Page 10 of To Run with the Wild Hunt

"You don't need to be afraid," Keilain said, his tone earnest. "I'll protect you to my last breath if I must. And I don't think he wants to be your enemy."

"Well, yeah," I said, with an awkward little half-laugh, dragging myself away from contemplating my knowledge of him. "We're soulmates."

The hellhound tilted his head to the side like a curious dog. "Why does that matter?"

"Er." I stared at him for a moment, but he just waited, so I added, "Why… wouldn't it?"

"Soulmates can mean anything," he said, still with that puzzled expression. "All relationships can be perfected. You can fight him if you want. Hate him." Key cringed slightly, his dog's ears pulling back. "You can hate me, too, if that's your pleasure. But I don't think I could ever hate you back. It would be… hard. I don't think we could find our balance that way, even if I tried for you."

I pursed my lips, trying to parse that set of concepts. "Hounds are pretty helplessly loyal, huh?" I said to buy myself time, reaching up and scratching him behind the ear.

Key melted into the touch, his lashes fluttering and lips parting in unfocused bliss. That look of raw pleasure on a man's face really only meant one thing in my experience, but when I nervously glanced down between us, he wasn't visibly aroused. Dogs didn't really have a lot of self-control in that particular realm, so either Keilain had enough focus to control some of his physical reactions, or the tiny moans of pleasure he was making were platonic moans.

They weren't all that platonic for me, but at least I wasn't going to end up getting humped by a horny hellhound within an hour of waking up in Faery.

The ramifications of being able to choose – of needing to find a balance together – were a lot less unnerving than the insta-love I usually associated with the idea of soulmates. Keilain was obviously devoted, apparently from the instant he'd bitten me, but I wasn't, and I liked that I didn't have to be. We got to pick, and we got to do it together.

"I don't want to be anyone's enemy," I said quietly, deciding I could be okay with him loving me, and after a moment of consideration pressed a kiss to Keilain's nose, just as if he was a dog and not a man.

He looked up at me with adoration, licking his lips as he inched a little closer to me on the bed. "You're my soulmate, and I love you," he said, angling his hand forward to rest his knuckles against my arm. "I know it's foolish. You aren't like me, and I know it's not that way for you. But…" Keilain hesitated, dropping his chin. "But maybe you can let me stay anyway? I'll try to be good for you. And maybe… that will be enough?"

"Be whoever you are," I said, tension pressing against my chest, the weight of all of this digging into me. "Stay by my side, if that's where you want to be. I'll probably need the comfort." I took a deep breath, closing my eyes. "This is a lot," I admitted, to him and to myself. "I'm pretty adaptable, but… this is a lot."

"I know," he said, sounding sad. "I would have stayed with you in the mortal world if I could have. But…"

Controlling my breathing so I'd stay calm, I rested my forehead against his. "Nuada chose for us, huh?"

"We would have died, I think." Keilain sounded embarrassed about it. He scooted another inch closer to me, his legs touching mine. "The Master is from the tribe of the gods, but there are much older gods in Faery. He killed one of the mortal sons of the Great Stag a very long time ago, and took his antlers. You're his… punishment. Or at least the Master said he thought so."

Keilain fell silent for long enough that I opened my mouth to say something, but before I could put together a sentence, he sighed, wiggling a little closer.

Just like a dog, I thought, amused despite myself as Key crept his way across the bed. Another few inches and he'd be in my lap.

"The Stag ran us," he said, again with a tinge of embarrassment. "We don't think while we're in chase. We just… run. And the Master is…" Key shook his head, making a low whine. "I'm wild. We're all… wild. We're hunters. Predators." He swallowed, slowly oozing closer to me, until his bare chest was pressed against my arms and the hard muscle of his stomach leaned against my soft tummy. "But we're only the hounds of the Hunt. The Master is the Hunt. He…" Keilain stopped again, tension in his whole body. "I think he… couldn't stop? Except he did. Because of… you."

"I don't know anything about that," I said, almost laughing at the absurdity of being able to stop the Wild Hunt when they'd run me down and savaged me. I was only one person, a chubby girl who'd grown up in a trailer park and turned her teenage shoplifting into a rather more exciting career. "Pretty sure I was fully unconscious."

Key made a happy sound, dropping a kiss onto my fingers. "Even unconscious, you changed my world."

God, that was a weird and romantic thing for a total stranger to say, but it didn't come off as false. Keilain clearly meant every word of it—and of everything else he'd said.

Dogs are pretty bad liars, I guess, even when they're fae.

My new best friend would probably have spent the entire day plastered against me getting his ears scratched, but there was only so much lounging in bed I could tolerate, and the itching need to figure out how to survive my new and bizarre life-path got me up and at 'em. Keilain transformed back into a dog as soon as I got up, giving himself a hearty shake before jumping off the bed to follow me out the bedroom door.

His tail just about didn't stop wagging as I padded through the Ruined Palace, which did live up to its name. Large sections of the sprawling complex had fallen into disrepair, with caved-in roofs and trees growing in the wreckage. Nobody harassed us as we moved through the building, though the only creatures we encountered were hellhounds, the unliving servitors, and a few brave birds and squirrels.

Much to my consternation, I found that I couldn't predict what would be around the next corner, even as I started mapping the place out. Hallways that I was sure would intersect with rooms led to entirely different wings of the palace, and the sun never seemed to be shining through the correct windows. It was unsettling, to say the least.

That was perfectly normal, Keilain explained in a happy tone, which probably had a lot to do with the fact that we were walking around with my hand resting on his shoulder. Faery palaces were connected as much by intuition and dream-logic as by natural geometry, and they answered to their Monarchs. Or gods, as it were.

If I didn't like being lost, I was the Master's soulmate, so the Ruined Palace was mine, too, he pointed out, red tongue lolling as he panted. If I wanted to go somewhere, all I needed to do was ask the palace to take me there.

"Even unbalanced?" I asked, running my fingers through his coarse fur.

"Even unbalanced," he said, with total certainty. "Everything he has is yours, too, unless you choose to separate from each other forever."

"Huh." That was kind of spooky—and also kind of cool. "Does that mean the hounds, too?"

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