Page 21 of Dark Hunter's Touch
“We couldn’t before,” said one. “Not when horses crossed our bridges on iron-shod hooves, not when the miller’s iron-bound wheel circled through our stream…” The other undine finished, “But now we can. And we will. This world will fall to the steel-born fae.”
Then, without even counting to three, they pushed him into the stream.
What they lacked in muscle they made up for in ferocity, needle teeth, and the noxious slime that oozed from their skin when they were roused to a killing frenzy. They fought him past all reason, past the point where any of them could have stopped. As they coiled around him, dragging him down through the water—that was barely deeper than his waist, damn it—he had a moment where he thought maybe it would be better to let the last of the air bubbles past his gritted teeth. If they were so determined to be free, who was he to stop them? Did he really care that much about living?
Olette’s blue eyes had flashed in his imagination. She hadn’t been able to hide that brilliant color—it shone even through her human guise. She had risked everything to live.
As water poured into his mouth, he released the magic in the blue amber ring. The light—brighter than the sun—exploded through the roiling waves, and the grasping hands fell away from him. He shot to his feet, flailing and choking.
Water streamed from his eyes, and he clenched his wings close to hold them away from the undines, floating belly up beside him. Even as he watched, they started to unravel in strands of algae.
The amber sun was a weapon of last resort. Too many fae had been lost during the Iron Wars, and every passing weakened the queen’s power. Although now that she was drawing magics from human collections, perhaps she would killhimin a fit of grand annoyance at his failure to bring the undines back alive.
He slogged out of the stream. By all that was dark and shining, why hadn’t they yielded? As overwhelmed as the hunters were, the undines could have pretended compliance and returned to their killing as soon as his back was turned.
His boots slipped in the mud as his knees suddenly weakened. Was Olette planning exactly that? He had turned his back on her as soon as the gate had opened to the faedrealii.But he hadn’t been able to stop himself from glancing around. Her sylfana sisters had bustled forward to surround her, and he caught only a glimpse of her fire-touched hair when she averted her face without meeting his gaze.
If she did escape again, the Lord of the Hunt might send another hunter—one who would not hesitate to use the amber sun’s fatal power against her.
He didn’t understand what was happening in the queen’s court, but he knew a certain sylfana who hadn’t been afraid to step into the unknown.
In a small oxbow of the stream lay the broken circle of toadstools that had been the undines’ gate to the faedrealii. He completed the circle with his vial of spores and stepped through.
There was only one more fae he needed to catch.
So when guard duty at the queen’s next feast was tossed his way, he just bowed his head in acknowledgment while his brother hunters jeered, but this time he bit his cheek to hide his smile.
Surely Olette would be there.
Sometimes the queen led her courtiers out of the faedrealii to dance in the reflected sunlight of a full moon, but apparently she was loathe to risk any more runaways. For this gathering, the shifting walls of the court had drawn back far enough to resemble a poppy field at dusk. As if a summer sun had just set, a warm glow lingered across the illusory sky, but the scarlet blooms were already darkening toward purple.
The queen held her fae in concentric rings. Her attendants lingered nearby, with less privileged courtiers farther out. Her inner circle stood close at hand, her hobgnome chancellor hopping at her elbow while her current favorite—a whispered half-blood with rounded human ears and catlike ylvish eyes—solicitously guided her over the rolling grounds. Dozens of other fae drifted across the field in small groups, their laughter like distant bells. Someone had even procured a badminton set, and the softthwackof rackets was as indolent as a lazy heartbeat.
Vaile took up a hunter’s stance on the farthest edge of the court. From the small rise beside a spreading tree, he had an uninterrupted view across the crowd.
The vantage point also made him clearly face the fact—despite the idyllic picture—he was not protecting the faedrealii but imprisoning it.
He shifted restlessly, ruffling his wings to create a little breeze in the sultry air. He should curse Olette for making him realize how unhappy the fae were…and how unhappy he had become. But he couldn’t close his eyes again; that was not a hunter’s way. He was on the hunt, and his knack would find his answers.
The glow of the sky did not falter, held in stasis by the queen’s magic, but will-o’-the-wisps emerged to dance among the poppies. Their glinting light brightened the crimson petals like the explosions of miniature fireworks, making the shadows beneath his tree seem darker by comparison. Through the heavy drape of leaves, probably no one would even notice him except for the wisps, and they would never tell anyone, except maybe…
The slow wave of his wings halted, but the breeze still swirled around him with a fragrance that haunted his waking dreams.
He turned just in time to catch a flutter of white.
“Olette.” His voice caught raggedly on her name.
She paused, though he had used no force to stop her, and glanced over her winged shoulder. “I didn’t know anyone was here.”
He wondered if he should believe her. Without his skin against hers, he couldn’t be sure. But when he took a step toward her, she sidled back. Her hands fisted in her gold spider silk skirts, whisking the long train away, as if she didn’t want any part of her near him.
He stopped. “If you are looking for a place to hide, there’s still room under here.”
“Is that what you were doing here? Hiding?”
“I was hoping to see you.”
She snapped out her wings in awell, here I ammotion, but she pulled her arms close to tighten the spider silk around her like golden armor. “I have plenty of fae watching me. They make sure I don’t go anywhere alone, and I don’t have access to any gate spores. I suppose you can see me whenever you want since I’m going nowhere.”
