Hunters descent, p.38
Hunter's Descent, page 38
Ruri moved away from her side.
Shejuanna’s gaze followed the massive wolf with her golden fur. Now that there was no drake to be terrified by, it appeared she was transferring her fear to Ruri.
“It’s all right.” Malice recognized the stance the wolf was taking, with her legs braced and her tail and head down. “That’s Ruri. She’s a wolven—a werewolf.”
“Werewolves?” Shejuanna stared at Ruri in fascination. “Those don’t exist.”
“No more than fairies,” Malice said. She scanned the cave for signs of further danger. Ruri was at her most vulnerable during the change.
“Yeah, but I’ve seen those.”
“And now you’ve seen her.” The shadows were clear, as best she could tell. The melting ice made it a little difficult to get a bead on things, but nothing in the cave pressed against her skin. Nothing except the warm spot she always got from Ruri in her wolf form. Heat flared along that spot as her energy spiked and Ruri shifted.
Mal had seen the transformation more times than she could count, but it was different being there with Shejuanna. What must she have been thinking watching muscles writhe beneath tawny fur? The crack of bone being forced into place while the fur receded to reveal pink flesh happened gradually at first, then all at once. A moment later, Ruri crouched before them, the skin on her back covered in a sheen of sweat. Steam rose off her. At least this part of the change was much neater than the other.
“Holy balls,” Shejuanna breathed.
“Not really,” Ruri said as she straightened her back. She made no attempt to hide her nudity, but she rubbed her hands briskly over the skin on her upper arms.
“I’ll be right back.” Malice hurried off to gather Ruri’s clothes from where she’d dropped them in the tunnel leading to the cave mouth. “Here.” She handed them over. “How was your wolf?”
“She’s not happy about any of this.” Ruri snatched her clothing and hurriedly donned it. “I had to talk fast to get her to agree to go back, especially knowing this is going back on.” She held up the arm band that had been wrapped up in her pants, then slid it up her arm.
“I’m glad you’re back,” Malice said. There was so much more she wanted to say, but not in front of Shejuanna. “Let’s get her back to the castle.”
“Agreed.” Ruri picked her way carefully around still-icy patches of ground, stopping at a boulder to lace up her boots before heading toward the cave mouth.
Malice took the time to retrieve her sword. It still stuck out of the icedrake’s neck, but the skin had receded from around it. She pulled it out easily, then wiped the blade off on a relatively unsullied patch of its hide before settling it back in its scabbard. The blue glow from the icedrake’s eyes still lit up the room, but it was fading. Much longer and they’d be in the dark. She met up with the other two at the mouth of the tunnel. Ruri started into the crevice as soon as she joined them.
“Go ahead,” Malice said to Shejuanna.
The teen followed close on Ruri’s heels. She watched her closely, as if Ruri might turn on her at any moment.
Malice shook her head. She took up the rear, keeping her wits about her to make sure they weren’t ambushed from behind. It seemed unlikely, but she wasn’t going to lose someone to an assumption.
They made their way slowly through the tunnel that connected the cavern to the outside. The light behind them faded, and the tunnel got dark enough that Shejuanna pulled out her phone and turned on the flashlight so she could pick her way around the larger boulders and sharp chips of stone that littered the floor of the passage. Eventually, daylight from the opening of the crevice made the phone unnecessary. Shejuanna tucked it back into a belt pouch. The light dimmed for a moment as Ruri stepped through the opening.
“Uh, Mal,” she said, “we have a problem.” Her voice filtered back unsteadily to Malice.
Shejuanna looked back at her, eyes questioning.
“Stay put,” Malice said as she tried to maneuver past the teen. “Don’t come out until I call for you by name.”
“Okay.” Shejuanna squeezed to the side to allow her to pass.
“What’s going on?” Malice asked when she stepped back into the sunlight. “Oh.”
Mounted fae surrounded the cave mouth. More looked down on them from the heights. She had no doubt that if she looked behind them, she’d see more fae there as well. These were those she recognized. Lord Regin sat astride his giant lizard. In the same bunch was Freki on her dog-insect thing. The rest she recognized from their hunts.
They all pointed weapons their way. Malice couldn’t count the number of bows and spears that were leveled at them.
“What brings the Wild Hunt out here?” Malice asked. She stepped forward to stand next to Ruri, who had her hands raised.
“Oh, Lady Malice” came a familiar voice from the ranks of hunters in front of them. They parted to reveal King Tedrick astride the kelpie. He guided his mount forward. “The moonstones quickened again. Imagine my surprise when we discovered you at their source.”
Chapter Forty-Four
Ruri kept her eyes on the ring of fae surrounding them, but her attention was focused on the fae king. He ignored her completely while he glared at Mal, who had stepped forward and angled her body so it was between them.
“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Mal said.
Tedrick laughed, a harsh sound that contained none of the musical qualities King Connall’s had. It reminded Ruri of the harsh cries of scavenger birds.
“Come now, Lady Malice,” he said. “You’ve been playing me for a fool this entire time. I have to hand it to you. Your performance has been nothing short of masterful, but you really shouldn’t have worn your totem in front of me.”
“Totem?” Mal glared at him. “What are you even talking about?”
“Do not play your games with me.” He stared back at her expectantly.
Ruri lowered her arms, then crossed them. No one said anything; they paid attention only to her mate.
“Was your plan to take down the realm?” King Tedrick’s lip curled. “Was that it, cur?”
Mal shook her head. “I’ve never wanted to take down this place. All I wanted was to go home, but Connall wouldn’t let me.” She took a step toward the king.
Tedrick shook his head and raised a finger on his right hand. Two fae stepped forward and interposed themselves between Mal and the king. “I knew the cur in my realm had to be one of the humans who had most recently arrived.” He smiled, a malevolent grin that twisted his lips but never touched his eyes. “My loyal steed took the girl, and you followed her as I expected you would. Humans clump together like filth. It is really too bad you had to kill my icedrake.” He shrugged. “But his mate sits on a clutch of eggs. I’ll be able to replace him soon enough.”
Ruri stared at the fae king, the bottom dropping out of her stomach. They’d killed that drake thinking it had snapped and gone after the kids. Acid churned in her belly. It had been a pawn, its death no more necessary than that of the hodag.
“I knew it had to be you when you shook off my charm spell,” he said.
“Charm spell?” Mal’s voice was quiet; Ruri had to strain to hear it. “You charmed me?”
Ruri took a step back toward the mouth of the cave. Nothing good happened when Mal’s voice got that quiet.
A shimmer started in the air to their left, then rippled out from the center, growing wider by the second.
The ripple seemed to spread to the gathered fae as they noticed the shimmer.
“King Tedrick,” Lord Regin said, “a portal is opening. Your guards!”
Four Tuatha materialized out of the crowd and descended on Tedrick to form a protective square. The king scowled and tried to wave them away, but they ignored his direction. He craned his neck to see around the two armored fae in front of him.
Ruri took a few steps back. No one was paying the least bit of attention to her. She ducked inside the cave and started yanking on the ties of her boots. The rest of her clothing would tear as the wolf forced her body into its other form, but boots were made of sterner stuff.
“What’s happening?” Shejuanna spoke in a harsh whisper from right behind Ruri.
“Stay put,” Ruri said as she peeled off the boots.
“If you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to check for myself.”
Ruri sighed. “The king and the Wild Hunt think Mal is one of the wolven. They were confronting her about it, but a portal is opening and now they’re more worried about that.”
“Why do they care if Lady Malice is a werewolf?”
Ruri cringed at the slur. “We’re called wolven. And the fae don’t get along with my kind. Apparently it’s some ancient beef about wolven being created to protect humans from the fae, but it’s so long ago that I don’t remember it.”
“So what you’re saying is they don’t like you.”
The considering tone in Shejuanna’s voice had the hairs on the back of Ruri’s neck standing on end. She looked back at the teen.
“No, they don’t,” Ruri said. “But how much do they really like you?” Shejuanna opened her mouth to answer, but Ruri kept on talking. “Simeon could have been healed, did you know that? When Mal and I fought the hodag, they gave us a drink that healed our wounds up completely. Why didn’t they use that on him?”
“Why on you then?” Her words were hot, pushing against Ruri in pained accusation.
“They had another use for us.” Ruri tilted her head. “How many mounts in your stables have creepy human eyes?”
The question took the heat out of Shejuanna. While she was struggling with it, Ruri pressed on.
“Why did just the two of us come after you? If they care so much, there should have been a big group of us. They simply were not interested.”
“That can’t be right. What about the others?”
“They were told to go back to work. Jermayne came close to punching someone.”
“Sounds like him.” Shejuanna deflated, the bravado seeping out of her before Ruri’s eyes.
Ruri felt bad for being so blunt with the teen, but the last thing she needed was for her to attempt to curry favor with the fae while Ruri was trying to pull her mate out of the fire.
She had no idea what was going on out there. She crept to the cave mouth to find out.
* * *
Malice glared at King Tedrick behind his wall of guards. They wouldn’t be able to protect him for long. She’d already calculated four different ways of getting to him. She was having issues wrapping her head around ways to actually kill him. Her mind skittered away from those scenarios.
Charm her, would he? The manner of his death would be a surprise to both of them.
She took one step forward, but some of the hunters had still been watching her. Half a dozen bows lifted and pointed her way. She couldn’t feel Ruri’s comforting presence at her back. She must have taken advantage of the distraction to get back inside the cave. Malice grinned. The hunters and their king were in for one hell of a shock.
The shimmer of the portal was now large enough for a normal-sized person to pass through. Lord Regin would have had some trouble, but the rest could have passed through easily. The fae knew it also.
“You lot,” Lord Regin bellowed. “Weapons on her. The rest of you, take care of whatever comes through that portal.”
They waited in tense silence. The moment stretched as the portal remained, but no one stepped out. Finally, a dark-skinned woman’s head and torso appeared among the shimmers in the air. She bent down and through. Scaled coils followed her body, then Mami Wata turned and looked at the king.
“Ah,” she said. “My old friend, the Jaeger. How fare you these days?”
“Old friend?” Malice said. “You two know each other?”
“Oh yes.” Mami Wata shifted forward on sidewinding coils. “Well, for a time. He was quite interested in what I had to say a few years ago. He wanted the ‘Witch of Lake LaBette’ to tell him how he could become king.”
Two of the guards protecting Tedrick shifted to sneak looks at their ruler. So too did a number of the hunters. Lord Regin’s eye flicked back and forth between Malice and the snake woman.
“Is that true?” Malice recognized Freki’s voice.
“The time of two Huntmasters was the sign you’d been waiting for, was it not? Did you have to talk good King Connall into making you heir, or was that his idea?”
“I never spoke to him of it,” Tedrick said. He picked his words with obvious care. The gathered fae muttered amongst themselves.
“Have you found your cur yet?” She swayed in place.
Tedrick’s eyes followed her. Sweat stood out on his forehead, a sickly sheen that Malice could see from where she stood.
“I have.” He pulled himself up to his full height. “She’s right here.” He pointed an accusing finger at Malice.
Mami Wata’s face twitched and writhed before splitting in a huge grin. She threw her head back and guffawed, the beads in her hair clicking merrily against each other in rhythm with her mirth.
“You really think the Hunter is the cur that summons your downfall?” she finally said. “Your reign will last until a cur leads the Wild Hunt, that is what I told you.” She shook her head. “I’m beginning to think you don’t have the intelligence to govern our people.”
“My people,” Tedrick growled. “You are not fit to live among us.”
“So say you, but you are not fit to be king. If the Hunter was your cur, your reign would have ended before it began, instead of merely teetering on the edge of ruin.”
“You forget, witch.” His eyes glowed with triumph. “I control the Wild Hunt! I alone name the Huntmaster. If she isn’t the cur, then I’m safe.”
“So tell us more about how Connall died when you’d finally maneuvered yourself one step away from ultimate power,” Mami Wata said, her tone silky. “Nothing about the prophecy I gave you said you had to kill him.”
“I will not start my reign under a cloud of suspicion.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t have murdered poor Connall. He was headed for the Summerlands sooner than later. All you had to do was wait, but that was beyond you. Such impatience does not befit a king.”
Tedrick ignored Mami Wata’s comments and kept on as if she hadn’t spoken. “I am king now. My wishes are what guide this realm, and it is my wish that you be gone.” He stared at the snake woman as if expecting something to happen.
“I’m afraid that won’t work on me.” Mami Wata slithered closer to the king, a bland smile on her face. “I’m not one of your subjects, remember? I doubt you’ve managed the control over the realm your predecessor had. It’s a pity he died before he could impart that to you…”
“There’s more than one way to wield power.” King Tedrick cocked his head in Mami Wata’s direction. “Kill her.”
Two of his guards started forward. They lowered their polearms in the snake woman’s direction. The two who stayed by him were the ones who’d looked back when he’d been accused of Connall’s murder. They stood between Tedrick and the snake woman, but stoic faces couldn’t completely mask the doubt in their eyes.
The portal shimmered again and Corrigan—no, Reese—stepped through. She was covered in mail that shimmered crimson and silver. In one hand, she wielded a long sword and in the other she carried a cloth-wrapped bundle the same red as her mail and a little shorter than her sword. A simple helm that gleamed too brightly to be steel covered her crest of red hair. Despite its brilliance, remnants of past battles crisscrossed the helmet in darker lines. This was someone who was no stranger to a fray.
“Usurper,” the former Heir thundered. Her voice reverberated off the hills and crashed around them in a deafening wave of sound. “I claim my right to combat. You murdered my uncle after poisoning him against me. You are no more fit to rule than you are to take breath. Face me!”
“I don’t think so.” Tedrick looked up at the hunters surrounding them. “Kill them all,” he shouted, then raised both hands to the sky. Darkness boiled above him as clouds formed from his hands and coiled around each other in a steadily widening funnel that reached to the heavens.
The shocked silence was punctuated by growls of thunder.
“Here!” Corrigan tossed the bundle to Malice, who caught it easily. The sheriff swung a large shield off her back and held it up before her in a defensive crouch.
Malice recognized the hilt through the wrapping. She tugged the fabric away to reveal her katana. She grinned.
Light streamed from points all over the hunters and their king.
“She reveals herself,” he cried over a crack of thunder. “Attack them.”
The hunters raised their bows and released a volley. Arrows whistled through the air toward them. Corrigan raised her shield to intercept those headed her way, but Malice had no such protection. She fell back on what she knew. When defense was impossible, the only other option was in-your-face offense.
She darted forward, hoping to work her way beneath the arcing rain that plummeted toward her. There weren’t nearly as many arrows as there should have been. Not everyone had followed the orders of their king.
She managed to avoid most of the arrows. They landed behind her, burying themselves in the ground or hitting the sheriff’s shield with solid thunks. They bounced off an invisible barrier around Mami Wata with hisses like water hitting a hot pan.
Malice swatted one arrow out of the air with her katana an unthinking extension of her hand. Fire roared through her shoulder as one arrow flew true. She couldn’t stop the cry that forced its way past her lips. She stumbled, but only for a moment. She was halfway to Tedrick, close enough to see his eyes widen when she took another step toward him, the arrow sticking out of her shoulder.
“Again,” he cried, then redoubled his efforts to fill the sky with storm clouds.
The guards who had been heading for Mami Wata adjusted their attack and struck out toward Malice.
