Shadows and Light

possible that enough of them were created that they’ve formed more than one nest?”
    Shivering at the thought, Morag shook her head. “I don’t know.”
    “We’re going to have to find out. Let’s get back to the Clan house and warn—”
    A flutter of wings made Ashk whip around. Before she finished turning, her bow was drawn back, the arrow ready to fly.
    The raven that had just perched on a tree branch let out a startled caw.
    Ashk lowered the bow and carefully eased the tension on the bowstring. “Report.”
    The raven fluttered to the ground and changed to a flustered adolescent girl. “I thought you should know that Evan and Caitlin went out riding. Evan said there were a couple of things he wanted to get from the manor house, and Caitlin said she needed some things, too.”
    Temper blazed in Ashk’s eyes. “I didn’t give them permission to go out riding, let alone ride to the manor house.”
    “That’s what we told them, but they were mounted and ready to ride out before any of us noticed that they hadn’t just gone into the stables to groom their horses. We told them not to go, but Evan insisted that they couldn’t come to any harm since it was daylight and you’d defeated the Black Coats.”
    Ashk bared her teeth and snarled.
    The sound, coming from a human throat, startled Morag enough to stop thinking. In that moment, when her mind was blank and open, she heard Death’s whisper.
    “Owen went with them. They said they didn’t need an escort, but he rode out with them anyway.”
    Morag pictured the young Fae male. Death crooned a warning.
    “We have to go,” she said, pushing past Ashk to reach the place on the trail where her dark horse waited for her. “We have to find them.”
    They’d left the horses at a place where a game trail crossed the forest trail the Fae rode. Had left them there because the horses had picked up the scent of death even before Ashk, with her keen sense of smell, had.
    Now Morag flung herself into the saddle, hearing Ashk, behind her, telling the girl to warn the Clan that signs of the nighthunters had been found. The dark horse turned on his own and trotted up the game trail, waiting for Morag to gather the reins and shove her feet into the stirrups before changing to a canter.
    This way, Morag thought. Yes, this way. It wasn’t the same path the children would have taken, but it was going in the right direction.
    She heard the pounding of hooves behind her. Knew that Ashk had caught up.
    Foolish children. What made them think they were beyond Death’s attention? They knew there were dangers in the woods, even at the safest times.
    But they were children, and they still believed there were no shadows in the light, just as they probably believed there was no light in the shadows. It would take a few more years before they understood you didn’t have one without the other.
    Great Mother, let them have those years.
    A break in the trees. A narrow clearing.
    The dark horse stretched into a gallop.
    She heard a male voice scream, broken by fear and pain. She heard other voices scream, young and high pitched.
    And Death summoned.
    Too late. Too late.
    “This way!” Ashk yelled.
    They rode hard, weaving through the trees with reckless speed until they burst out into daylight.
    And saw.
    “No!” Ashk screamed.
    A moment caught by the eye, frozen by memory. Morag knew she would see it for a long time whenever she closed her eyes.
    A small horse galloping away from the edge of the woods, the rider cringing desperately to the saddle, the horse running for the place it still remembered as home, the place that meant safety. Running back to Neall.
    Two riderless horses galloping after the small horse.
    Owen, still thrashing weakly, covered with winged, black bodies tearing at his flesh, gulping down his blood.
    Evan on the ground, the small knife in one hand raised in an effort to defend himself from the swarm of nighthunters that were almost on him.
    And the stag, with nighthunters already covering its haunches, leaping into the swarm, drawing the creatures’ attention away from the boy by offering them that big, powerful body.
    Then Ashk was gone, her saddle empty, the bow and quiver of arrows on the ground beside her trembling horse.
    And a snarling shadow hound raced for the boy.
    Morag reined in hard. Tumbled out of the saddle. Ran back a few steps and grabbed the quiver of arrows. The bow wouldn’t do her any good, but the arrows ...
    The stag, almost