Page 25 of Howling Eve

She hoped that sounded more convincing to him than it did to her own ears. Somehow, she suspected not.

His lips curled in mocking smirk, and she cursed inwardly because she knew that he understood exactly how he was affecting her. Worse, her desire was gradually heating the longer they stood there in the room together. He lifted his hand and gently cupped her jaw.

“It will be interesting to see how long you hold out against Ha’shena, my stubborn little human mate.”

“We will see. Now, do I finally get your name, or do I get to invent one for you? Please say I get to invent one for you.” She gave him a hard smile.

He chuckled, and the rich sound rolled over her. “Raskyuil, my wicked one. Now let us leave. I don’t wish to approach the carnival at night when we are unexpected.”

“Right,” she agreed, and they hurried out the door.

A sense of lightness overcame her as they left her room, followed by giddiness as she turned in her key. Marik watched her curiously and then delicately sniffed the air. The pervert probably thought she’d just gotten laid.

She shook her head, very much aware of Raskyuil’s warm hand settled on the small of her back as they left the outpost. He walked in step with her, hovering over her protectively the entire way until they reached her truck. He stopped and eyed the vehicle skeptically.

“Well, hop in.”

The blatant look of disbelief he shot her would have been funny if she weren’t aware of the fact that they were standing outside, and the woods felt like they were getting darker by the minute. “What troll do you expect to be able to ride in that?”

She squinted at the cab of the truck and then peered at him. Oh. “You may have to ride in the bed in the back. Sorry. The truck is so big to me that I didn’t even consider that it might be a tight fit for you.”

He gave the bed of the truck a dubious look but grunted. “Very well. Try not to cast me from the back of this mechanical beast.”

“Please. I’m a better driver than that,” she scoffed. Usually. When the truck cooperated. “Get in.”

He gave her and her truck one last speculative look before hoisting himself over the wide frame of the bed. The entire vehicle swayed with the force of his weight, and she watched it with wide eyes, for a moment fascinated with the idea that came from nowhere of all that power moving over and between her legs.

Biting back a groan, she drew back and smiled, and she nodded approvingly before climbing into the cab, far too aware of the massive male settled just behind her. Turning off her flashlight, she tossed it into the seat beside her Thankfully the truck started without an issue for once, and she was able to pull away from the outpost with minimal fuss.

A smile slowly stretched across her face as she pulled back onto the road. She may have somehow acquired a mate, but she was no longer plagued by the strange fever dream that seemed to have possessed her over the last few days while driving. She felt settled and confident with Raskyuil solid presence there with her. And more importantly she was finally on her way and one step closer to finding her kids.

ChapterSixteen

The truck was a menace. By the time they reached the outer edge of The Bend, Raskyuil had gained a new appreciation for wagons and just why he never bothered to acquire any of the other human vehicles outside of his motorcycle. Even that he would have happily replaced with a crocotta mount if he had been able to successfully track down a pack and establish a bond with one. He knew that they were roaming about, but wild crocotta were elusive and cunning predators. It was unfortunate because he was certain that MaryAnne would find riding double with him on a sure-footed crocotta far more comfortable than bouncing in this… thing.

His hands gripped the sides hard as the truck hit a damaged part of the road, jarring him ruthlessly.

“Sorry!” MaryAnne shouted back and cursed as the truck made a terrible grinding sound that assailed his ears.

Gritting his teeth, he grunted in reply but doubted she heard him. Bracing his legs against the sides of truck bed, he attempted to stabilize himself as much as possible as she slowed and made a turn onto a pockmarked road that made the truck jerk and thump repeatedly as she made her way toward The Bend.

As another hard jolt made his teeth clack together, he considered just getting out and walking. This was insanity! Compared to the truck, riding within the cramped confines of the wagons had been a joy. Especially considering that he was entirely exposed and not even running at enough speed to potentially escape anything that might attack in the encroaching darkness.

And he could feel it too as the sun sank and the wild magic of the night came alive. This was the magic that trolls were attuned to and, in the far-sprawling villages, lived by which had inspired rumors of them turning to sun in the sun. There was a touch of familiarity and home within that magic as it pulsated and stretched, expanding and reaching as the sun sank lower in the sky, but it was dangerous, too. Every troll from a young age became familiar with how to spot the signs of the creatures that hunted the night in the dark forests of the fae realm.

Humans appeared to be largely ignorant of such things as they’d taken to locking themselves in their domiciles when the sun went down or seeking shelter in a secure spot. They wrongly assumed that the fae were the only monsters out there. They didn’t know the creatures that emerged to feed and lurked within the darkest abodes.

He didn’t know exactly when the creatures made it into the human world—within a few years after Cacus crawled from the depths and hunted through the forests, he was sure. Raskyuil had wandered for a full year before he came upon the first signs of predation, and they had been enough to chill his blood. Humans wrongly called many of the fae monsters, but these were the true monsters. Predators that hunted and killed indiscriminately to feed their endless appetites. The signs were indisputable.

He had known exactly what he was looking at when he'd pulled his motorcycle up alongside the remains of a being so torn apart and consumed so savagely that there wasn’t enough for him to identify the species, even so much as to know whether it was human or fae. And those weren’t the only remains he’d come upon within that ruined town. Bits and pieces of bodies were littered about in various states of decay as he’d traveled through in a grim landscape of carnage, indicating that something had now taken residence that was feeding upon anyone and anything that passed nearby. He had not remained in the area but had climbed onto his motorcycle and traveled hard without daring to rest until he was confident that he was beyond the creature’s territory and far from the limits of its hunting grounds.

His nostrils flared as he scented the air. He doubted that they were within close range of anything’s nest. The carnival would not winter someplace where they might be picked off as easily as any human. And while that bode well when it came to some of the larger, more aggressive predators, there were others that roamed restlessly, moving across the land with the fall of night. Those were the ones that he was particularly wary of at the moment. Those would be the ones to suddenly give chase at the scent of prey.

The fairy hounds were among the least dangerous but most common, and a nuisance to deal with since they hunted in packs among the deep shadows of the night. Raskyuil snorted softly to himself, narrowing his eyes as he peered into the darkening shadows. That was what he was looking for now and what he was afraid he scented coming on the air. The muscles in his shoulders and neck tensed as he peered at the gathering darkness within the forest that thickened alongside the road. The fire-colored leaves dulled and gradually faded into browns and grays in the waning light as they swayed without wind to stir them.

Something was moving out there, slipping among the darkness. By himself hounds would be simple enough to drive off, but humans were as vulnerable as younglings, and he had a mate to worry about. This was why trolls bred crocotta. Not only were they superior mounts but they also protected the villages from the hounds and sounded the alert if a hunt was nearby.

His eyes searched the shadows for the first sign of their ghostly-pale silhouettes whipping among the shadows, his ears straining to pick up their growls. That superficial resemblance to hounds was what earned them their name, but it was a treacherous misnomer. It suggested that they were tame companions under fairy control rather than ravenous wild “dogs”—to frame it loosely.

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