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Chapter Three
We walked for what felt like hours, the sun sinking over the horizon and the stars glittering overhead. I’d never been this deep in the forest, and all I could see were miles of trees in every direction. Everything looked the same—a wall of green marking the boundaries of my prison.
Swerving confidently between the trees with the sinuous grace of a serpent, the monster to which I was tethered clearly knew exactly where he was going. His focus aimed at the path we trod, I stared at the wide expanse of his back, trying to obliterate him with the heat of my sizzling rage. But he continued unharmed, his long cloak fluttering in the air like the angel of death.
The fabric of my dress snagged on the brambles and branches, shredding the delicate silk into ribbons. I stumbled over my tired feet, but the Reaper never slowed his pace. I got the sense he wouldn’t hesitate to drag me across the forest floor until my skin peeled off my bones if I fell. I harbored no illusions he’d entered the Hunt because he wanted to set up a home and make me his wife.
Ahead of us, an expansive range of rocky hills loomed, their tops dusted with browning greenery. They stretched for miles in either direction, forming a barrier symbolizing the divide between the future I’d been assured and the fate that now awaited.
As we drew closer, I noted a small opening that allowed us to pass through unheeded. I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing my delicate slippers would never survive the climb.
My stomach rumbled in hunger, and my throat crackled with thirst. It had been hours since we’d left the castle. I wondered what Margaret and my mother were doing right now. Was Ellis poring through texts, searching for a way to get me out of this? My father was likely ordering every one of his advisors to get me back.
But the decree was binding. The Fae had seen to that a long time ago. My only means of escape were death or the Reaper’s release of his claim on my life. But this monster hadn’t brought down the largest stag in the forest just to let me go.
No, I was his forever, no matter his reasons.
Just when I didn’t think I could walk any farther, the trees parted, and a gentle hill rose across a small grassy plain. At the top stood a battered stone castle, looking like a single incisor left in a gaping, toothless smile.
I shook my head, unable to believe this sight, stu
Though it looked uninhabited, I understood with mounting dread, this was to be my new home.
The Reaper pulled me up the length of the well-trodden switchback to the massive wooden gate. He heaved one open with the heft of his shoulder, just enough that we could both slip inside.
Green moss grew over a small courtyard covered with cracked flagstones, many of them missing. Moonlight glinted off the smoothed, worn surfaces, and I could taste the eternal silence permeating the walls.
More moss muffled my footsteps as we crossed the space and entered another door at the far end. Pulling me inside a small room, The Reaper locked the entrance behind me. The only illumination came from a few small windows set high in the walls.
I surveyed the area, my eyes adjusting to the gloom. There was a beaten wooden table in the center, surrounded by three equally beaten chairs. Beyond that was a huge fireplace lining the wall, the hearth burning low. In the corner was a countertop and several cupboards that served as a kitchen, and in another corner was a large, neatly made bed.
As my gaze traveled across every angle, what I saw on the opposite wall made my blood run cold.
A cage.
The Reaper tugged on my rope, pulling me toward it, and I yanked my hands back. “I’m not going in there!” I shouted, digging my heels into the stone floor. My delicate slippers offered no grip, and I slid like I was being dragged over warmed butter. I fought with every ounce of strength I could, but he didn’t even seem to be trying.
“Please! I won’t run. I promise.” He pulled the rope so hard that I tripped and crashed into him. He was all muscle, as hard and unforgiving as iron. Before I landed on the ground, a large, gloved hand grabbed my upper arm and hauled me up to a standing position. “I’ll stay put,” I said again, and the Reaper let out a derisive snort that suggested he wasn’t about to buy that.
With his enormous hand still wrapped around my arm, he shoved me through the door of the cage. My skirts tangling, I crashed into the far wall, my bound hands scraping the stone and my cheek grazing the surface. I winced at the sting when it broke my skin.
The cage door slammed with a metallic clang and then a click signaled the last remnants of my freedom, of my future, vaporizing into mist.
Wrapping my fingers around the bars, I shook them. “Let me out!” I shouted as loud as I could, but I might as well have been talking to a wall for all the attention the Reaper paid me.
After screaming for a minute, to no avail, I fell silent, deciding it was pointless. Instead, I watched the Reaper as he moved around the room, that hideous skull mask swinging from side to side.
Though he had an entire castle at his disposal, it seemed he’d confined his life to only this room. He stoked the fire, the glow of orange flames offering more light and warming my numb fingers and toes.
Not taking my eyes off him, I watched as he pulled off his cloak and hung it on the wall. He then removed the thick overcoat underneath, revealing a black tunic. He appeared to be shaped like a human, his broad shoulders tapering to a narrow waist and thick, muscular thighs.
With his back facing me, he unbuckled the mask he wore, and I held my breath, prepared for the very worst. What horrors lurked beneath the mask of a creature known as the Reaper? After pulling it off, he shook out a head of wavy black hair that fell past his shoulders.
Curious, I stepped closer to my bars, watching while he removed his gloves and unbelted his weapons, dropping them all into a chest at the foot of his bed, which he then locked, stuffing the key in his pocket.
Then he stopped and stood stock still, as if feeling my eyes boring into him. He whipped around and I leapt back, again crashing into the wall behind me.
He was...normal? Almost normal, anyway, but for the line of dark markings that ran down the side of his face and throat and disappeared into his collar.
He smirked, apparently enjoying my distress, before he turned away and headed to the kitchen, where he opened the cupboards, retrieving plates, a loaf of bread, a hunk of cheese and thick slices of roasted beef. He deposited them on the table and then went to retrieve a pitcher of water, pouring two glasses.
It was then I noticed it.
He appeared normal, yes, but also not quite of this world. His skin bore a sheen, a near iridescence, his ears sweeping into delicate points. The way he moved like water flowing over river-worn stones marked him as anything but human.
“You’re Fae,” I whispered. “You’re one of them.” He looked over, the crescents of his dark eyes reflecting in the flickering fire, and grunted. “I don’t understand. Why do you live out here?”
Ignoring my question, he continued his chores. While he worked, I examined my cage, noting the bare stone floor, absent of even a stool to sit on.
“You’re going to keep me here like an animal?” I asked, my fury cresting. “Why do you have a cage in your home? The Reaper is a filthy Fae?” I spat the last word out with as much venom as I could muster, which finally secured his attention.
“Watch your mouth, Princess.” His voice, no longer muffled by the mask, was still deep and rough, but less guttural.
“I will not! Why do you have a cage here? Who else have you locked up? Where are they?”
He stopped what he was doing and pi
I hesitated. Did I?
“Don’t worry, they weren’t all human,” he said before he turned his back to me again. The proof of his statement was obvious from the state of the floor. It was filthy in here.
“You’re really going to leave me in here like this? This is disgusting.” Tossing me a smirk, he pulled out a chair and sat down, pulling a plate of food toward him. “You won’t be in there long.”
While those words sounded promising on the surface, I knew not to trust them.
“Who are you?” I asked. “Why do they call you the Reaper?” The answer to that question wasn’t one I was sure I wanted either, but I was here now and information might be the only weapon I had.
He shook his head, his lip curling in the corner. “I’m not the Reaper,” he said, biting into a chunk of cheese. “The thing you humans call the Reaper is actually an ogre and lives somewhere deep in the woods.”
I blinked. There were two monsters haunting the forest?
“Why does everyone call it the Reaper, then?”
The Fae-who-wasn’t-the-Reaper arched a dark eyebrow. “Obviously, because it kills everything it sees. Not very clever, are you, Princess?”
I narrowed my gaze as he tore into a piece of bread and chewed slowly, savoring it along with the bitter tang of my distress.
“If you’re not the Reaper, what do you want with me?” Another question and another answer I probably wouldn’t like hung in the air like a rancid phantom.
“You’re going to help me catch it,” he said, casually taking a sip of water. My gaze followed the bob of his throat as he swallowed, and I licked my dry lips. His eyes darkening, he stared at me, his words collaring me around the throat with dread.
“How am I supposed to help you catch it?”
A grin stretched across his face. It marked him as something wild and feral, not entirely of this world. Something that refused to be tamed, no matter the shape of the whip.
“You’re the bait, Princess.