Chapter 30 #2
“If you hadn’t been born—if you hadn’t been so besotted with her—none of this would have happened!” Malen snarls. His eyes are wild. Not afraid, but enraged.
“If you weren’t so blinded by greed and ambition, you’d see that none of this is our fault,” Hunter fires back. “The king is corrupt. You’re a smart man. You must know that.”
Malen lets out a dry laugh. “And what does that matter?” He gives Hunter a condescending look, like he’s scolding a child.
“As long as we come out on top, what happens to the rest of them is irrelevant. This is war, Hunter, not some child’s storybook about rescuing damsels.
There’s no right and wrong. Only survival of the smartest, the strongest, the most powerful.
” His sword trembles in his hand. “You’re blinded by a pretty face. ” He spits at Hunter’s feet.
Hunter doesn’t flinch. He holds his spear steady, his eyes locked on his father. “I love her.”
Malen barks a bitter laugh and gives a mocking bow. “Spoken like a true hero.” He turns slowly, shifting the tip of his sword from Hunter to me.
Hunter stiffens. “Don’t.”
“Or what?” Malen asks, his voice sharp with challenge. “You’ll stab me?” He sneers. “I’ve known you your entire life, son. You have no spine. You’re weak.” Malen shakes his head slowly. “And I am done with both of you.”
Malen charges toward me just as Hunter raises his spear, ready to throw—but he doesn’t get the chance.
The corpse bear barrels between us.
I leap aside a heartbeat before it would have trampled me.
Commander Malen is not so lucky. The corpse bear slams into him with its massive head—more skull than muzzle—knocking him flat. He lets out a startled sound, his eyes going wide as he stares up at the towering beast. But he doesn’t have time to fight back.
The bear swipes, its claws slicing clean through his armor.
Blood spills from the gashes in his chest. It pools beneath him like a mountain spring.
As he gasps for air, more blood bubbles out of his mouth.
For the briefest moment, his gaze flickers to Hunter.
I almost think I see regret there, words left unsaid.
Then the corpse bear crushes his skull in a single bite.
Hunter stands frozen, eyes wide, as a dead creature eats his father alive. But we can’t stay here. We can’t wait for the bear to turn on us.
I grab Commander Malen’s fallen sword from the ground and a flash of silver catches my eye. Grandmother’s moth necklace glimmers in the trampled grass. I snatch that up too, then seize Hunter’s arm.
“Hunter.”
He turns to me, still in shock.
“I’m sorry, but we can’t …” I press his father’s sword into his hands.
He takes it with trembling fingers. It’s more ornate than his melted King’s Guard blade.
The pommel is shaped like a copper fox’s face, its eyes set with rubies.
The crossguard curves into the fox’s tail, its tip dipped in silver.
It’s the sword of a man who did everything to claw his way into the king’s good graces.
It’s the sword of a man who is now dead because of it.
Hunter’s grip tightens. His eyes burn with new resolve.
Together, we run.
Around us, the battle has turned into a twisted dance of shadow and blood.
The bonfire has spilled over and a blaze rapidly consumes the dried autumn grasses of the valley.
Smoke billows up into the sky, the fire greedy in its hunger to burn.
The fire illuminates the carnage that surrounds us.
Men, gaping, bleeding, dead. Corpse wolves with gore on their maws search for their next target.
One spots me. Its white eyes reflect the inferno around us.
“Keep running!” Hunter yells, snapping back into survival mode. He stands with his father’s sword at the ready.
“No, Hunter!”
The corpse wolf snarls in a low, haunting rumble. As if it delights in drawing out the torture. As if it enjoys the taste of mounting fear.
“I love you, Sienna.” Hunter steels his gaze on the corpse wolf. “This is not how you die.” He runs toward the creature.
“Hunter!” My voice is high, hysterical with fear.
The corpse wolf sprints—faster than anything with broken legs and rotting sinew should be able to. Hunter slides to the ground just as the corpse wolf lunges toward me. He swings his sword upward, the blade slicing, spraying blackened, fetid blood across the grass.
Then, from behind a wall of fire, another wolf emerges, its milky eyes locking onto mine. I turn and run.
The creature charges after me. I can’t fight it with just a knife. My power is still empty, burned out by the wraiths. I search wildly through the chaos for any escape. Up ahead, a narrow gap between two boulders is my only shot.
With barely a second to spare, I dive for it, squeezing through the tight crevice.
The wolf snaps at my heels, its teeth tearing through the hem of my red cloak.
I shove myself deeper into the rocks, panting, as the wolf snarls and lunges.
Its hot, putrid breath washes over my face as it tries to reach me.
Suddenly, there’s a loud thwack and the creature falls to the ground. For several seconds, I stare at its white eyes and unmoving jaws before I realize someone is yelling for me.
“Red! Red, hurry!”
A familiar hand reaches into the crack to help me out. I grab it, stepping on the corpse wolf’s head as I crawl out from between the rocks. When I emerge, I see Tristan. Sweat drips down his temples and there’s blood smeared across his cheek.
“Tristan?”
“Are you alright?” The blazing fire reflects in his eyes. He’s lost his fox sword, but he’s clearly improvised. At his feet lies the corpse wolf, its head severed cleanly from its body by an axe still buried in its neck.
I nod. “I’m fine.” Several yards behind him, a wolverine feasts on a man’s internal organs. “How did you …?” I can’t stop staring at the beheaded wolf. “Can you kill what’s already dead?”
“It’s their one weakness,” Tristan says. “Severing the spine.”
I nod, like that makes any sense at all. In a world where the dead can rise, what’s a little severing of the spine?
Tristan’s expression turns grave. “It’s now or never.”
Annwyn. This is our one chance to reach the trees at the base of the Spires and cross into enemy territory. I hesitate, scanning the chaos for any sign of Hunter. When I turn back to Tristan, he shakes his head slowly. We can’t wait. I know this in my bones, but it doesn’t make it less painful.
I follow him, weaving through boulders and rubble. We pass the chaos of dying men and undead creatures, all illuminated by uncontrollable fire. Finally, we make it to the edge of the valley. The shadowed trees are just ahead when a voice cuts through the air, calling my name.
I freeze. Tristan notices and turns back, urgently waving me forward.
“Red! What are you doing? We’re nearly there!”
That’s when we both see him.
Hunter.
Gone is the clean-cut boy in gleaming copper armor.
He’s limping after us, pain etched into every line of his bruised face.
He’s filthy, caked in dirt and blood, some of it likely not his.
More drips from a gash at his temple. He looks nothing like the boy I grew up with.
The boy I loved before the world ruined me.
And yet—he’s never looked more beautiful.
“What are you doing?!” he yells.
It takes me a moment to realize he isn’t talking to me.
“I told you to protect her, not kidnap her!” His face is lit with a rage I’ve never seen before. He steps nose to nose with Tristan, who stands there coolly, as if Hunter had simply asked whether he takes sugar in his tea.
“He isn’t taking me.” I wedge myself between them. “I’m going by my own free will.”
“Into Annwyn territory? Have you lost your mind?” He gestures wildly toward the blood-drenched battlefield behind us, where the dead still feast and fires burn.
That’s when I realize—the Dead Queen is gone. She sent her monsters after us and then vanished, slipping back into the veil of shadow and mist.
Hunter points toward the valley, where flames have reached the last of the city walls and screams echo through the smoke. “They have more of those monsters in there!”
Tristan cuts in calmly. “There are monsters everywhere.”
“Shut up, Wolf!” Hunter snaps.
For a moment, it looks like Tristan might argue, but one glance at my expression and he shuts his mouth.
“Hunter,” I say, trying to reason with him. “That’s a risk I have to take.”
His shoulders slump. “You were just going to leave me? Again?”
“I have to.”
He shakes his head slow and disbelieving. “No, Sienna. You really don’t.” His voice shifts. “I can take care of you! We can make a life together, without Foxes and Wolves and everything that’s in-between.” He reaches for my hand, but I take a step back.
“I can’t,” I whisper. “Deep down, you must know that.”
He scrubs his hands over his face in frustration. Then he takes a breath and looks at me, voice tight with anguish. “Is this about what I did?”
“No, Hunter. I—”
“How long are you going to punish me for one, stupid mistake?”