Betrayals (Cainsville Book 4) (27 page)

He smiled and slid off the bike, and we walked into the woods, hand in hand, like Hansel and Gretel. When I mentioned that to Ricky, he said, “You think there’ll be candy?”

I took out my boar’s tusk. When I touched it, I thought I’d accidentally grabbed my gun instead. The tusk was as cold as metal. I held it out for Ricky to touch and he said, “Weird.” Then he checked his own and confirmed it was the same. “So that’s a sign they’re working
extra
well, right?” he said.

We shared a smile. In our guts, we both knew it meant the opposite. Our handy-dandy fae-evil-repelling boar tusks had shut down, as if their power couldn’t penetrate these woods.

At a loud croak, I looked over my shoulder and saw the raven launch from the tree and fly back toward the road.

“Abandoning us already, huh,” I murmured. “If the mortals are too stupid to heed flashing danger signs, screw them.”

I turned toward the forest. It was unnaturally dark, the moonlight seeming not to penetrate the tree canopy. When I looked up, I could see gaps in that canopy, but not a single star glinted in the blackness beyond.

“Second thoughts?” Ricky asked.

“Never.”

The woods were larger than they seemed from the road, and we walked at least a mile, Ricky moving sure-footed and straight, his gaze fixed on something only he could see. Then I caught the sound from my vision—the whine of the hound. Not boredom and frustration now, but anticipation. Ricky’s hand squeezed mine.

“Before we get there,” I murmured, “what exactly do we expect to find in that cabin?”

“Presumably his master.”

“So do we split up? You take the front and I slip around the back?”

“I’d
really
rather not split up here, even for a second.”

“Okay, so we stick—”

I stumbled. I didn’t feel any obstacle or dip in my path. I just stumbled. Ricky’s hand tightened, his grip pulling me up. Then his hand disappeared and I staggered forward and when I caught my balance and turned …

I was alone in the forest.

“L
iv?”
Ricky spun around, but even as he did, he knew he wouldn’t see her.

“Liv!” he shouted again. Yeah, that wasn’t smart, yelling so close to his quarry’s den, but what mattered was that she was gone and this forest was wrong, unnatural and wrong, and he’d brought her in here. Fuck the signs. Fuck the omens. Fuck the fact that the raven wouldn’t cross the threshold and their damned tusks were cold weights in their pockets. They had their weapons, and they had each other, and that was enough.

It’s never enough. It never was.

Ricky squeezed his eyes shut as if he could block Arawn’s voice.

You did this. So cocky. So confident. You dragged her into this place knowing—feeling—the danger.

Which was bullshit, of course. No one
dragged
Liv anywhere. But that didn’t mean Ricky failed to accept responsibility. He would never be Arawn, blaming Gwynn for centuries until he’d finally faced the truth—that he’d been equally responsible for Matilda’s death.

Ricky had sensed the danger here, and they came in anyway. He hadn’t told her exactly how this forest made him feel. Had
not been clear enough, and that was where his failure lay: in believing he could simply hold her hand and keep her safe.

“God-fucking-damn it,” he cursed. Then he yelled again, “O-liv-i-a!”

“Lose someone?” a voice whispered through the trees, and Ricky’s hackles rose.

He didn’t need to see the figure to know it was a Huntsman. And yet not a Huntsman, no more than this forest was truly a forest or the hound truly a hound. The hound and the forest were tainted, warped, by no fault of their own. The taint came from the voice that oozed through the trees like an oil slick, black and unnatural, corrupting everything it touched.

“Show yourself,” Ricky called, and the voice laughed.

“Arawn, I presume? Yet another pretender to the throne. And such a child, too. A swaggering, grinning child, clutching his switchblade and telling himself he’s a man. Telling himself he’s Lord of the Cŵn Annwn.”

“Pretty damned sure I never claimed any such thing. But I did come on behalf of the Cŵn Annwn. To take back something you stole.”

“Your girl?”

Ricky snorted. “Hardly.”

“Oh ho, so the girl doesn’t matter? Perhaps you are the true Arawn after all—finally man enough to stop playing silly romantic games, chasing a girl he’ll never have.”

“You have something of ours. A hound.”

“Yours? No, the hound is mine. A broken and useless beast that I found and saved. But let’s test exactly how little you care for your Matilda. You may choose which I return: her or the hound.”

“You misunderstood. When I laughed, it wasn’t because I don’t care for Liv. It’s because you didn’t steal her. If you’d managed that, you wouldn’t have time to come mock me—she’s
a bit of a handful. Something has separated us, but you have nothing to do with it, and as much as I’d love to tromp through this forest, shouting, I won’t find her until it’s time. I trust she can look after herself until I do.”

“Are you certain?” The voice slid around him now. “Very certain?”

“Yep. Sorry. And the weird-ass spooky-voice thing really isn’t going to work. Why don’t you just come out where I can see you and talk?”

“I have nothing to say to you, little Arawn.”

“Then you won’t mind if go collect my hound.”

A shadow cut in front of him as he turned, formless, the very trees seeming to shift and slide as it moved.

“It is not
your
hound, boy.”

“Wanna bet? Bring it here and we’ll see who it chooses.”

A laugh resounded through the trees. “You
are
an arrogant child, aren’t you?”

“Confident, not arrogant. There’s a difference.”

“Ricky!” It was Liv, deep in the forest. He turned to track the sound.

“Your borrowed lover calls,” the voice said.

“Liv!” he shouted.

“You say you are not concerned, but that bellow gives you away. Does she wander from you often, boy? I bet she does. Wanders from your side to his, comes back when she wants something from you.”

“Yep, she comes back when she wants to be
with
me. Which is all that matters. Now, if you’ll excuse me …”

He turned in the direction he’d heard Liv, because as brash and bold as he might act, the man was right—he was more concerned than he let on. He could hear the hound whining, but
it had waited all this time, and it would understand if it had to wait a little longer.

He broke into a jog, yelling for Liv as the voice chuckled behind him.

“Ricky!” she called.

“Here! Coming!”

“Damn it,” she said, her voice carrying in the night. “We’ve really got to figure out how to stop separating like this.”

“Agreed.”

“You know what we need more of?”

“Bike sex?”

She laughed, and he knew that wasn’t some random snippet of conversation shouted across a forest—she was making sure it was really him.

“Run, little Arawn,” the voice whispered. “Run after her while you still can.”

Ricky shot his middle finger over his shoulder and picked up his pace. A shape leapt in front of him, darkness against darkness, pulsing there. He veered, as if it was no more than a stump in his path, but when the shadow dove for him, he was ready, blade slashing. He could still see nothing, but the knife met resistance and there was a sharp intake of breath.

“Guess my puny weapon can do some damage after all, huh? Even if you don’t have the guts to uncloak yourself.”

Ricky saw the blow coming. No fist. Not even a shape. Just darkness flying at him, but he’d been in enough fights to recognize the sense of movement alone, and he wheeled out of its path, shouting, “Liv? Be careful! I’ve found our rogue Huntsman.”

“Kinda figured that’s who you were talking to,” she yelled back. “You two keep exchanging semi-witty banter and I’ll have no problem finding you.”

“I
think he’d rather exchange semi-useless blows.”

The next one came from his right, and Ricky wasn’t quite fast enough to duck. That was, of course, the danger of being a smartass. You can enrage an opponent into wild blows, but one of those blows is bound to hit. This one struck him in the jaw and—

Holy fuck.

He’d say it felt like a sledgehammer, but there was no pain, just … explosion, and then—

Terror. Overwhelming terror, like something had reached into his brain and released every nightmare, the shock of that doubling him over, breath stopping, heart stopping, everything stopping, that blackness swallowing him and—

God-fucking-damn it, no. Just no. Get a fucking grip.

He gave himself a mental smack upside the head. He would not go down. He would not let this bastard put him down. He was better than that. Stronger than that.

He was Arawn.

Or at least he could fake it long enough to smack himself back into shape.

“You find this funny, boy?”

Ricky realized he was laughing. Doubled over, barely able to breathe, but wasting what little breath he did have laughing at himself. Because sometimes, that’s all you could do. You make a fucking stupid mistake, and you could only call yourself an idiot and then snap back before you screwed up again.

He heard Liv in the forest, trying to sneak toward them, and when he looked, the rogue Huntsman’s shadow had taken shape. Still black as night, no features to be seen, but the form of a cloaked man turning in Liv’s direction.

Ricky ran at the figure. He jumped at its back and hit solid flesh and thought
Yes!
and then his hands started to pass through it,
to pass into absolute cold, that ice running up his arms, pitch black enveloping his arms—

Running.

He was running so fast every breath was a dagger through his lungs, but the terror—that crushing terror—kept his legs moving as pain ripped through them, ripped through his entire body.

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned …

Prayers raced through his head, the words expelled on each exhalation, words Ricky didn’t know, prayers he didn’t know. Another man’s prayers, coming in desperation, a ward against a fear for which there was no ward, a hope against a fate for which there was no hope.

A vision? A memory?
Someone’s
memory. Not the Huntsman’s, but from him, a straight shot of terror, sending Ricky tumbling into some stranger’s body, in some long-ago place. He tried to hold on to that, tell himself this wasn’t real, but all he could think, all he could feel, was whatever this poor man was thinking, feeling …

The hounds, dear Lord, the hounds, he could hear their baying growing ever more distant, and in the beginning that had given him hope, until he’d discovered that the farther away they sounded, the closer they actually were, and when he glanced over his shoulder—

Do not look! Do not look!

He looked anyway, and he saw fire. The fires of hell on his tail, giant hounds whose eyes blazed, giant black steeds who breathed flames, whose fetlocks and manes burned with it. And the riders. He could see the riders now. Faceless cloaked men with red eyes. Eyes that burned hellfire and promised damnation.

No more than I deserve.

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.

Hail Mary, full of grace.

No grace, no blessing, no escape, no mercy for him, because he’d shown none. Shown none to those women he’d taken and toyed with, and this was the price, yes, this was the price.

No one told me it was the price!

The world had lied. It told him that if he was caught, the most he’d suffer was a lifetime in prison, and with it would come fame, glorious fame, his face in every newspaper.

But there was no fame. No face on a newspaper. No name in a headline. He would die, his deeds unnoticed, his body torn apart in the forest, corpse left to rot and feed wild creatures and hungry earth, because this is what she’d promised him. The last woman. The one whose skin had shimmered when he’d sliced her open. The one who’d spouted madness when he captured her, who’d promised him this ignoble end.

The hounds will come. The Huntsmen will come. You will burn.

No more than he deserved, and he knew it now, as he ran.

Is that not enough? That I know it? I confess. I confess!

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.

Hail Mary, full of grace.

Isn’t that how it worked? Confess and ye shall be saved. Repent and ye shall be forgiven.

He heard the woman’s tinkling laughter as he ran. She’d laughed as he’d sliced into her, promised that no matter what he did to her, his death would be a thousand times worse.

He stumbled then. Felt his foot slide out. Felt his brain scream,
No!
Heard it rip from his lungs.
No! I repent! I repent!
and the woman’s laughter rang out like a trumpet at his ear.

The trumpet of the archangel, on the Day of Judgment, calling him home to heaven.

“Oh, no,” her voice whispered in his ear. “This
is
Judgment Day, but heaven is not where you’re going, Michael O’Grady.” He felt the body strike his. A massive furred body, knocking him off his feet, onto his back, and then he saw it, the hound, the giant hound, its eyes blazing fire, jaws opening, fangs slashing down—

Ricky Gallagher. I’m Ricky Gallagher!

Through the wild and swirling vision, Ricky found himself and shouted the words in his head, and he snapped back so fast he felt himself hit the ground, flat on his back, the
oomph
of the blow exhaled on a single breath.

He blinked hard, pulling back the scattered piece of his psyche, forcing the last remnants of the vision away and—

He felt something moving over him. Something on his chest. He tried to jerk upright, but it shoved him back down and all he could see above him was darkness and then …

Eyes. Blazing red eyes. A massive paw on his chest. A huge shadowy head taking form above his. The head of a hound.

No, damn it. I’m Ricky Gallagher. I’m—