Chapter 2
Chapter two
The temperature began to drop as afternoon gave way to early evening and Briar moved deeper into the trees. The silence felt wrong, too heavy, as though even the forest itself was holding its breath in anticipation of what would come next.
“You’ve lasted longer than any of us expected.”
Briar stopped short, twisting around to confront the speaker.
A fae she was unfamiliar with stepped from behind a tree she could have sworn was empty shadow just a moment before.
His antlers branched above his angular face, each point sharp enough to pierce, and his eyes held a hunger that made her skin crawl.
"In case you’re considering it, running won't help," he continued, matching her stumbling retreat with unhurried steps. "This deep in the old forest, the trees themselves will turn you around and drive you back to me. They know the natural order of things."
She tried anyway, turning to flee, but the trees had shifted while she watched him, forming an impassable wall behind her.
"Human futility is so endearing." His voice came from directly behind her, close enough that she felt his breath roll across the nape of her neck. "You certainly know how to keep things interesting."
His hand caught her shoulder, twisting her around to face him.
"Let's see what made Eliam so—"
Briar lashed out in desperation, her nails raking across his face before conscious thought caught up to instinct. Four lines opened from cheekbone to jaw, deep enough that dark blood welled immediately, running down to drip from his chin.
He froze. His hand went to his face, fingers coming away wet. For a moment he just stared at his own blood, expression unreadable.
Then he smiled wider, something dangerous and delighted flickering in his eyes.
"Oh, you want to play?" His hand shot out, catching her wrist before she could run. He yanked her against him hard enough it left her gasping, his other arm wrapping around her waist to trap her there, arms pinned at her sides. "Let me show you how it's done properly."
She struggled, trying to twist free, but he held her easily.
“Normally I’d leave a mark to match, but it’d be a shame to scar such a pretty face,” he explained as his free hand caught the neckline of her dress and tore downward.
The sound of ripping silk filled her ears just seconds before cold air hit her exposed skin. “This will have to do.”
"No—" she gasped, but his fingers were already tracing down her throat, across her collarbone. Where his nails touched, they tore, dragging lines of fire across her skin. She felt blood well up warm against the cold.
“Beautiful,” he murmured.
His grip shifted, his hand moving lower. She grit her teeth as a single clawed finger dragged across the swell of her breast, leaving a welt in its wake.
"Should I go deeper?" he murmured against her ear. "Give you something to remember me by?" The claw pressed harder, and she sobbed. "Perhaps I'll write my name. I’ll take my time of course. Would you like that?"
His finger continued its path down across her chest, then back up to her shoulder, each line a promise of worse to come.
“Maybe on your back while I—”
Briar spat in his face.
The mixture of saliva and her own blood hit him across the mouth and cheek. His expression went from delighted cruelty to pure rage in an instant.
He threw her away from him in disgust and she hit the ground hard. She tried to roll, to get her hands under her, but her body wouldn't cooperate fast enough. He advanced on her, blood still dripping from the scratches on his face, his eyes promising violence.
"I was going to make it quick. But now?” He drove a sharp kick into her side that left her gasping. “Now I'm going to take my time with you. To savor every whimper, every scream until you’re beg—"
The ground beneath them erupted with a sound like breaking bones.
Massive thorns, each as thick as her waist and sharp as fresh-forged steel, burst upwards with violent force.
One tore through the side of her dress at the hip, and she felt its edge draw a line of fire across her skin as it passed.
Another exploded up between them, missing her face by inches.
The scent of disturbed earth and something else, something green and growing and wrong, filled her nostrils.
But the fae—
The thorn caught him through the middle of his torso, punching through his abdomen and emerging from his back in a spray of dark blood that steamed in the cold air. It lifted him three feet off the ground, his feet kicking uselessly, his expression shifting from rage to complete shock.
She staggered back onto her elbows, unable to tear her eyes away from the gruesome sight.
More thorns burst upward around them in a rough circle, each one three to four feet of organic spear, their surfaces smooth as glass but pulsing with faint golden veins.
Another erupted precisely where she'd been standing, and only her stumble backward had saved her.
Another to her right, the edge of it catching her calf as it rose, leaving a shallow gash. The pain dropped her to her knees.
"What—" he gasped, his hands scrabbling against the thorn piercing him, unable to find purchase on its unnaturally smooth surface. Dark blood ran from the corner of his mouth, staining his perfect teeth. "You're human—you can't—what IS this?"
She didn't know. The warmth in her chest had transformed into something else entirely, burning with confused fury, lashing out like a wounded animal that couldn't distinguish friend from foe.
The thorns looked wrong even to her eyes, not like natural growth but like something had forced them into existence through sheer violent will.
They pulsed with that golden light, almost like a heartbeat, almost like breathing.
"Get it OUT!" he snarled, his glamour failing as his control slipped.
The face underneath was all sharp angles and too many teeth, beautiful in the way broken glass was beautiful.
When he tried to dissolve into shadow the thorn pulsed brighter with golden light and he reformed, screaming.
The sound echoed through the forest, too high to be human, too anguished to be anything but real.
She needed to be gone before more fae came to investigate.
Briar scrambled backward between the thorns, her injured leg screaming protest. Her hands found purchase on bark and stone as she pulled herself up, forcing her body to cooperate despite its desperate protests.
"Wait!" The fae's voice cracked. "You can't leave me like this—come back here! COME BACK!"
She ignored him, stumbling away from the thorns, from his screams, pushing deeper into the trees.
Blood ran steadily down her calf from where the thorn had caught her, each step leaving red prints in her wake. She couldn't keep going like this. The blood trail would lead them straight to her.
Briar stopped, leaning against a tree. She looked down at the gash, several inches long but shallow. If she didn't stop the bleeding soon, she'd leave a trail bright enough for even human eyes to follow. She needed pressure, needed a bandage, something to stem the flow.
Her eyes dropped to the dress that was barely more than rags at this point. She grabbed a hanging piece near the hem, gritting her teeth as she pulled. The fabric resisted, then gave with a sound that felt too loud in the quiet forest.
She wrapped the strip around her calf, pulling it tight enough that she had to choke back a cry. Her fingers shook as she tried to tie it, the silk slippery with blood, but she managed a knot that would hopefully hold. The bleeding slowed to a seep rather than a flow. It would have to be enough.
Pushing off from the tree, she continued forward, her gait uneven but steadier.
Briar wasn’t sure how much time had passed before she heard it, the sound so faint at first she thought she was imagining it. A rushing that grew louder with each step. Water. Moving fast.
The memory rose unbidden. Some nature documentary she'd watched years ago, curled on the couch with Allegra. A mountain lion hunting deer. The prey had run through a stream and the hunter had lost the scent, circling in frustration while the deer escaped.
Water broke scent trails.
The trees opened ahead, and she saw it. Not the gentle stream she'd hoped for, but a river, swollen with recent rain. The water moved rushed by, white foam churning around rocks that jutted like broken teeth. The sound of it drowned out everything else, a constant roar that vibrated in her chest.
This was stupid. Dangerous. She'd almost died in water before, and that had been with Eliam there to save her.
Behind her, a hunting horn echoed through the trees too close for comfort.
Briar stepped to the river's edge and looked down. The bank dropped off sharply, muddy and treacherous. She could see where the current had carved away the earth, roots hanging exposed like grasping fingers. The water looked black in the shadow of the trees making it impossible to judge its depth.
Another horn answered the first, from a different direction this time.
She sat on the bank and slid down before she could reconsider. Her feet hit the water and the cold was a physical shock, stealing her breath. It rushed past her calves with force that immediately threatened her balance. The rocks beneath were slick with algae, each step she took was a gamble.
The water reached her thighs. Her knees. The current pulled at her dress, the fabric dragging, trying to sweep her downstream. She grabbed for a rock and her hand slipped, fingers scraping across stone. The makeshift bandage on her calf came loose, disappearing in the current.