Page 13 of Vicious Kings
Run.
I'm on my feet before I fully process the decision, stumbling through the forest on legs that barely work. Behind me, whatever was stalking me gives chase. I can hear it now, matching my pace, herding me like a sheep dog with a wayward lamb.
This is what prey feels like, I realize. Strange to be on the other side of the equation.
The thought should terrify me, but all I feel is rage. A lifetime of being the wolf, and now I know what it is to be the rabbit. The knowledge that something faster, stronger, more dangerous is coming for you. The certainty that you can't escape but trying anyway because what else can you do except run into its jaws?
I dodge between trees, leap over fallen logs, crash through undergrowth that tears at my clothes and skin. My pursuer keeps pace easily, close enough that I feel its presence but never quite see it. Playing with me. Enjoying the chase.
I, at least, am a pragmatic predator. I savor the hunt, but I don't drag it out. I don't toy with my prey. A hunter is still a human, once you strip away the resonance and the armor and the years of training. Still too vulnerable to indulge such petty luxuries.
The Fae have no such qualms. Neither does anything else that might be lurking in these woods.
A howl splits the air, so close it seems to come from inside my own chest. Wolf, but not any wolf I've ever heard. This sound resonates in my bones, vibrates through my soul like a tuning fork struck against my heart.
My body responds without my permission, stumbling to a stop as every muscle goes liquid. The heat flares so intensely I actually cry out, dropping to my knees as my legs refuse to hold me.
"No, no, no." I force myself back up, but my body moves like I'm underwater.
Voices carry through the trees. Male voices, calm and assured.
"Circle around to the north. Cut off her escape route."
"Carefully. You saw what happened to the last group that mishandled an omega."
"She's in heat. First one by the scent of it. She won't get far."
A third voice, gentle in a way that makes my skin crawl because it sounds almost familiar, the same way the fox's eyes looked familiar, even though I know that's impossible.
"If any of you hurt her, I'll personally remove every digit from your limbs and every limb from your body, in that order, saving the head for last. Understood?"
Murmured agreement. They know what I am. Of course they do. I probably smell like a fucking beacon to every supernatural in a five-mile radius. Just like the Shepherd said.
I push through a curtain of hanging vines and see it. A cave mouth yawning in the side of the mountain. Too unobtrusive and plain to be the portal I was looking for, but shelter. Somewhere defensible. Somewhere I can make a stand with my pathetic knife and whatever dregs of training I can access through the heat-fog in my brain.
I run for it, hearing shouts behind me as they realize where I'm headed. My feet hit stone as I plunge into the darkness, and too late I see the circle carved into the cave floor. Symbols that hurt to look at, thrumming with power that makes the magic by the stream feel like a candle compared to a bonfire.
A Fae circle. A fucking Fae circle, and I've just thrown myself into it like a lamb to the slaughter.
Blue light erupts around me, so bright it burns through my closed eyelids. It wraps around me like tentacles, pulling me down, down, down into something that isn't quite here but isn't quite there either.
The last thing I hear before the light swallows me whole is that familiar voice cursing in a language I don't understand, a language that tickles my brain in ways both wrong and ecstatic, but I somehow understand means trouble.
For them or for me, I don't know.
Five
BILLIE
The first thing I notice is warmth. Soft and safe, like being wrapped in clouds made of butter and sunshine.
This must be death.
My eyelids feel like they've been glued shut with industrial-strength adhesive, but I manage to crack them open just enough to see...
White.
Everything is white. A white ceiling with intricate molding. White walls that seem to glow with their own inner light. White sheets that feel like they were woven from the finest threads.
