Page 11 of To Run with the Wild Hunt

He dropped his jaw in an expression of amusement. "You could try."

So I did.

I whistled to the next hound we encountered, the same c'mere whistle I'd used on the neighbor's rat terrier growing up, the closest thing I'd ever had to a pet. The dog picked herself up, giving me a longsuffering look, but wandered over with a desultory air, as if she was doing me a huge favor. Keilain licked her on the face, I scratched her behind the ears, and we moved on.

The hounds were willing to come, sit, and lie down, though they didn't seem to have a great concept of "fetch" or "roll over." Keilain even laughed at me, saying that they were hunting hounds, not pets.

We were still laughing, Key's tail wafting through the air, with my attention on him instead of the palace, when we entered the throne room and encountered the Master of the Hunt.

Naked Jealousy

Nuada Silverhand

It was all but physically painful to leave Lexi with her hound. Keilain had been mine for a long time, but the prince he'd once been had possessed a strong sense of self and a will forged in the flame of war, and unlike many others who ran before me, he was still a man. His devotion was that of a hound, though, even though he could think and speak, and a dog's love is given without reservation.

I growled with frustration as I stalked through my palace, the black hounds staying well out of my way. What woman can resist unconditional love? For that matter, what man can? Beautiful Keilain, prince and loyal hound, would surely become her beloved companion. He wasn't the cruel creature I'd first met, and I doubted he could return to the man he'd been before he'd given himself over to the Hunt. Change can never be fully undone, even by great strength of will, and he had no reason to want to hurt her.

Surely they would find a balance of affection, whether as hound and mistress or as prince and princess. Perhaps they would even forge a path of their own, twining together like a linden and an oak-tree, inseparable in their love.

But as for me…

I raked the dull claws of my left hand through a rotting painting on the broken wall, a snarl twisting my expression. I wasn't tame. I wasn't safe. A hound may bare his teeth in protection of his master, but a hunter is not a protector. You run with the Hunt or you race before it, and Lexi had been willing to die human before becoming my possession or my prey. I wanted her with a reckless desperation I didn't understand, and I had no idea how I could ever have her.

The reflection of my antlers in a window caught my attention, my focus whipping towards the view of the wild lands outside the Ruined Palace before I realized that the prey was merely a phantom. I clenched my hands into fists, bitterness twisting in my gut.

I'd killed one of Sarcaryn's many sons, worn his antlers and won them for my own. I was the Hunter. I'd blooded the Stag himself, and now look at me. Wracked with desire, a woman sleeping on my bed who I couldn't even fucking touch, who I had to give over to one of the hounds—

He didn't just lean on Faery’s power, I realized with a sinking sense of horror. He leaned on me.

Nothing else made sense. I'd spent tens of thousands of years untroubled by desire for companionship, let alone the raw intimacy of sex. I hadn't even pleasured myself for centuries, satisfied by hunting and killing. Yet I couldn't stop thinking about Lexi—her creamy skin marked by my hounds and my power, the sweetness of her mouth, the defiance as she looked into my face and laughed.

I dropped heavily into my throne, burying my face in my hands. Sarcaryn couldn't create what wasn't there, but he could certainly inflame, and though it was many eons past, I had once been a stallion as much as a man. I still bore the proof, my horse's tail as much a part of me as my beating heart.

What stallion can resist the mare? He can think of little else besides her scent, of burying the thick length of his cock to the hilt in her heat, of breeding, of flaring, of filling her with his seed over and over and—

Without thinking, I licked my fingertips, hungry for even the faintest traces of her skin, and finally, finally realized what my body had known all along. Lexi was in heat, that brief window of fertility mortal women experienced alongside the patterns of the moon. I shuddered, forcing myself to lower my hands from my face, my pulse throbbing through my stiff cock and my jaw aching from how hard I was clenching my teeth together.

She was in heat, and I'd left her to the care of a dog. If he hurt her—

He won't.

Though Keilain was no longer mine, he'd run with me for many centuries. Once, I would never have trusted him to guard someone from harm, but his nature was no longer merely that of the prince he'd been. He belonged to Lexi, and to her went his whole heart. He'd probably try to kill me if I offered her harm.

The thought amused me. A hound's loyalty is total. It wouldn't matter one whit to Keilain that I couldn't be killed. He would savage me without hesitation.

I knew when Lexi set her foot on the stone of the Ruined Palace, her feet bare and stride precise. I followed her through the palace with my connection to it, eyes closed and head leaned back against the stone of my throne. A smile tugged at my mouth as she started exploring her connection to me, commanding my hounds with a far gentler touch than I ever used. It pleased me for her to do it. Perhaps if she found pleasure in my power, she would find something kinder than horror to feel for me.

Keilain walked beside her on all fours, keeping pace with her. I had no hope of stifling my envy for that position. I didn't even try. I wanted her at my side, and I wanted her there because she wanted to be there as badly as Keilain wanted to be at her side.

I'm going to make that fucking Stag pay for this, if it takes me until the end of time.

I didn't move when they came into the throne room, laughing together. I didn't think I could look at them without all of my hunter's focus coming down onto her, let alone my naked jealousy.

She fell silent. I knew she'd seen me—that she was standing there, looking at me. It was unbearable.

"You're Nuada." She took a deep breath. "Nykhir."

The sound of my true name in her voice made me shudder with pleasure. It didn't matter that she said it with the wary concern of a doe observing a well-fed wolf, nor that Keilain stood so close to her that I knew he had to be leaning against her hip. She said my name, a thing I hadn't heard spoken aloud since Boenn had stolen my headwaters from me.

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