I swallowed, trying not to think about what was inside them. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. My name is Isobel. I’m, um, a portrait artist.”
“I haven’t the slightest idea what that means,” Hemlock replied, smiling. “Now, Rook—”
Rook danced sideways and gave her a bloodcurdling equine scream.
“Oh, don’t be rude! We mustn’t carry on just because we’re at war with each other. As I was going to say, before you interrupted me, I think we should even out the odds by giving you a head start. If my hounds catch up with you again, then I can have a proper go at ripping you to shreds. How does that sound?”
He snaked his head forward and snapped at the air between them. I realized with dread that he wanted to stand his ground. I turned my face into his mane so Hemlock wouldn’t see me speaking to him.
“Please go,” I breathed. “You might be able to survive this, but I wouldn’t make it through, and without me you’ll never mend your reputation.”
The skin twitched on his shoulders as though dislodging a fly.
“Are your court feuds truly worth it?”
His head turned. One of his eyes fixed on me, and it was awful seeing the intelligence in it, an intelligence that didn’t belong anywhere near the animal’s shape he wore.
“Please,” I whispered.
Rook jerked as if I’d taken a crop to him, and veered around Hemlock and her hounds to gallop into the waiting darkness.
“Do hurry, Rook!” Hemlock cried behind us, a shrill, almost desperate call. “I’ll be after you soon! Run as fast as you can!”
I wrapped Rook’s long mane around my wrists and risked a glance over my shoulder. Hemlock’s armor blended so well with the forest I saw only her ghastly pale face receding until the branches and leaves obscured even that. The Wild Hunt’s horn sounded again. It occurred to me I’d gotten quite a good look at Hemlock, and she hadn’t been carrying one.
Rook ran like the devil chased at his heels. I focused only on not falling off, blind to the scenery whipping past. For a time all I knew was the pounding rhythm of his hooves and the furnace heat rising from his back, the hard, stinging chunks of dislodged earth that pelted my legs. Then a bright shape tore past my face and lodged in my collar. At first, I didn’t recognize the fluttering yellow scrap as a leaf. When I did, everything changed.
I raised my head. My breath caught. Wonder poured through me, brighter than a sunrise spilling over the horizon, headier than a glass of sparkling champagne.
We were in the autumnlands.
Dim as it was, the forest glowed. The golden leaves flashing by blazed like sparks caught in the updraft of a fire. A scarlet carpet unrolled before us, rich and flawless as velvet. Rising from the forest floor, the black, tangled roots breathed a bluish mist that reduced the farthest trees’ trunks to ghostly silhouettes, yet left their foliage’s luminous hues untouched. Vivid moss speckled the branches like tarnished copper. The crisp spice of pine sap infused the cool air over a musty perfume of dry leaves. A knot swelled in my throat. I couldn’t look away. There was too much of it, too fast. I’d never be able to drink it all in—I needed to absorb every leaf, every chip of bark, every flake of moss. I clenched my fingers in Rook’s mane, ravenous for my paintbrush, my easel. Sitting up straighter, I let the wind rush over me and fill my lungs to bursting. It still wasn’t enough. After seventeen years of living in a world that never changed, I felt as though I’d just flung off a stifling wool sweater and felt the breeze on my skin for the very first time. Nothing would ever be enough again.
When his pace slowed, the absence of the wind tearing at my clothes and the sound and motion of his pounding gallop left me strangely bereft. My thoughts whirled, and the blood buzzed in my veins. Every sound seemed muffled after the wild ride—his hooves barely disturbed the cushioned forest floor; steam gusted from his nostrils in perfect silence. Finally, he lowered himself to his knees in the middle of a glade. I slid off on legs weakened to the point of trembling and turned in a slow, unsteady circle.
No horn sounded in the distance, no baying of hounds disturbed the misty air. No droning grasshoppers here—only the music of crickets, the liquid peeping of frogs, the quiet plop of acorns falling from trees. Not a single raven roosted above me. The danger had passed.
Therefore, when I completed my revolution, I froze at the sight of Rook back in his normal form, standing with his sword drawn.
And I forgot to think altogether when he turned the blade upon himself.
Six
I DIDN’T protest. I didn’t scream. Whatever he was doing, I was neither willing nor able to stop him.
He didn’t look at all weary or disheveled as he knelt with his right sleeve rolled up to the elbow, the sword laid across his hand. A curl of damp hair clinging to his forehead was the only sign that remained from our reckless flight, the sweat that had previously soaked his neck and shoulders. Calmly he looked aside, and then he drew the blade across his palm in one vicious stroke. Blood spattered the moss below. It was a paler color than human blood, and thicker, as though mixed with tree sap.
Once the shock wore off I understood Rook was working some fairy magic. Whatever it was, I hoped it hurt. Perhaps it would even weaken him in a way I might use to my advantage.
“You said there were only two other fair ones as powerful as you,” I said, curtsying for his attention. “I thought you meant the regents of the spring and winter courts. But is Hemlock one of them?”
He wiped his hand off on the moss, bent over his knee in a seamless bow, and stood. The cut had vanished—though I had no way of knowing whether it was truly healed or merely disguised by his glamour. The latter struck me as something he would do out of pride.
“All of us have different gifts, some more than others. I can change my shape and as prince I command the power of my season. Hemlock is known for her prowess in battle, but she is no winter lord. Perhaps—if all my magic were exhausted, or if I chose not to use it—I might meet her in physical combat as an equal.” His lip curled. I wondered how often he wished he could lie.
“Her fairy beasts must be a danger to you, then,” I ventured, sensing an opportunity to learn more about his weaknesses. “If not one or two at a time, the entire pack fighting at her side.”
He sheathed his sword in a violent motion and strode over to me, stopping only when we almost touched, staring down. I felt his breath on my upturned face. My heart skipped a beat. He was a little winded, after all.
“They are a danger to you, mortal, not I. You saw how I fared against the thane. How many times do I have to remind you? I am a prince.”
“Yes, I know!” I didn’t budge an inch. “It’s not as though you’ve given me a chance to forget it.”
He squared his shoulders and bared his teeth as if I’d just slapped him.
I schooled myself, resisting the urge to reach for my ring. “I just don’t understand any of this. Fairy beasts, the conflict between your houses, why on earth the Wild Hunt’s been after you for centuries if Hemlock knows she can’t win. I suppose it’s too much for my foolish mortal brain to take in.”
Rook relaxed. Annoyingly, he didn’t register the sarcasm.
“Hemlock is the Huntsman,” he replied. “She obeys the call of the winter court, which ever seeks to spread its frost across the autumnlands.”
“The horn,” I murmured. “It commands her. She doesn’t have a choice.”
He nodded. “For her, the Hunt is everything. It is her only purpose. She will hunt until she dies and at last must hunt no more.”
Wind rustled through the canopy, and leaves pattered like rain across the clearing. I thought of Hemlock’s ghastly face receding into the dark, the way she’d screamed at us to run. A shiver coursed through my body. The chill bite of the autumn air was finally catching up with me.
Or was it? For then I wondered if I had shivered at all, because the trembling went on and on, heaving the ground beneath my feet. I staggered back, but there was no escape from the peculiar quickening that followed. Beginning at the point where Rook had spilled his blood, a tide of moss starred with tiny, pale blue flowers no bigger than the tip of my little finger surged forward, unfurling across the glade, foaming partway up the tree trunks—and my own legs. I yelped and pulled my boots free, sending clumps of moss flying as I gave my skirts a vigorous shake.