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The pines scrape my elbows and dress as I crash through the grove and spill into the timberland. From behind, a cluster of noises carries to the treetops, the boisterous howl chilling my bones. It’s a wild call, the sort hounds deliver to their pack, to signal a target.

In this case, it’s the call of Faeries. It’s the litany of pursuit.

They’re coming for me.

7

The earth shudders beneath me. The wet slap of feet and percussion of hooves grow louder, gaining momentum not three milliseconds after my departure. Although Puck had kept his word, he hadn’t specified how much of a head start I’d actually get.

Pine needles rain from above, tapping my shoulders on the way down. Boughs creak and bob, as if bearing a succession of individual weights. Silhouettes flit in and out of the heights, racing across the branches, jumping from limb to limb.

I sprint ahead, vaulting into the woodland. The haunted teals, sportive greens, and glaring golds of this weald flank me in shawls of color. The evergreens spread out, oozing gilded light from the candles. Despite the illumination, I’m lost in a void, my breath wheezing through the night.

My first concern is a practical one: Don’t stop running.

My second concern is a passionate one: Let him try and catch me.

The howling sharpens, mutating into whistles and heckles. They disband and spread out while arrows arc from every direction, cutting the air into ribbons.

They’re enjoying this.

My ears prickle, interpreting the catcalls. The leprechauns are a raspy bunch, their hollers sawing through the timbers. The dryads’ croak, expansive and weathered. The brownies laugh, plying the land with gratified little chirps. As for the lithesome Faeries, their calls lash like whips.

But which noise belongs to him? What does he sound like while in pursuit?

I strain to hear the roguish thump of cloven hooves, but the rhythmic, galloping stomp of Cypress drowns out the opportunity. I twist to gauge their distance, detecting nothing. Veering back around, I skitter on my heels as a pair of lime eyes glow inches from me. The creature hisses and slides out of sight, its claws scratching high into the nearest pine, the fibers of its tail bristling.

Only in this land would such a critter flash a bushy tail ringed in lime fur to match its irises. Only in this land would its sibilant vocal cords overlap and multiply, reverberating like cymbals.

Raccoon? Rabies?

Ridiculous. Fae fauna do not breed such ailments.

Taken off guard, I discover a crescent wall of rock suddenly encircling me. It’s a cul-de-sac. The undergrowth jostles, the creepers rattle, and ethereal purrs invade the woods.

“Juniperrrrr,” they sing.

“Oh lovely, Juniperrrrr.”

“Come out, come out and play with us, Juniperrrrr.”

A cold sweat pools behind my ears. I glance at the evergreen where the critter had disappeared, the branches dense with needles and cones. Lark gave me precisely three lessons in climbing. My sister, a former chimney sweep who’d grown up scaling the sooty, congested lungs of flues, had taught me the fundamentals of balancing my weight and lodging my toes into the right crevices.

More heckling. More echoes of “Juniper, Juniper, oh, Juniper!”

My nails and toes burrow into the clefts. I clamp on to the trunk and heft myself up, up, up. The hooded cloak drags behind me, swinging like a curtain. An offshoot snags on my skirt, yanking me in place. I may as well be scaling a cheese grater. I bite back a yelp, my wrists flaring with heat where skin must have peeled away, raw flesh stinging beneath.

I don’t make a noise, can’t make a noise, won’t make a noise. Instead, I keep going, conjuring Lark’s lessons, her tips about moving quickly and safely.

Boughs multiply around me. Again, those lime eyes find mine and then swivel away.

If it had felt threatened, its choppers would have severed my thumbs by now. I flop belly-first onto a limb, my chest pumping.

I’m not afraid, I’m not afraid, I’m not—

A cluster of footfalls and hoofbeats gather below. I freeze, my limbs tightening around the bough, my eyes widening as I register the distance between me and the forest floor. It hadn’t seemed like a towering climb. Am I truly suspended that high?

Outlines swoop into the impasse, then stalk around the tree’s base. A laurel wreath and mint-colored braids, impervious to the dark. A scruffy beard. A floral gown. Talons and tails. Orange forehead markings.