The Danger of Destiny

by Leigh Evans

  His thumb stroked my bottom lip.

  “Open,” he said, tilting my jaw upward.

  My tense smile softened into my Lolita come-hither. My lids lowered and my mouth parted, ready for his kiss. But instead of lips that could be either hard or warm, I felt the intrusion of a stick of wood that tasted like Trowbridge and bitter bark sliding into my mouth.

  I opened my eyes.

  Blue ones gleamed at me. “Chew, sweetheart. It will keep the hunger away.”

  Chapter Two

  Trowbridge, being wolf, likes to cuddle. And caress. Bottom line, with me he’s inexplicably tactile. It’s startling and wonderful and odd. Having spent a hug-deprived youth, I was having to relearn being held. Most of the time, I delighted in it. But here, in the spot he’d found us under a tree, I couldn’t find a comfortable position in his arms. It was still daylight—the sun was bright and hot—and even though my body was beyond tired, my mind was busy.

  Despite his suggestion, I couldn’t catch forty winks on the drop of a dime.

  My brain was too busy concocting a nightmare situation where I ran into a Fae or a Raha’ell and Trowbridge was unable to communicate on my behalf, being (a) suddenly mute or (b) amnesic, and/or (c) feverish and unable to do anything other than sing the entire chorus of “Baby Don’t Leave Me” in falsetto.

  Up in Threall—a mist-shrouded place where the souls of the Fae hung from ancient trees like beautiful balls of light—I spoke the language. Hell, in that realm Fae bon mots just flowed from my tongue. There I was the Dorothy Parker of the Fae. But in the land of the Fae—the one place where speaking and understanding the language might prove near indispensable—I was disturbingly unilingual.

  What does one say to a person who may or may not wish to kill you and/or your mate?

  “Stop squirming,” said Trowbridge.

  “I’m not.”

  His chin scraped my temple. “Relax. I’m the wolf. Keen eyes and nose. If anything creeps up on us, I’ll know long before it gets close.”

  A branch snapped deep in the woods.

  His arms tightened. “It’s nothing.”

  “I hate not knowing where I am.” My sense of direction had been screwed by our long detour. “Can you draw me a map? Show me where we are and where we have to go?”

  “You’re going to get yourself riled up more.”

  “Map.”

  He allowed himself a man-sigh. “Sit up.”

  I leaned forward, and he uncoiled himself with his customary grace. Trowbridge walked a few feet into the woods and came out carrying a stick. He knelt on one knee to clean the ground of pine needles and sticks. Then, my mate drew a single curved line, an artistic effort that could be interpreted as a half-moon lying on its side after a quart of tequila.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “That’s the river we’ve been following. We started about here”—he tapped the far right of the line—“and now we’re here.” The end of the stick moved along the curve all the way to the left. He filled in the interior curve of the shape with light hash marks. “All this is Fae land.”

  “Just as an FYI—if we ever have treasure to bury, I’m drawing the map. There’s no scale; there’s no north and south.”

  He etched the letter N at the top of the drawing. “Always the critic.”

  “You’d get too full of yourself if I didn’t pull you down a notch. You being so beautiful and studly and all that.”

  “‘Studly’? Is that a word?”

  “It is in my dictionary.” I jerked my chin at his map. “Keep going, Picasso.”

  Grime had embedded itself into his calloused knuckles. With a wry grin, he leaned forward and drew an x in the middle of the Fae territory. “Daniel’s Rock.”

  I scooped up one of the twigs he’d ejected from his drawing area and used it to make two smaller x’s to the left of it. “The Two Sisters.”

  “Very good.” He sketched an elongated circle.

  I stared at the oval he’d drawn. “That’s the castle? Are you telling me that we landed in Merenwyn just south of the freakin’ castle? We’ve been moving away from it all this time?”

  “Told you. It was necessary.” He frowned at his map, then scratched out his first castle effort and redrew the shape a little north of where he’d made it. “That’s better.”

  “That’s so annoying,” I said. “If the water had run a little slower, we could have crossed the river and been there hours ago. How did the Gatekeeper ford it?”

  “There’s a rope bridge to the east of where we landed.”

  “There’s a rope bridge?” I repeated slowly.

  “Better this way,” he grunted. “No one would expect us to come at the rock from this direction.”

  “You’re expecting trouble,” I said quietly.

  He used the side of his hand to erase the map. “I always expect trouble. Right now, we have to focus on getting to Daniel’s Rock. There’s a lot of hoops to jump through before we start worrying about storming the castle.”

  Storming the castle? I was thinking we’d be “sneaking” into the castle.

  He stretched, working the kinks out of his neck. “Rule of the road,” he said. “Rest when you can; hydrate when you can. I say we rest for a bit. You’re exhausted, Tink.”

  “I’m not.” My empty stomach was keeping me awake.

  “We’ll take a break. After the Fae shit moves off, I’ll find some more berries.”

  Oh, goodie.

  “Then we’ll put in a few more miles before the sun sets.” He moved back to his former position, spine braced on the back of an ancient tree, arms open, legs splayed wide for me. “Come here.”

  “I can’t nap during the day.” But I could cuddle. Yes, I could do that. I moved into the space he’d created for me. “Move, Ralph,” I told the amulet resting on my mate’s chest.

  Still miffed, Ralph didn’t. Trowbridge hooked his chain with his forefinger, then tossed Ralph over his shoulder. I leaned back, telling myself to relax. Merry settled into the space between my boobs.

  “Shhh,” Trowbridge breathed in my ear. His fingers began working into the knot between my shoulders. His scent curled around me, another set of arms, and licked away my tension.

  It was comforting.

  I’ll still never sleep.

  It was my last conscious thought before I slipped into the land of Nod.

  * * *

  Beneath my ear, his abdomen muscles suddenly tensed. “Hedi.”

  Shhhh.

  My dreamworld had never been so sweet. I was sitting in my chair in the Trowbridge kitchen about to dig into the bowl brimming with Grade A maple syrup. The room smelled of Were and happiness, for it was jam-packed with my family, all of them clustered tightly around the round oak table. Everything was right; everything was as it should be. Trowbridge held my free hand. Merry supped from a spoon of honey while Cordelia ruled court from the kitchen sink. Harry leaned against the tall cabinet, still wise and alive. Biggs was there; my affection for him was unpolluted by the knowledge of what he’d done.

  My family was complete.

  Because Lexi sat opposite me, sandwiched between Anu and Biggs; his bowler hat hung from the back of his chair’s spindled top. How long had it been since I’d seen my twin grin so freely? Look at him; he’s the guy he would have grown up to be, if the Fae hadn’t—

  “Hedi.” Trowbridge said more urgently.

  The dream shattered and with it the sense of rightness.

  I woke to the distinct flavor of danger.

  It was in my nose—Trowbridge’s scent was spiked with sour stress. And it was flaring at my breast—Merry was hotter than a potato taken straight out of the oven. I bolted upright, curling my body into a comma so she could swing free. Sweet heavens, she was so hot, I was surprised she didn’t leave a smoke trail. Not only was she telegraphing distress with her heat, but she was also broadcasting it with light. The heart of her golden amber was suffused with a dull red glow, the hue of a coal
that had been sparked to life.

  “What’s wrong?” My fingers curled on his thighs.

  “Horses,” muttered Trowbridge.

  My gut tightened into a hard knot. In Merenwyn, the Fae ride and wolves run.

  He pushed me forward. “Keep low and shadow me.”

  Merry ratcheted up her chain as we did a low sprint toward the overlook. Five feet from the edge, Trowbridge caught my arm, urging me to drop to my knees. I did and followed his belly crawl to the overhang.

  My breath whistled through my teeth as I scanned the scene below.

  For the life of me, at first it all looked the same as before—a rippling ribbon of water, two swaths of woods—but as I studied the valley the scar on my wrist began throbbing and the single tooth indent left from the bite took on a greenish tinge. The dental imprint was a lasting memento of an encounter with a cornered kid. Somehow, the boy’s magic has attached itself to the wound, and now I had a built-in sorcery sensor. I don’t know why the scar glows when I’m near a spell, or a ward, or a mage, but it’s turned into a handy warning system.

  I leaned forward, lifting myself higher on my elbows, in an effort to see better. Magic’s near.

  Trowbridge’s arm swept out, pinning me hard to the ground.

  “I told you to stay low,” he growled into my ear.

  “I need to see.”

  “There’s nothing to see yet.” But he lifted his heavy arm, letting it slide down my back to rest at my hip. He pulled me closer to his body, then parted the grasses wider so that I could peer through the hole he’d made in the line of scrub edging the overlook.

  “What direction am I looking in?” I whispered.

  “Watch the east side of the river.”

  Goddess, if we’d used the Shallow Crossing when I’d wanted to we would have walked right into a Fae hunting party. And we’d be either captured and dead or simply dead. The whole epic journey would have been over before it had really got off the ground.

  “They’re close,” murmured Trowbridge.

  Wolf ears. I could hear little over the Penance’s murmur. A bee droned by and I didn’t even blink. I kept my eyes on that strip of land, my anticipation rising. I hadn’t seen a full-blooded Fae since Lou.

  But when the Fae finally appeared, my first reaction was: So? Change out their clothing, cover up their pointy ears with a Maple Leaf toque, and you had your basic Canadian. And also, not to make too much of the point, but it was two men, not the squad that Trowbridge had anticipated.

  They emerged from the trees on the river’s bank. Both were astride totally unremarkable horses. One carried a sword; the other had a bow slung over his shoulder. The bow carrier was a tracker wearing fawn-colored leathers; his eyes were downcast, searching the ground, while the guy in the bottle blue uniform seemed to be content to be sitting pretty in his saddle.

  Just two riders, stopping by a river.

  A “meh” reaction, quickly squashed, because I was leaning the length of me against the length of Trowbridge and my body felt the abrupt change in Trowbridge’s when he shifted from battle-ready tension to statue stiffness.

  I turned my head.

  My mate’s eyes were slit, the faint lines fanning from them tense slashes. He was focused on the scene below, but I sensed he wasn’t seeing it. His face had the stark quality of a man revisiting a brutal memory.

  I touched his hand. “Trowbridge?”

  His fingers fisted. “The tracker’s name is Qae.”

  It was how Trowbridge said the name—as if it were a gutter curse—that told me what I needed to know. Somewhere, somehow, Qae had hurt my mate. I focused on the tracker, committing his features to memory. Medium height. Shorn brown hair. Wide face. Nothing overly distinctive about any of that; he could be easily missed in a crowd.

  Qae dismounted. He led his horse to water, then walked along the edge of the bank. The man was light on his feet, and he walked with calculation as if he was as much aware of his own tracks as the ones he was following. It was his tell, and I knew if ever our paths crossed I’d recognize him by his gait.

  You’re dead, I told him silently. If I meet you in a blind alley, Qae, my magic will be cinched around your throat before you can let out a surprised squawk.

  The tracker toed the ground briefly and then turned to say something to the other Fae. In response, horse-guy stood up on his stirrups and twisted to look back behind himself.

  “What’s he looking for?” I whispered.

  “Probably the rest of the company.”

  The horseman resumed his seat. And for an uncomfortable stretch that probably amounted to less than ten seconds but felt like ten hours, nothing much happened. A small brown ant followed the spine of a piece of grass, reaching the tip, then turning and going back down again. Trowbridge breathed loudly through his nose and held me too tightly. My right boob registered a squish protest. My wolf created gaseous hell in my lower gut.

  I was afraid.

  Of Trowbridge’s reaction to the tracker, of not knowing what was going to happen.

  Meanwhile, Qae and company appeared to be waiting. The cavalryman pulled out a linen-wrapped packet and proceeded to eat from the contents. Que squatted to inspect his horse’s fetlock. Just as my heart was starting to reregulate itself, the scout wheeled around sharply in our general direction, his buttock resting on his heel.

  Crap.

  “Don’t. Move,” Trowbridge breathed into my ear.

  Really, really hard not to. My body was telling me it was flight or fight time, and there was no doubt which option my feet preferred.

  The tracker’s gaze slowly swept the woods on either side of the river, before he rose to his feet to gather his horse’s reins. His focus turned to the long ridge of the gorge that Trowbridge and I had followed all afternoon.

  A methodical man, Qae started to scan from left to right. A bonus for us, as we were slightly to the right of the long, curved overlook. With acute care, Trowbridge slowly closed the peephole he’d made in the grasses, allowing them to feather back together.

  My man’s gaze flicked to mine. His eyes were flat and cold, not a flicker of Alpha light in them. “If I tell you to run, you do that, got it? You don’t look back. You head up the mountain.”

  “What do you mean, don’t look back?”

  An answer that will forever remain a mystery, for that’s when the cavalryman wearing the bottle blue jacket called out to Qae. The tracker turned around. His companion gestured to the northwest sky.

  I inhaled sharply.

  Skimming along the wood’s ragged tree line was a milky haze. It was similar to the fistful of sparkles we’d seen earlier but far larger. And unlike the earlier specter, this thing knew where it was going—it poured over the top of the woods, a low, thin, undulating blanket of fog, heading straight toward the horseman and the river.

  A cloud of ill will.

  Don’t ask me why my instincts attributed that to the rolling mist. It was actually a strangely beautiful thing. Almost alive, the color of bleached bone, rippling with movement and depth. The afternoon sun was strong and bright, and its rays caught the shimmering particles suspended inside its wavering shape, turning them pink, and purple, and plum.

  Qae observed its progress with no visible emotion—a marked contrast to his companion, who followed the glimmering miasma’s approach with the anticipation of a guy sitting in the third-base stands watching a strike turn into a fly ball.

  Gonna-get-it, gonna-get-it was written all over the cavalryman.

  My Fae was a hard knot bothering my sternum. “Elemental magic,” I heard her say quite clearly. “You must flee, sister.”

  No shit, Sherlock.

  Qae caught up his horse’s reins and threw himself up on the saddle. He tipped up his jaw to the other man, who nodded and put away his confection. In unison, they turned their mounts around and melted back into the forest from which they’d emerged.

  “They’re going?” I asked, confused.

  “N
o,” Trowbridge said, his tone hard, “they’re waiting.”

  “For the other Fae?”

  His face taut, he shook his head. His gaze flew from Qae’s hiding place to the cloud now streaming at breakneck speed toward the river. He twisted on his hip, tilting back his head. His nostrils flared as he inhaled long through his nose, and then—I swear I didn’t think it was possible—his body got harder and tighter.

  His hand slid off my hip.

  “Trowbridge?” I asked him as he started to rise to his knees.

  I think for a moment he’d forgotten I was there beside him. But at the sound of my voice he froze, his arm braced.

  His eyes turned toward mine. His face was drawn in stark lines. At that moment, I didn’t understand his expression; there was too much mileage between us for me to comprehend. I understood only the most obvious—his anger and frustration—before he shoved his feelings into lockdown.

  There were more emotions, balanced on top of each other like a shaky Jenga tower. But that is all that I understood at the time, for I was awash in my own responses. Mainly, shock and gut-wrenching disbelief as I watched the Son of Lukynae slowly sink back to his belly. He breathed out and parted the grass again.

  “Trowbridge?”

  I waited for him to turn to me. He didn’t. When I reached a tentative hand toward him, he leaned away from my touch.

  I withdrew. “Tell me what’s going down.”

  A muscle moved in his jaw; then he jerked a nod to the cloud. “It’s a fucking ambush; that’s what’s going down.”

  The thing in the sky had covered much ground in the short seconds it had taken for him to rise and sink back to his belly, and now the inherent malignancy I’d sensed on first sight of it was palpable. The haze was no longer milky; it was a dead bone gray fog, spitting sparks of purple and red. In gleeful pursuit, it frothed over the forest’s canopy, boiling around the tall spires of the firs in its haste to bring down its quarry.

  Horrible and frightening. “Why is it changing?” I asked myself.

  “Don’t know,” Trowbridge grunted. “But it’s driving them right into the Fae’s hands.”