Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Half of us would be culled. Cold truth settled over me as I processed the cruelty of pairs. Half of eighteen was nine, but one half of a pair could not live with their partner dead.
Ten.
The second trial would not end until ten of us were gone.
The hall exploded, voices rising sharp and panicked, the air itself vibrating with terror. Rhiannon rapped with her scepter, but no one heeded her. Even the Sylvanwild queen was just one fae.
Beside me, Dorian had paled. His face shuttered.
“We’re to be hunted, aren’t we?”
“Yes,” he said without turning his head.
“By what?”
“Most terrible creatures of myth,” the fae who’d lost an ear said from my other side. “Unseelie fae from below, and their wolves, too.”
“Below?”
I had never given thought to what lay beneath us. In the Kingdom of Storms, some religions believed in an endless river of spirits. Others believed in a pit of fire. But none of it had any bearing on the life I’d lived; past the age of six, I hadn’t considered that they might actually exist.
Rhiannon finally rose from her throne.
A breeze swept over my cheek, which soon picked up into wind. My attention locked on her, on the soft movement of her lips and the rubbing of her fingers at her side.
Magic. She was using her magic. And not sparingly.
Fae hair fluttered, the tapestries on the wall flapped. Soon the room was enveloped in a gale that whipped at our clothes and slapped at our faces.
It happened within seconds—a windstorm spawned in the citadel’s throne room.
If Dorian hadn’t grabbed hold of me and crouched above me, I’d have been knocked over. Beneath him, the scream of the gale filled my ears. My eyes lifted to the dais.
Amidst all of it, Rhiannon stood unfazed, untouched, her scepter raised in one hand, her other palm extended upward. The calm at the storm’s heart. The fur robes around her body whipped and clawed like the beasts they had once been.
This power belonged to her.
Air bent to her will, and it was fucking incredible.
I’d thought Dorian’s abilities were amazing. But Rhiannon… I wondered if she could sweep us all away with a single movement of her hand, the way she’d flicked water at us in her chambers.
Now I understood what these fae meant when they spoke of their women harnessing nature most potently. And I understood why she wore the diadem and held the bramble scepter.
Queen.
Finally, the wind died down. Her hands lowered, and the throne room fell to silence, not by command, but because silence was all that remained. Rhiannon’s eyes moved over all of us, as though waiting for a challenge, for someone to speak up or step forward.
When no one did, she gave a single nod.
“Such is the trial set before you,” she said to us. “The Wild Hunt will claim the unworthy, and only those who are fit to carry on to the third and final trial may taste victory.”
She pointed the end of her thorny scepter toward the double doors. “Go now, and bring honor to our court. In life, and in death.”
All eighteen of us passed down the central aisle, the weight of the court’s gaze pressing on our backs. Dorian and I hung behind the others, the last to approach the doors.
But when it was my turn, Dorian caught my arm. “Wait,” he whispered.
One by one the others pushed their way out the double doors, vanishing into the night. None spared us a glance.
By now I knew if Dorian was holding me back, he had good reason. “Why?”
“Because they’ll kill us.” His hand stayed on my arm. “The sooner we’re dead, the closer they are to victory.”
He meant the other fae. Of course—why pin your hopes on evading the hunters when you could take out the competition yourself? Starting with Dorian and his human.
“Surely they can’t kill us on citadel grounds.”
“No,” he said, and only then did he start steering us toward the stairs. “But they’ll be watching for the moment we cross that moat.”
“The hunt’s that way,” a man’s voice called out, and a few of the more brazen fae fell into laughter. “Or have you lost your good senses, thanks to your pettifey?”
“Silence,” Rhiannon said, her voice edged. “Lest I send you fools out as morsels for the wolves. There is no rule of law outside the citadel tonight.”
The laughing stopped. The stares did not.
As we ascended the stairs, Rhiannon’s eyes met Dorian’s. Her face was planes of hard edges, her eyes stony.
She gave him a nod. I had no idea what it meant. A sanction? A warning?
When we were out of the throne room, Dorian began jogging.
I caught up to him. “There’s no other way out of here, is there?”
“There’s always another way out.” He came to a flight of circular stairs and began ascending, two at a time, toward the area where we sparred. Where I’d seen him fighting a wraith on that first night.
We circled until we came out onto the high, enormous tree branch. By night I found it wholly foreign, like stepping into dark water. And yet Dorian strode onto it, nearly disappearing into the darkness.
It was a cloudy night. Such was our luck.
When I met him on the branch, he said, “We’re going to cross to the next tree. Are you afraid of heights?”
“No.” I stared into the nothingness of the night. There was something I feared. “You told me I’d be killed if I strayed from the paths at night.” I met his eyes. “There’s something else out there besides this hunt.”
Dorian stared at me, his gaze flicking between mine. Then his jaw moved as if in resolution. “The wraiths,” he said, low. “They roam the forest. They attack anyone who isn’t of Sylvanwild.”
Ice spread through my belly. I heard it all again: metal on metal, the screams, the sounds of death. I wondered if I would ever be able to forget. “They’ll come for me.”
“They won’t have you as long as you’re with me.” His hand reached out toward me. “Which is why we can’t be separated.”
I didn’t move. “The Wild Hunt—tell me what it is. Tell me what I’m about to walk into. I deserve to know that.”
His jaw worked. “She is cursed, Eurydice. A cursed fae who rises at the behest of the spirits. She rides a horse, and her wolves hunt alongside her. They cannot be stopped and they cannot be reasoned with. They can only be survived.”
“Where do they rise from?”
“The Underwood. It is our hell.”
So there was a fate worse than becoming a wraith. I couldn’t imagine it.
The ice spread further, rising into my throat. “Wraiths and the Wild Hunt. It’s a special kind of fucked, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” In the semidarkness his mouth twitched, but his hand stayed extended. “But it wouldn’t be the first time.”
I gazed at his hand, and then into his eyes. Even in this darkness, even with goosebumps running up my arms and my hair standing on end, I could perceive the change in Dorian. In his eyes, in his soft mouth. Here was my partner from the Eldermaze. Here was the man who had nearly died to save us.
I set my palm to his.
His fingers closed firm over mine. “Trust me, as much as you can. For as long as we’re in this, I won’t fail you.”
I swallowed. “Bold claim.”
The hint of his crooked smile appeared. “There’s a strong chance we’ll be gutted and eaten alive by wolves. Better?”
“Much better.” My grip tightened. “You lead.”
“Keep your voice to a whisper.” Dorian led me along the branch, away from the citadel’s interior and all light. Out here, the sounds became the sounds of the forest: the rustle of leaves, the creak of trees, the chittering and crying of creatures whose names I didn’t know.
I didn’t hear the wraiths. And I didn’t know if that was good or bad for us.
After a minute, he stopped. “You’re going to drop down. The next branch is a short distance below.”
“Just… drop?”
“Wait here.” As if I had a choice. He let go of my hand. Instantly I experienced a powerful disorientation in the darkness. The branch gave the slightest creak, and then a soft rustle sounded below me. Dorian’s low voice rose to me. “Step off. I’ve got you.”
The dizziness made me crouch and set my hands to the branch. “You’re certain of that?”
“Positive.”
I couldn’t even see him, but I had to trust him. It was the only way we’d make it through this. “I’m dropping now.”
I slid off the edge of the branch. My stomach lurched into my throat as I fell. Then warm hands caught me at the hips and slid up my sides, steadying me.
“Well done.”
My heart was a canary. I gripped his forearms. “Tell me we won’t be doing that again.”
“We’re on the next tree now. From here, we’ll climb down.”
“Dorian—”
“I’ll carry you.” His hands stayed on my sides. “It’s the only way.”
The resistance in me deflated in the face of necessity. I nodded.
I sensed him crouching before me. “Hold on to me. I’ll need my hands and feet to get us down.”
The last time I’d climbed onto him, he’d been thrashing from poison. And the time before that, we’d both been thrashing as I tried to bury my knife in his neck.
Now, I had to climb on to live.
I patted into the darkness and found his shoulder. He had turned his back toward me, and I lowered myself, wrapping my legs around his waist and clasping my hands at his neck.
His voice was right beside me. “Tighten your grip.”
“It’s tight.”
“Tighter. This will happen quickly, and I won’t be able to catch you if you lose your hold.”
I pressed myself closer, locking my arms beneath his chin. I grasped my opposite forearm with each hand. My mouth was next to his ear. “This is as good as it gets.”
He shifted his weight beneath me. “Close your eyes,” he said, low. “You’ll need to trust your other senses.”
“Why?”
“Just do it, Eury. Please.” His voice sounded strained and sincere.
Trust. I had to trust him to get through this. I won’t fail you, he’d said. I obeyed, squeezing my eyes shut.
“Good. Once we get to the bottom, I’ll give you a signal. Don’t speak—don’t scream—don’t make noise. Just think of a happy memory.”
My eyebrows rose. “Don’t scream?”
He ignored me and rose. “Whatever you do,” he said, “don’t let go.”
He told me not to scream, and in the next sentence to think of a happy memory.
The past was impossible; I had never felt more present. Never felt more inside my own body.
When he started moving, the branch didn’t even creak.
The leaves barely rustled. He moved so silently I could only tell by the pull of my own body—and I could feel every part of him in motion.
His legs, running and dodging. His arms, swinging to balance.
He ducked and surged forward, and we were airborne a moment before he landed on another branch with only the faintest groan of wood.
Then we began to descend. He jumped from branch to branch, sometimes a lateral leap, sometimes a drop. When we fell, I felt that dizzying weightlessness every time. Once he caught a smaller branch and swung us before we dropped again.
With each leap, my grip was tested. I was jarred again and again, forced to listen for the subtle shifts in his movement before he jumped. A few times my legs slipped loose and I felt my own death clawing at me before I wrapped tighter around him.
It felt endless. Would we ever reach the forest floor?
Finally, he stopped. His hand squeezed my forearm twice—that was the signal.
Don’t speak, don’t scream, don’t make noise.
He dropped, and this time it was a longer fall than any of the others. I felt the difference when his boots struck ground: the jarring solidity of it, but also a strange comfort.
Still clutching him, I kept my eyes shut. I inhaled his scent and found it, unexpectedly, a comfort.
On the ground, Dorian took off through the inky darkness. He moved through the forest as silently as he had across the branches, which I almost couldn’t comprehend. As far as I could tell it was autumn here in Sylvanwild, and I’d seen dead leaves scattered everywhere.
I didn’t know where he was leading us. Away from the citadel, away from the other fae, yes. I hoped away from the Wild Hunt. But where to? I had no choice but to trust his knowledge of Sylvanwild.
As he ran the cloud cover thinned, and a faint brightness pressed against my eyelids. I frowned in the dark. Moonlight.
On instinct, I cracked my eyes open and the world snapped into harsh silver.
The clouds had parted fully, and the moon’s light poured down. It shone like daylight between the leaves and branches, throwing everything into stark relief.
And I understood why Dorian had told me not to scream.
All around us, wraiths followed. They moved as silently as shadows, some so close I could have reached out and touched them. Their scythes gleamed silver in the moonlight, and their bodies were voids of all color but night.
Every one of them was hunting me.