6 A BLADE OFFERED HILT-FIRST
ALAR WALKED THROUGH the High Queen’s encampment, his pace unhurried. He was aware of his escort—the bullish chief-enforcer and the glowering captain of the army—stalking at his heel, but he ignored them.
Something wet and cold pushed against his neck then.
Stumbling under the force of the nudge, he turned to find a huge dog with a shaggy dark-green coat and massive jaws looming at his shoulder.
The beast—at least four times larger than the biggest wolf he’d ever seen—had massive jaws that could crush a man’s skull like a walnut, yet its amber-hued gaze was adoring.
“Hello there,” he murmured, wary. He was used to wolves and dogs responding well to him, but it was wise to be careful around a fae hound. He’d never stood so close to one before.
The dog gave a low whine and nudged him once more.
“Skaal!” The chief-enforcer’s tone was sharp. “Back!”
Reluctantly, the fae hound obeyed, and Alar turned, resuming his journey through the camp.
Warriors watched as he passed, curious gazes tracking him. They were trying to decide who he was. Later, they’d discover that ‘The Half-blood’ had walked amongst them, but for the moment, they were mystified.
“Walk faster,” the chief-enforcer growled, “Or I’ll wedge my boot up your arse.”
Alar glanced over his shoulder, meeting mac Brochan’s hard blue gaze. He’d heard of this big, tattooed man and the fae hound that followed him—few in Albia hadn’t. He’d once hunted and killed Shee for the High King and now served Talorc mac Brude’s daughter. “Am I making you nervous?”
“No, you’re pissing me off.”
“It’s not my fault your dog likes me.”
“Shut your mouth, Half-blood,” the captain added tersely. “You’ve said enough for tonight.”
Alar smirked. “Eavesdropping, were you?”
Of course, these two pricks had been standing right outside the tent while he’d been speaking to the High Queen. They’d listened to every word.
“He insulted our High Queen,” mac Tav muttered. “Maybe we should rough him up a bit.”
Mac Brochan cracked his knuckles. “Don’t tempt me.”
Alar’s smile didn’t slip, although his instincts sharpened at the threat in the chief-enforcer’s voice. Shifting his attention ahead once more, he slowed his stride further, hands flexing at his sides. “You’d attack an unarmed man?”
Mac Brochan shoved Alar between the shoulder blades. “Keep moving.”
They reached the edge of the camp, where mist wreathed around the warded perimeter.
Druidic magic hung heavily in the air here, and the pungent scent of ash and pine filled Alar’s nostrils.
As he walked through the wards, his skin prickled, the tattoo on his chest warming as it responded to earth magic.
Ignoring the sensation, he turned then to face his escort. The chief-enforcer held out his twin fighting daggers, which he sheathed, one over each shoulder, with deft, practiced movements.
“Slither away now.” The captain raked a gaze over Alar. “And don’t bother returning.”
Alar took a step backward, his attention shifting to mac Brochan. “I won’t need to,” he replied softly. “Because you’ll come looking for me .”
The chief-enforcer’s features pinched at this, while the captain spat on the ground between them.
Unbothered, Alar turned away. Years, he’d prepared for this moment—and now his time had come.
Finally, justice was about to be served.
For him. And for the wulvers. He then walked off, covering the ground in long, easy strides.
All the while though, he was aware of stares digging into his back.
The skin between his shoulder blades itched in response.
Moments later, he entered the woods that fringed the northern edge of the High Queen’s camped army, his boots sinking into peaty soil.
He wove his way through the trees, his keen eyesight picking out the dark outlines of twisted oaks, birches, and pines frosted in the light of the waxing crescent moon.
It was a still night, eerily so, and he caught movement out of the corner of his eye as he walked.
These woods weren’t slumbering tonight. Ever since the Shee had occupied the North, the faerie creatures that roamed Albia had been more active.
He spied deep claw marks scored upon the trunk of one of the birches then and stopped to examine them.
Reaching out, he rubbed a finger over where sap oozed onto the silvery bark.
A shiver tickled his spine, and he glanced around.
Moonlight filtered through the branches overhead, yet the shadows were deep.
Anything could be lurking there. Watching. Waiting.
He moved on then, his right hand lifting to the hilt of the blade jutting at his shoulder. And as he walked, he kept a sharp eye upon his surroundings. Presently, he came to a small glade where a burn trickled over mossy rocks.
Lyall and Dolph were waiting for him there.
His brothers. Two large wulvers—shaggy wolf heads on rangy men’s bodies—their eyes glowed gold in the light of the torches they held.
Lyall was the bigger of the two, with a thick black and grey ruff above his shoulders.
Dolph, his mate, was smaller and lithe, with a coat the hue of weathered oak.
“Well?” Lyall rumbled.
“The seed has been sown.”
“The queen didn’t swoon at your proposal then?
” Dolph crossed arms corded with ropey muscle across his chest, where heavy knife belts had been strapped.
Unlike most of the faerie creatures that inhabited Albia, wulvers could tolerate iron.
Over the long age since they’d been cast out of Sheehallion, whatever faerie magic they’d once possessed had been lost. These days, wulvers had more in common with the Marav than the Shee—a fact Lara’s father had wished to ignore.
Alar halted before them. “No … although you knew she likely wouldn’t. She’s proud.” He paused then. “She thinks herself too good for me.”
Lyall snorted. “She’s no better than any of us.”
“That’s right, brother,” Alar replied before shrugging. “However, her imperious manner is merely a shield … in reality she’s isolated … and desperate.”
Lyall’s feral gaze glinted. “But not yet desperate enough to agree to marry you?”
“She will be.”
Dolph muttered something under his breath.
“It’s all part of the game,” Alar assured him. He paused then, glancing back over his shoulder. His instincts stirred once more. Something was watching him. “It’s her move now.”
“Let her sweat,” Lyall agreed with a nod, his mouth curving into a smile that revealed sharp canine teeth. “Wait until despair creeps in. She can’t win this battle without us.”
“This is our moment,” Dolph added. “Finally, we’ll step into the light.”
“Aye … and not before time,” Alar replied before slowly reaching over his shoulders and drawing both his daggers.
The wulvers tensed and unsheathed blades of their own. “What is it?” Dolph murmured.
“I was tracked through the woods.”
“The Marav?” Lyall’s voice hardened.
“No.” Alar turned then, his gaze sweeping the edges of the glade. “Something else. I noticed claw marks on one of the trees … there could be a clag-doo nearby.”
Lyall cursed.
Clag-doos were rare, yet deadly. The lean, cat-like hunters were territorial and marked their domain with deep scratches that never healed. It had been years since Alar had last seen a ‘Black-claw’, although he wasn’t in a hurry to do so again.
He caught sight of movement then, sinuous dark shapes wreathing between the trees. Low, thin voices followed, moaning, hissing, and snarling.
Alar stiffened. “The Slew?” There was something worse than a clag-doo in these woods.
“Can’t be,” Lyall answered, his golden eyes snapping wide. “The nearest burial site is half a night’s walk away.”
More shapes appeared, slithering around the edges of the clearing, as if they were wary of moving out of the shadows.
The Slew were the spirits of men and women who’d committed terrible deeds during their lives and so were forbidden from entering the Otherworld.
Their crimes were so awful that they couldn’t enter the Underworld either—a cold, hostile place, where winter storms raged—and so they lurked in the Threshold or Albia’s dark corners waiting to feed on the souls of the living.
Dolph breathed a curse. “It’s still two moons until Gateway.”
“That may be so,” Alar replied, his skin prickling as he watched the shadows creep through the trees.
Indeed, the only night of the year when the Slew ventured forth was the eve autumn slid into winter—the night when the veil between the living and the dead was at its thinnest. On that night, they took to the skies and went hunting. “But they’re hungry now , it seems.”
“They have been for a while,” Dolph answered as he too tracked the Slew.
All three of them hadn’t moved since spotting the wraiths.
The Unforgiven fed on the weak and fearful—and as such, the wulvers and their half-blood companion stared them down, even as their bodies tensed, readying themselves to run.
“I think the Shee have something to do with it.”
Alar harrumphed. “It’s possible.”
His pulse quickened then. The balance between the living and the dead, and fae and mortal, was delicate at best. The last High King had hated that the fae could cross between realms while his people couldn’t.
Talorc mac Brude was a butcher who loathed the Shee and all faerie kind, including wulvers and half-breeds like Alar.
But now that mac Brude was dead, and the Raven Queen sat on the throne in Cannich and ruled The Uplands, Albia was changing.
Maybe the Slew knew it and grew bold as they prepared themselves for a new age.
Alar was readying himself too.
Even so, the restless dead made him uneasy. He wasn’t foolish enough to let fear creep in, or they’d sniff it like hounds on the scent, but it was wise not to linger here any longer.
“Come on.” He moved toward the trees on the northern side of the glade, where the Slew hadn’t yet reached. “Let’s get back to the others.”