The Hunter
Eira and I didn’t speak another word until we reached her friend Stella’s house. My mind was a conflicted mess, tumbling between the fear of being summoned by Calista again and the confusion of whatever I was feeling for Eira.
She had been ill. Feverish. Incoherent. And in that moment, I had been utterly terrified of losing her.
Now that she was well again, I had these tangled thoughts to sort through. I already knew I couldn’t kill her when the time came to settle our bargains. But I was beginning to suspect—and fear—that what I felt for her was something deeper. More intense.
Something I couldn’t hide from for much longer.
Stella’s home was a log cabin at the end of the road, lined by the forest through which Eira and I passed. As we approached, I was surprised to find Frisk trotting out to greet us. His thick white coat of fur was shining and spotless, as if he hadn’t been part of a gruesome battle just yesterday.
Eira rushed over to him, and he hopped into her arms, nuzzling against her chest as if he were a kitten. She pressed a kiss to the top of his head, and he leapt from her arms, landing on his feet.
“You tell Mauro about that and I’ll claw your eyes out,” Frisk said, sitting on his hind legs as if the show of affection hadn’t happened.
“Mauro? Is he all right?” Eira asked.
“He’s in the back. We figured he’d be a bit too conspicuous hanging around the front door.”
Eira chuckled. “I agree. And Kendra?”
“She’s napping by the fireplace. Apparently, you assigned her an arduous task.
” Frisk’s keen eyes sharpened, and I tensed, wondering how much the dragon had told him.
Did he know what Eira and I had done to escape the soldiers’ notice?
Kendra had been oblivious, but if she had told Frisk what she’d seen, he would have been clever enough to put the pieces together.
“What about the other creatures?” Eira asked. I could have sworn her cheeks had turned pink, as if her thoughts mirrored my own. “The ones who helped us fight off the soldiers. Are they all right?”
“We lost a few rabbits,” said Frisk. “All the fae beasts survived, though.”
My eyes widened in shock as I processed this. “There were mortal creatures fighting with us?”
Frisk fixed his dark eyes on me. “You really need to get this into your thick skull, hunter. Species isn’t everything. Unseelie, seelie, fae, or human… Get those damn divisions out of your head or it’ll be the death of you.”
I could only blink at him as he led Eira into the house. For a moment, I lingered in the front yard, my head reeling with the notion that this infuriating princess and her animal friends had turned my entire way of thinking upside down.
I wasn’t even sure who I was anymore. A week ago, I would have said I was a full-blooded seelie fae, an assassin for the Queen of the Winter Court, only one assignment away from a blissful retirement.
Now, I was a wanted fugitive who had turned against the queen and fought her soldiers, aiding and abetting the vigilante princess who sought to start a civil war in the court.
The fact that I was a full-blooded fae meant nothing now.
But perhaps that was how it should be. Why should my bloodline give me any amount of privilege? Why did that matter to me at all?
My jaw went rigid, my teeth grinding together as I was forcibly reminded of my father. Humans are worthless, he’d said. They were put here by the gods to test us. To make us stronger. We must use that strength to wipe them out and prove we are the more dominant species.
Never in my life had I agreed with my father’s practices and beliefs. And yet, somehow, the idea that the seelie fae were the more dominant species had been ingrained so deeply in my brain that I didn’t even notice the belief was there.
Damn you, old man, I thought, cursing my father. Even after he’d been taken from this world, his ideals still haunted me, dragging me down like a weight I hadn’t realized I’d been carrying.
And it was exactly why it had been so difficult for me to believe the queen was a Demon Fae. Because she had risen to power, claiming the throne of the Winter Court. So of course she had to be full-blooded seelie; it was the only thing that made sense. Why else would my father have served her?
And yet, thinking of Eira and everything she had gone through… I knew she had more sense than I gave her credit for. How could I have accused her of making this up? Of being delusional?
Guilt and shame and regret warred within me, making it hard to breathe. I couldn’t focus on this now. There were more important tasks at hand.
Voices echoed from the open window of the house, startling me from my thoughts. There would be a time for introspection later—assuming we survived this at all.
The odds were slim.
With a deep breath, I entered the house, following the sounds of excited whispers and murmurs.
When I reached the living room, I found Eira embracing a woman with pale blonde hair I’d seen once before—in Knockspur, when the humans had ganged up on me.
She had been the one with the stellar knife skills.
Stella withdrew from the embrace and fixed a cold stare on me, her chin lifting in defiance. “So, the fearsome assassin is still with you, is he?”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. But she didn’t draw a weapon on me, so I saw that as an improvement.
“Stella, you shouldn’t even be here,” Eira chided, ignoring my presence completely.
Stella gripped Eira’s hands in both of hers. “I heard whispers that the Snow Princess had been captured. I had to come and see for myself. I knew you wouldn’t have been caught so easily.”
Eira’s shoulders deflated, the motion so subtle I almost missed it. “I was caught. Stabbed, actually.”
Stella’s pale eyes grew wide. “Blood and ice, Snow! What happened?” She scanned Eira’s body as if searching for a wound.
Finally, Eira turned to face me, though she wouldn’t look me directly in the eye, for some reason. “Theron brought me to a healer. He saved my life.”
My heart tumbled from the fervor of her words. I swallowed hard, wanting to deflect her praise because it hadn’t been courageous at all. It had been the cowardice of a desperate man.
And in the end, the healer I’d trusted to save Eira had betrayed us. So perhaps it hadn’t been a wise choice after all.
Stella blinked and glanced between us in confusion. “The… assassin? Saved you?”
“Yes.” Eira still refused to look directly at me. Was she angry with me? “I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him.”
“Eira saved me, too,” I chimed in, feeling completely awkward throughout this whole exchange. “She had plenty of opportunities to let me die. But she fought to keep me alive.”
Stella sniffed. “Well. That’s more than I would have done.”
Eira elbowed her friend. “If you thought I was captured, you should have left. That was the plan.”
“To hell with the plan,” said a gruff voice.
A blade was in my hand as I whirled at the newcomer. From the next room emerged another human, this one also familiar—the burly fellow who’d held an iron blade to my throat in Knockspur.
Denton. The farm boy clearly still enamored with Eira. His dark, intense gaze was fixed on her as if he owned her. Anger simmered in my veins.
Eira straightened. “Denton? Shivering bones!” She raced toward him, throwing herself into his chest. His arms wrapped around her in a tight embrace.
The anger within me boiled over, my teeth clenched so hard my head was throbbing.
“Who else is here?” Eira asked, eagerly looking around as if expecting more of her friends to appear.
But Stella shook her head. “It’s just us. The others are rallying forces and will meet us at the palace.”
“We figured if the two of us died here, the others could still continue with the plan,” Denton explained.
“Didn’t you just say to hell with the plan?” I asked, my voice dripping with sarcasm.
Denton’s gaze shifted to me, and his stance went rigid. “I see you haven’t rid yourself of this nuisance yet.”
“You were there when we struck the bargain,” Eira said. “I had no choice.”
“That’s not true. You could have refused to bargain with him at all.”
“Denton—”
“Come on, Snow, you don’t need him. We can do this without his pretentious fae ass.”
“Actually, you can’t,” I said loudly.
The three of them turned to look at me.
“Eira needs me to get into the palace,” I went on, fixing a hard stare at her. “Isn’t that right?”
Eira offered a nervous chuckle. “Theron, we no longer have the element of surprise. The queen and all of her soldiers are searching for us.”
“If I can distract the queen by giving myself up, then you can sneak in on your own. I’ll still be fulfilling my bargain with you.”
Eira’s face paled. “Theron—”
Denton huffed a dry laugh. “Turn yourself in? I don’t believe it for a second.”
“He can’t lie,” Eira snapped.
“He said if. It doesn’t mean he’ll do it.” Denton drew closer to me, a challenge lighting up his gaze. “Tell us this is your intention, hunter. Prove me wrong.”
I met his gaze, unwavering. His intimidation tactics wouldn’t work on me. Because for the first time in days, clarity burned through my thoughts.
This was what I needed to do. My own life be damned; I’d spent too long allowing my father and Calista’s crusade against humans to escalate. Eira could make more of a difference in this court than I ever could. It was more important for her to survive than for me.
This was my penance.
With a firm, steady voice, I said, “It is my intention to turn myself in so Eira can sneak into the palace undetected.”
The truth in my words rang out in the small room, and Eira’s eyes went wide. She was right. I couldn’t lie. And that meant I had just vowed to face certain death to give her a chance at accomplishing her goal.