“Isolde!”

“Isolde?”

“The fox!”

I’m more than a little hysterical, and I’m about to claw him like a wild animal if he doesn’t let go of me, but Raze finally puts it together as another wail from the hunting horn echoes through the forest. This time, I hear the baying and yipping of dogs as they join in.

Before I can do anything else, Raze’s shape blurs and reforms. My hair is blown back by the powerful wings of a giant owl—truly giant: its wingspan must be at least as wide as Raze’s human shape is tall—with coppery-red stripes in its feathers. What is he doing?

Then the owl is gone, diving through the leaves on the fox’s tail.

“Wait for me!” I try to scramble after them, but I trip on the hem of my dress and smash my face into the dirt.

It’s probably a good thing that I do.

I’m almost flat to the ground when the first horse’s hooves thunder past, narrowly missing crushing my head. I roll to the side, dodging another, and then try to scramble to my feet. I’m still stepping on my hem, trying to gather up all my skirts, and then I’m sliding down a shallow ditch, slipping in mud with brambles slashing my tender, exposed skin.

I can’t imagine how it must look to the faeries. It’s hard to hear them at all over the horses and the dogs baying and the horn. I think I’m safe from being trampled to death here, so I risk peeking up over the embankment.

There’s so many of them, more than I would have expected, all passing in a tempest of movement, flashing too-sharp teeth in their fierce grimaces of excitement. They’re mostly dressed in golds and greens that blend in with the forest’s summer decadence, on top of horses that gleam in every natural (and unnatural) color. A few of the horses’ manes spray water in an endless stream, and some have fangs—because that’s what mortal horses were missing, scarier teeth.

It’s so deafeningly loud that the noises splinter, and instead of a cacophony, I hear each individual sound, all layered on top of each other: the thundering of the horses, the barking of the hounds, the chatter and whoops of excitement of the faeries...

And a familiar laugh. I search for the source, but everything is moving too fast. Olani is a blur on a silvery horse, head thrown back with laughter like she belongs with them.

“Olani!” I scramble to my feet successfully this time, piling my skirts in my arms and leaving my legs exposed.

But if she’s part of the hunt...

I go from relief at finding her to panic more quickly than I would have thought possible. I have to stop Olani from killing Isolde. Cursing with each slow, shuffling step, I try to throw myself in her path and hope she sees me. “Olani!”

Something pulls my arm hard, and then I’m flying through the air, a scream torn from my throat. After a long second of weightlessness, I land so hard I’m afraid my backside may be permanently damaged.