were tearing at my shirt, and when it didn’t give way they ran over the material, rubbing and kneading my breasts. His hips slotted between my thighs and oh, God, I needed him inside me.

  The music played faster, tone higher as we dry-humped the fuck out of each other. A red haze was creeping over my mind, and then Caister’s hand was down my waistband and I was raising my hips to give him access, to allow him to touch me, slick and wet and swollen where my desire threatened to overcome me. Come. Oh God, I was going to. He groaned into my mouth as I jerked against his hand, my brain on fire with sensation.

  Another groan, guttural and rough.

  No, this was…what was this? Even though my body was in the throes of passion my mind snapped to clarity, and I turned my head away from Caister’s kisses to look at our host. He sat in the chair, guitar abandoned as it floated beside him, playing independently. His pants were unlaced, his huge cock in his hand as he pumped furiously. Veins bulged from the sides of his neck as he worked himself up to orgasm.

  Heat shot through me. I needed that cock. I needed it inside me.

  No.

  The music.

  It was the music. I had to stop the music.

  But Caister was pulling down my pants, he was yanking them down my legs, and I was free. His silken hardness was pressing against my hungry wetness, and the music was good, it was…Oh, God, he was pushing into me, sliding deep and…Yes. Oh yes.

  Caister fisted my hair and fucked me hard up against the flagstones, and nothing else mattered but the rasp of his cock inside me and the slap of his flesh against mine. Nothing mattered but reaching the pinnacle and cresting the rise to the orgasm that would complete us.

  Thud.

  No. I grabbed Caister’s face, my breath coming in gasps as we neared climax. “Stop, we have to…Oh, God.” Why was I still moving into him, why was I still fucking him? “Caister, the guitar. Something is wrong.”

  His jaw clenched, and the haze in his eyes cleared a little. “Guitar.”

  He thrust deep in me, again and again. I arched my back, my body readying itself to come. “Stop the music.”

  He froze, buried inside me, muscles trembling. “Fuck.”

  He swung an arm at the guitar suspended in mid-air. It shot across the room and smashed into the wall. The music cut off, and the man in the chair bellowed with indignant rage. His huge cock shriveled, and his body morphed into a small, wizened man. He hissed and spat at us before running out the door.

  Caister sagged over me, his face buried in my neck, his cock still hard and throbbing inside me. I reached up and ran my hand through his short dark hair. It pricked my fingers. I clenched my fist against his scalp, unable to gain purchase on the strands.

  “What was that?” My voice was a thick whisper.

  He raised his head to look down on me, his gaze clear. “I think…I think it was a gancanagh. They feed off sexual energy to stay youthful. I should have realized what he was as soon as he started to play.” He made to pull out of me, and I clenched my thighs around him.

  He froze.

  I licked my lips. “Would you like to finish?”

  His green gaze heated. “Do you want me to?”

  I rolled my hips against him, moaning at the friction. “I need you to.”

  “Thank God.” He let out a ragged groan and then began to move.

  His thrusts were slow and deliberate this time, gaze locked on mine, the contact deep and inexplicably meaningful. This was more than fucking, this was a connection we’d been circling ever since we’d met. The residue of power that still bound us flared and tingled across my skin. He closed his eyes briefly as if in pain, but then his lips curled in a smile before his mouth claimed mine, creating a circuit for the power that took us sailing over the edge of reason.

  The couple lay entwined on the bed, wasted and skeletal but locked in an eternal embrace. The thuds had been the headboard against the wall as they’d fucked. How long had the gancanagh kept them in his thrall? How long had they been fucking?

  “He drained them,” Caister said. “It’s why he looked so young when we got here.”

  “But he snapped to old when we stopped the music.”

  Caister shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe breaking the guitar drained the power he’d gathered?”

  If we hadn’t stopped, if we hadn’t stopped him, then we would have fucked each other to death.

  I turned away from the dead lovers. “The storm’s ebbing. Let’s get out of here. If we keep moving, we can be at the citadel by midday.”

  We left the house, and what had happened between us, behind.

  Chapter Five

  It was later than midday when we entered the city surrounding the citadel. The hustle and bustle of the busy capital carried us through the colorful streets, past fancy stores and elaborate houses, and through crowds of fey dressed in silk and embroidered clothes before spitting us out on the hill that led to a fortress of glittering marble and stone that rose up like a monolith in the center of the city.

  Spires and turrets, stations for guards and marksmen, were visible, and platforms jutted out of the structure—landing spots for aerial defense? The fortress was magnificently built to both withstand attack and deal damage to the attacker, and it was home to the high monarch of the fey realms. A moat cut off any access to the structure, and as far as I could see, no drawbridge was lowered.

  I looked to Caister. “How the heck are we going to get in?”

  Caister studied the fortress. “Let’s get closer. There may be a way to request entrance.”

  We trudged down toward the moat, where barriers rose up to meet us—iron and steel fencing with barbed tips and guards. Yes, there were guards.

  Caister hailed one with a raised hand. The man frowned at us, his grip on his crossbow tightening.

  “Who goes there?” he asked.

  “We are the Hunt and we request to see the high queen,” Caister said.

  The man looked us over. “Right,” he scoffed. “The Hunt doesn’t request anything. It goes where it pleases.”

  He had a point.

  Caister sighed and shot me an I-told-you-so look. “We would, but we were attacked while on a mission for the queen, which affected our abilities. We need to report to the queen.”

  “Attacked?” He turned away. “Barny, look here. This is the Hunt and they were attacked.”

  Another guard, this one sporting a spear, sauntered over. “Who are you?”

  This wouldn’t get us anywhere. They would never believe us. I looked to Caister. “Do you have any gold?”

  He frowned, and then his expression cleared in comprehension. He pulled a small pouch of jangling coins from his pocket, teased open the laces, and held it up to showcase the glinting gold inside. “We need to speak to the high queen.”

  The guards eyed the gold eagerly but then shook their heads. “No gold is enough for us to risk letting you in to see the queen without a royal summons.”

  “Fine.” I took the coins from Caister. “Then how about summoning her advisor, the Raven. Find him and tell him the Hunt is here with a report for the queen.”

  They exchanged glances, and then the one with the spear nodded. “I’ll send a message now.”

  “And if they’re lying?” crossbow guy said.

  “Then we play innocent and take the slap on the wrist. Worth it for the gold.”

  He wandered off to a cage filled with white fluttering forms. Birds? He retrieved one, attached a message to a clip at its foot, and then released it. The bird flew high into the air, veered toward the citadel, and was gone.

  “Hand it over,” the bow guard said.

  Caister pocketed the gold. “When we get a reply.”

  The guard didn’t look happy, but he nodded. “Fair enough.”

  Long minutes passed, and as the heat of the sun intensified, the guards retreated into the shade of the tiny barracks beyond the barrier. The walls of the citadel far beyond gleamed in the sunlight as if tiny gems had been
embedded into the stone and marble. And then a dark shadow sliced across the sky.

  The Raven.

  He landed a moment later on our side of the barrier. His hair was loose today, dark and billowing in the breeze to kiss his alabaster cheeks, and his dark eyes were deep and searching in his hawkish face.

  “You have answers,” he said.

  I snorted. “We have information, but maybe together we can find answers. We need to see the queen.”

  He adjusted his cuffs and turned to the guards. “Open the gates.”

  Stone passageways hidden from prying eyes, tunnels and doors, and then into a tiny room that was little more than a study. The Raven left us there, instructing us to wait and not leave the room. No one could see us, no one could know the truth of why we were here. The crown wanted to keep Berrywell’s predicament a secret until the issue was resolved.

  Caister stood by the window, looking down on the world below. I perched on the edge of the desk, agitation coursing through my veins. Now that we were here, every minute we spent waiting was another minute lost.

  The doors opened and a woman strode in, tall, dark-haired, and regal. The Raven entered behind her and shut the door.

  This was the queen? She was dressed in trousers and a tunic top, and her hair was knotted atop her head to expose her slender neck. She looked young, too young to be a monarch, but then she was fey and fey aged well.

  Caister’s gasp was audible, and her gaze slid to him. A small smile played on her lips. “It’s been a long time, Caister.” Her voice was sultry and much too worldly for someone who looked so innocent, but then she locked gazes with me and there was knowledge in those eyes, an agelessness that stole my breath. “What happened?” she demanded.