The smile slid from Caldris’s face, a look of irritation crossing over it briefly before his jaw clenched. “Fuck,” he grunted, tearing his arm free from my hand. The first of the wolves leaped and struck him in the chest the next moment, knocking him back a step as he caught the massive creature. Its hind legs dropped to the ground, the front paws bracing against Caldris’s shoulders as he stared at the wolf that was nearly as tall as him. “Don’t you fucking do it—” The wolf yipped happily, licking a long line up the side of Caldris’s face and making a shocked gasp break free from me.
The second of the wolves collided with the back of the first, knocking both the wolf and Caldris to the ground. It scrambled to its feet, prancing happily as the two of them nudged Caldris with their noses and nipped at his hands when he tried to swat them away.
I was so busy watching their interaction that I never saw the third wolf coming for me, the force of its body striking into my chest knocking me off my feet entirely. I landed hard, my back thudding against the dirt behind me and stealing the breath from my lungs. “Fenrir!” Caldris shouted, but I was trapped by the enormous creature crawling over me. He prowled forward until his snout lingered over my face, one enormous paw on either side of my head. The wolf’s head tilted in an animalistic way that was so like the God of the Dead it was almost painful, his eyes considering me.
I swallowed back my nerves, meeting his stare. He seemed to find me lacking, and to see all the weaknesses that I knew lingered just beneath my surface. I dug my fingers into the soil beneath me as I pushed myself up to get closer to the wolf’s nose and the teeth that he bared at me when I moved. “I don’t relish the idea of hurting you,” I said, staring into his garnet eyes. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t if you don’t get off of me this instant.”
He huffed a breath, that red stare twinkling for a moment before his nose twitched, then the wolf smelled me, tipping his face toward my neck as I grabbed a fistful of the dirt beneath me and readied myself for a fight that I stood no chance of surviving. His wet nose touched the side of my neck, drawing a shudder from me as it connected with the swirling lines of my Fae Mark.
Just when I thought I was a breath away from having his mouth wrapped around my throat, the wolf licked a long trail up the side of my neck and cheek. His expression wasn’t as enthusiastic as his companions’ had been when they’d greeted Caldris, but there was a grudging acceptance to his stare when he finally stepped back.
Caldris had risen to his feet, glaring down at the wolf who’d knocked me over. The others sat by his side, their ears pointed up as they watched me clamber to my feet. “You do not assault my mate. You protect her,” he said as Fenrir approached him. He was the biggest of the three, his head level with Caldris’s stomach.
The other two stood, making their way to me and sniffing at the hands that I kept perfectly still at my sides. My fingers twitched despite my best intentions when one of them pressed his wet nose against my skin, using his head to guide my hand up on top of it. I scratched the fur there, watching as he rolled his neck in satisfaction like any of the stray dogs I’d seen in Mistfell.
“They have been completely insufferable,” the leader of the Wild Hunt said, steering his skeletal horse closer. He stopped just in front of me, but his eyes remained pinned on Caldris at my side. “The next time you think to leave them with me—don’t,” he warned, dismounting with a grace that defied logic.
Where all the other spirits floated awkwardly, appearing lost, this man was a person in all ways.
Except he wasn’t.
His ears were lightly pointed at the tips where his darkly shadowed hair was pulled back from his face, falling into the fur-lined hood of his cloak. Those white eyes were eerie as he shifted his attention from Caldris, pinning me with a look that felt so similar to that day in the woods.
So many questions danced in my head, so many thoughts about that night or the one that followed when he and Caldris had fought on the cliff.
His fur-lined cloak was open at the front, straps of leather criss-crossing over his breast to connect the two sides. His skin beneath it was bare in spite of the cold weather, a swirling tattoo of pale blue ink dipping over his chest and coming to a low point at the start of the definition of his abdomen.
Caelum growled behind me, the low rumble of sound making me jolt in place as I spun to meet him with wide eyes. “Look at him a little longer, my star. I dare you.”
The urge to defend my curiosity rose within me, my cheeks heating with embarrassment. The leader of the Wild Hunt chuckled, his full lips tipping up on one side in a completely arrogant expression. “I won’t complain, Beasty,” he said, the reminder of the name filling my veins with ice. “Anything that gets this one all riled up is a bonus in my book.”
I glanced over his shoulder, my eyes skimming past the feathers woven into the strands of his black hair. The shadowy, slightly transparent riders of the Wild Hunt sat astride their horses, faces completely disinterested. I looked among them, carefully searching until my gaze landed on the one I wouldn’t ever be able to erase from my nightmares. His face was committed to my memory, angular with incredibly high cheekbones.
His lips were thin, his nose slightly arched through the bridge until it came to a point at the end. His dark hair was long, hanging loosely around his shoulders except for the pieces he’d pulled back from his face and pinned to the back of his head with two bones. His gray stare met mine, a glare I didn’t deserve in his eyes as his nostrils flared. The look of annoyance was fleeting, his attention turning away from me as quickly as it had settled, deeming me unimportant, dismissing me as if I wasn’t worth his time.
He’d killed my brother, taken the last of my family from me for no reason other than his own vicious crusade against the humans.
I darted forward, stepping through the gap between the wolves who were determined to sniff every part of my body. Wrapping shaking fingers around the dagger on the leader of the Wild Hunt’s belt as I passed, I pulled the blade free from the sheath and raced toward the male who deserved death more than any of the others.
They’d all meet their fate if I had my way, but I owed one a debt that could only be repaid in blood.
“Estrella, no!” Caldris yelled, something in his voice sinking inside of me. It reminded me of the times when I’d fled the danger threatening us, when I’d sworn to stand by his side only to do the opposite in the end. I brushed it off, shaking my head as I reached the skeletal horse of the rider I would kill. His steed reared back as I grabbed him by the cloak hanging at his side, putting all my weight into the pull as I tore him down to the ground. He stumbled off the side, falling to the ground in a disgruntled heap before he vaulted to his feet.
“You’re going to be a pain in my ass. I can feel it,” he said, brushing the dust off of his clothes. “Of all the blades, you just had to steal Dainsleif? Ignorant girl.”
I swung for his middle, dismayed when he jerked back suddenly in surprise. I didn’t know why it would shock him that I’d try to disembowel him. The last time we’d met I’d stabbed him with his own dagger. “I don’t know what that means, and I don’t fucking care,” I said, spinning the dagger in my grip.