Hunted(35)

And then, Perhaps I can run. . . .

He’d promised that he could disguise his presence from the animals whose senses were so much sharper than Yeva’s, and it was true that the only creatures startled from burrow and den were driven out by Yeva’s steps, not some unseen predator’s. But did that mean he was telling the truth? Or did it mean that he was no longer following her?

There is something out there, her father had whispered, as he stared mad-eyed and wild at the fire in the hearth. Something cunning. Tracking me.

Yeva, alone in the forest, shivered because she knew she wasn’t alone.

Despite the hairs lifting on the back of her neck, her heart seemed to lift too, surrounded by the world she knew, the world she loved. Though she was still a captive, for these few hours she was free, and freer than she’d ever been on her hunting forays from her father’s cabin. Something about this world, the Beast’s valley, made her life at home seem like a far-distant memory. Her steps came easier, and the ache in her ribs seemed to ease as she breathed the fresh winter air. The tiniest tendril of a feeling flickered in her heart, licking out like flames to warm her freezing toes and aching fingers. She felt . . . at home.

She came across the fresh tracks of a solitary deer almost by accident, her thoughts preoccupied. She had rarely hunted deer on her own before—her bow was not heavy enough to consistently puncture a deer’s thicker hide. But her father’s bow was. She pointed her boots in the direction of the deer’s tracks and set off.

Without knowing when the last snow had fallen, or whether there had been recent wind to disturb the top layer of snowfall, it was impossible to know how long ago the deer had passed this way. It could have been an hour, or days. But she had no other choice than to follow where the tracks led, and hope it would bring her some success. By whatever measure the Beast was using.

She’d been following the trail for an hour or two when a sound, distinct from the background tapestry of noises she’d cataloged, interrupted her. She paused midstep, one hand reaching for the bow over her shoulder, and listened.

Something was coming toward her, and coming fast. Too large for fox or rabbit, but too small for bear or boar. The cracking, crashing noise of underbrush told of a creature with great, leaping strides, and as the seconds stretched, she heard labored breath coming in great renting gasps.

A wolf?

Yeva grabbed for the bow, pulling it off her shoulder and nocking an arrow to the string in a second. She braced herself, facing the sound of the oncoming animal, eyes searching the frozen wood.

There. A torrent of motion, a furrow of flying snow and twigs. She caught a brief flash of fur amid the underbrush, not the shaggy gray she’d expected, but a pale gold. A wheezy yelp split the air, and Yeva froze, confusion washing through where certainty and had been moments before. That’s no wolf, that’s . . .

The creature burst out of the bushes and flung itself at Yeva, knocking her backward into the snow. All was fur and yelps and whines and a tongue bathing her face, and freezing-cold paw pads stabbing at her gut, her thighs, a tail beating at her knees, her face, as the creature turned and turned and barked and panted hot breath on her skin.

“Doe-Eyes!” Yeva cried, her voice tearing, grief and love and relief and fear tangling in her throat. How long must her dog have been searching for her? And in the kind of snow and cold she was not bred to withstand. “Oh, Doe-Eyes—you bad dog, you wonderful, terrible thing—”

Then Doe-Eyes stomped on her chest in her enthusiasm to get as close to her mistress as possible, and Yeva’s ribs, still only partially healed, seared white-hot. Yeva let out a shriek of pain before she could stop herself.

And then the Beast was there.

He came from nowhere, snarling rage and fury, fangs bared and fur bristling with readiness. He leaped toward Yeva, turning her yelp of pain to a scream of genuine terror, and she pulled herself in tightly to shield herself from the blow she knew was coming—

And then she opened her eyes to find the Beast standing over her, growling and shaking himself, staring down Doe-Eyes, who was now only a pace or two from her, all four legs planted in the snow, her own teeth bared.

She felt the Beast gathering himself to attack, felt it like she could feel her own intentions, and she threw herself forward, grabbing for his shoulder, too suddenly fearful to realize it was the first time she’d touched him since the blindfold fell away and she saw who—what—he was. Too fearful to process what she’d seen—that he was protecting her.

“No!” she cried, and felt his muscles bunch and halt under her hand. “No! She’s my friend—don’t—”

The Beast paused, the lupine head turning so he could fix his eyes on Yeva once more. The pupils, dilated with the rush of the hunt, suddenly contracted in the snowy glare as the fight left his gaze.

“I—” he said, and then Doe-Eyes leaped.

She was a fraction of his size, and built for speed, not for fight—her long slender limbs let her vault as high as his shoulder, her teeth sinking into the flesh there and gripping. Her eyes were frantic, wild, full of fury toward the Beast she thought was attacking her mistress.

The Beast gave a little roar, no more than a sluggish ripple of annoyance, and gave his great body a shake that dislodged the dog and sent her flying. Yeva’s heart shriveled, then snapped as Doe-Eyes collided with a tree and dropped into a heap in the snow, unmoving.