Chapter 8
8
One year ago
The cold air rakes across my skin as I approach the grave on the hill. Since they lowered my mother into the muddy earth, the world has shrunk to this headstone and the frozen earth beneath my knees.
Grief is a ravenous beast intent on devouring me.
The branches of the yew tree overhead creak and groan, bare limbs clawing at the bruised sky. The same gnarled old giant stood sentinel over this plot when we buried Father here thirteen winters past. Now it watches over Mother, too.
I halt at the foot of the fresh mound of dirt. Someone has laid a wreath of frost-limned white flowers on the ground, stems wrapped in delicate strands of ivy. An evergreen symbol of fidelity, of eternal bonds that endure beyond the grave. The sight reignites the slow-burning fury that’s kept me warm since they pulled my mother’s body from the filth in the Cowgate.
I didn’t know she’d died until the constable came to the townhouse. Found her mangled and lifeless in the mud, flesh rent open. Mother spent her final moments choking on rainwater and her own blood, abandoned to the monsters while the city slept. While I slept. Blissfully nestled under down quilts embroidered with whimsical rosebuds, exhausted from my own hunt.
Footsteps crunch on the frozen grass behind me. Soft. Cautious.
I feel the subtle press of power against my tongue, my skin, my senses—nothing overtly threatening, just the low-level hum surrounding a fae at all times. Still, it makes my shoulders tense beneath my sodden wool coat. The urge to flee wars with the desire to unleash every ounce of fury bottled inside me. To direct it at the first available target.
The footsteps halt just shy of my shoulder. He makes no move to announce himself or offer empty condolences. Simply a looming presence radiating winter’s chill. Pinpricks skitter across my exposed nape, raising the fine hairs. I know precisely who this is, why the air chokes with his power. Why he’s here.
I keep my gaze rooted to the earth. To the secrets buried there.
“I assume you’re not here to pay your respects.” I let him hear my fury when I speak. Focused like a lance between his cold heart and mine.
His response is calm. “Not particularly.”
“My mother always said the only way I’d ever meet you was over her rotting corpse, so I suppose she got her way,” I say, not turning to face him. “But don’t pretend this qualifies as a proper introduction. She told me to avoid you like the plague and I mean to.”
A pause.
His voice comes quiet under the rising wind. “Your mother promised to gut me if I ever dared approach you.”
Doesn’t he help you sometimes? Why can’t I meet him? My younger self once asked, all wide-eyed innocence.
The reply came in Mother’s biting tones. Because he’s a monster in beautiful skin, my darling. Nothing more.
“I assume she had good cause,” I say.
He stays silent. I feel the drag of his attention like a physical touch, tracing the tear tracks on my wind-chapped cheeks, the blood crusted beneath ragged nails from clawing frozen earth. Plucking at layers until only raw pain remains.
A carrion bird stripping bones.
When he finally speaks, no inflexion warms the smooth velvet of his voice. “The cause was sufficient in her view. Though we rarely saw anything the same way.”
I release a harsh, brittle laugh. “Well, she’s six feet of Scottish topsoil away from seeing anything now, so the last word is yours. Not that petty differences of opinion trouble the dead.”
Another silence crawls between us. My nails bite bloody crescents into both palms, pain grounding me before grief unmoors me completely. I should walk away. Leave him here and never look back. Instead, morbid curiosity roots me in place, studying his silhouette out of the corner of my eye.
He blends with the night, shadows clinging to his tall, lean frame. While moonlight gilds the bare oaks and tombstones in molten silver, darkness embraces him like a lover. It slides over the sharp planes of his face, the strong line of his jaw. I glimpse eyes limned in living flame flickering between violet and mercury. Ancient and endless as the firmament unfurling above us.
That inhuman perfection etched into such pleasing lines will unmake me. All these aeons walking among my kind, wearing that beauty like a weapon, swallowing light and warmth and fragile human souls.
When I inhale, the air fills my lungs with the scent of pine boughs dusted by snow. Of crisp ice on remote mountain peaks. And beneath it, the heady song of the wild hunt piercing the veil on a moonlit night when blood quickens and forbidden magics stir.
Predator.
Killer.
“Did your duties keep you occupied elsewhere while they tore out her throat?” I ask too softly.
The temperature plummets as his power unfurls. Frost glazes the grass under my feet in delicate fractals.
“I have a realm of fae to oversee, and your mother preferred to hunt alone.” The slow, simmering rage ignites. “She died alone. Shredded and butchered while you what—counted coins? Polished your damn boots? Made your fucking weapons?”
He says nothing. The silence between us is louder than screams.
“She was everything to me,” I say. The confession tears free before I can swallow it down. Admitting weakness pricks my pride, but I’m desperate to crack through his mask. To make him hurt the way I’m being flayed alive by grief. “I didn’t even know she was gone until they pulled her body from the gutter outside some tavern. Have you ever lost your entire world in one night?”
“Yes.”
That single syllable hits me squarely in the chest. In it lies a yawning abyss of old agony I scarcely comprehend. For the first time since I turned to face him, the predatory focus sharpening his expression falters.
I watch as he pulls the genteel mask back in place, emotions shuttered behind that wall of ice.
Like calls to like , a voice inside whispers.
I force steel back into my spine. He admitted nothing beyond a single damning word. Another manipulation from a master deceiver who’s wielded beauty and fae half-lies as weapons for longer than my mortal mind can fathom. I can’t afford sympathy.
“Well, you hide any grief masterfully,” I say. “Tell me, do your kind even experience emotion the way we humans do? Or do you simply mimic it to get the desired results?”
Power ripples toward me. The grass freezing under the building ice. Cold pierces my boots, gnawing at my ankles and arches as the temperature drops further. Icy needles prick any scrap of exposed skin, burning in their wake.
His eyes flare brighter between shards of purple, silver, and midnight flame. Deadly and depthless as the velvet abyss poised to swallow the stars.
“Careful,” he warns in that voice designed to resonate through bone and blood. “Don’t do something you’ll regret.”
The fury surging through me now scours away any lingering chill. I let it fill my lungs, taking shape on my tongue. I bite back a feral grin.
“Or what? You’ll give me a stern talking to while my mother’s body decomposes? Spin me pretty half-truths and send me to bed?” I step nearer. “Go on then. Dazzle me with your benevolence.”
Power coils tighter, sinking talons into my flesh. My lungs constrict, rebelling against the crushing weight. Frigid air sears delicate membranes with each shallow inhale. The cold leeches into muscle and organs like paralysis spreading. My breath mists as frost spreads beneath my boots, glazing each blade of grass in crystalline shells. Frost tendrils creep over my legs, my nerve endings lighting up everywhere it touches.
Let him try to kill me—I’ve already died a hundred times tonight. Let him lay siege. I’ll stand frozen and unyielding.
“That’s right, keep using your power against me,” I snarl. “Keep trying to make me yield. Show me your worst.”
A muscle feathers along his jaw. Tension radiates from his powerful frame, a silent warning. Simmering just beneath that surface lies something wild and feral waiting to be unleashed. I’m counting on it. Give me a reason to draw blood. To punish until this agony finds relief.
I want to hit someone. Hurt someone.
I grasp the weapon at my belt, and send the dagger spinning through the air straight at his chest.
Faster than I can track, his hand snaps up and snatches the blade from its lethal trajectory. The metal glints between his fingers—caught inches from plunging into his heart.
Slowly, he turns the weapon, inspecting it.
“Again,” he says. A dare, soft as silk.
Fury whites out my vision. I feint left when he tries grabbing my wrist, twisting away before his fingers close around my arm. Whirling back around, I sweep my leg out low, intending to knock his feet from beneath him. He leaps gracefully over my strike. Lands silently beside my mother’s grave.
“You fight like her.” A considering note. “She trained you well.”
The remark hits like a physical blow.
I straighten slowly from my crouch, pain lancing through my chest. I aim a punch straight at that infuriating face, but he sidesteps my swing. My fist glances off his shoulder. I grunt as my knuckles crack against unyielding muscle. I want to shatter something until this agony finds relief. Until my bloodied hands match my scraped-out insides.
With renewed fury, I unleash a series of fast kicks and strikes, pushing my burning muscles past their limits. I need to smash and break. Obliterate something. I pull my second dagger and slice along his shoulder. I expect him to snarl in pain or retaliate with punishing force. Instead, his eyes glint in almost amusement.
“Now I can see why Victoria wanted us to remain strangers,” he murmurs.
That does it. The last fraying thread of my restraint snaps.
I snarl and launch myself at him. He shifts again with that unnatural speed, catching me by the arm and whirling me around. My back slams against the solid wall of his chest. I stomp down hard on his instep and feel him jerk just enough for me to twist sharply in his grasp. Before he can react, I slam my forehead directly into his nose. A satisfying crunch echoes in the chilled night air. We both reel back.
He wipes his bloodied face with the back of one hand, studying the vivid red smear left behind. When his gaze finds me, a wild, savage amusement touches his mouth. My answering grin is all biting edges and fury. Murderous intent thrums through my veins, chasing away the bitter chill of grief. We circle each other, two beasts sniffing out tender places to sink in our fangs.
I’m the one who strikes first. Who closes the distance in a blur of speed, leading with my fists.
He knocks aside my wild swing and dodges the next.
“Tiring yet?” he asks.
“I’m not even winded, you bastard.”
I launch myself at his torso, clamping onto his back. We crash to the frozen earth in a snarling tangle of limbs, rolling through the grass.
Nothing exists now but instinct and reflex, my pulse roaring in my ears. I’m alive here in the dirt, claws sunk deep to grapple and strain against unyielding muscle. Alive beneath his grappling hands. Our reckless brawl between equals drunk on chaos and pain.
I begin another assault, feinting and striking in a dizzying blur of motion. He anticipates my every attack, countering with brutal efficiency. We continue our deadly dance—rush, parry, twist away. My blows land more frequently, though none get through his defences. I refuse to tire, fuelled by rage and pain. Sweat drips into my eyes, but I push my strained muscles past their limits. I can’t let him win.
We finish nose to nose, both our blades pressed to the other’s throat.
Chest heaving, I take in his mussed hair and the trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth where I split the skin. The fight etched similar marks on us both.
His eyes gleam. “A pleasure to finally make your acquaintance, Aileana Kameron.”
I lean in, pressing the knife edge harder against him. “Likewise, Kiaran MacKay.”