Red Hood's Revenge

and unafraid. “How long have you been this way?”
    They stared. For a moment, Danielle feared the Wild Hunt, like everyone else in this country, simply didn’t understand her language.
    “How long since you were truly alive and free?” she asked. She could make rats understand her. Surely she could do the same with the Wild Hunt. “How long?”
    The hunter’s bald scalp wrinkled ever so slightly. “We’ve no memories of our lives before.”
    Danielle smiled. Despite everything, she found herself ridiculously pleased to hear her own tongue. The Wild Hunt knew no boundaries, and from what Snow said, they were in many ways a single creature. If one of their number spoke a language, they would all know it.
    She could feel Snow pressing closer, her back to Danielle’s as the rest of the Hunt moved inward. Their glow had faded with the rising sun, but Danielle could still see the moonlight shining from his skin.
    “Zestan promised you freedom,” Danielle guessed. “That’s how she controls you. Night has passed, but you remain.”
    “She has given us the freedom of the moon,” the hunter said. “To carry its light. Soon we will once again ride when and where we choose.”
    “Where you choose?” Danielle repeated. “You ride where Zestan sends you, doing her bidding. Instead of being bound to the darkness, you would be slaves to a fairy master, hunting her prey.”
    He lowered his bow. “You offer us a better bargain? You wouldn’t be the first to beg for your lives.”
    “Not to beg. To give you a choice.” Danielle stepped closer, trying to reach past the fairy curse and speak to whatever trace of mortality remained. “You weren’t always like this. You used to be free to roam the world. Wild and unfettered, serving no one. Now you run and fight and die at Zestan’s whim.”
    “If you get the chance, ask where they came from,” Snow said eagerly. “Scholars have spent centuries trying to trace the origin of the Wild Hunt, but nobody knows for certain. If you could learn which country they—”
    Danielle glared, and she fell silent. “You wear the shapes you had in life. Some part of you remembers that life.”
    “Those days are past.” The huntsman nocked an arrow, each movement slow and deliberate. “The man I used to be is long forgotten from this world. All that remains is the consequence of his foolish pride.”
    “That’s not true,” Danielle said. “The pride also remains. I see it when I look into your eyes. You could regain that pride again. Run free, answering to neither man nor fairy. Tall and free and proud.”
    “You have courage, though your words cannot change what we are,” the hunter said. “Perhaps Zestan will allow you to join us.”
    Danielle blinked. “I’m sorry, but what makes you think I was talking to you?”
    The hunter hesitated, confusion crinkling his brow.
    Remember and be free! Danielle stepped forward, reaching toward the horse and silently urging with all of her strength. Go!
    The horse turned and leaped away, nearly spilling the rider. Horse and hunter alike vanished into flaming shadow. The rest of the Hunt followed, disappearing into the moonlight.
    Snow whistled. “Zestan is going to be so mad at you.”
    Danielle wiped her palms on her clothes. Her heart drummed in her chest. “Is the Wild Hunt known for holding grudges?”
    “I’ll strengthen the wards when we get home,” Snow promised.
    “We still have to get past the ghosts.”
    Snow was shaking her head. “They’re gone too.”
    “How?” Danielle spun.
    Snow pointed toward the walls. “I’m not sure. I can feel a handful scattered throughout the palace, but I think Zestan sent the rest into the desert. She might have noticed our reinforcements gathering.”
    In which case everyone Muhazil and Lakhim sent to help would be riding into an ambush. Danielle grabbed Snow’s hand and pulled her through the garden.
     
    Roudette was dying.
    If not for the magic of her cape, she might have already succumbed, but there were limits even to the cape’s strength. Blood stuck her shirt to her skin. The arrow in her side scraped her ribs with every breath. The sounds of her body filled her ears: the pounding of her blood, the gritted gasps, the muffled cries of pain. Zestan and Naghesh were distant presences, their voices rising and falling like the waves of the ocean.
    This whole place stank of death and fairies. Roudette could smell them all. Zestan’s ghost slaves. The Wild Hunt,