Page 39

Tinder had mentioned that place when I’d eavesdropped on them. I swing my head toward Puck. “Is it close?”

“By human or Fae standards?” he quips, then relents when I just stare at him. “On both accounts, it’s close.”

The tiny boar skitters over to Puck, squealing with glee and butting its head against the satyr’s arm. Puck indulges the piglet and murmurs in Faeish while flicking playfully at the creature’s tail. This causes another round of squeals that, any louder, could penetrate every quarter of this wild.

The shoat nestles between us, tucking into the vent between Puck’s hip and mine. I glide my palm over its fuzzy head and scratch behind its ears, remembering the sanctuary back home, the haven for animals that my family keeps on our land, the creatures we’ve housed. The ones waiting for me and my sisters to come home.

I gulp, then laugh as the wee boar snorts into my fingers.

I sense Puck watching us. Mostly, I wish he’d return his attention to the piglet. I don’t know how to bear the weight of his eyes on me.

Yet an admission springs off my lips. “I think in straight lines and rely on Fables because I trust them. They’ll never veer off course, so I won’t get lost or make mistakes. They’re safe.”

Safer than my own ideas, perhaps.

He’s quiet for a long time. I peek at his profile angled toward the piglet, who bumps its snout against his knuckles. Then his sharp features find mine, and he repays me for the honesty. “I want to know your real thoughts, not a Fabled quote or lesson, so I know who I’m up against, to find out if you’ve changed in nine years, because the payoff is greater that way, and I’m greedy, or I’m selfish—take your pick. But it comes down to this: I want to know your real thoughts because I want to know whatyouthink.”

“I thought you’d forgotten me,” I say. “I didn’t want you to remember.”

He raises his eyebrows. “At last, something I relate to.”

We study one another. The wee one grunts at being left out, snatches my pack, and dashes off.

Puck and I break apart. I lurch to my feet and race after it. “No, wait!”

The satyr falls into line with me. He jogs at my side until the garden, with its trees and sculptures of spun twigs, fades behind us.

The land flushes out into a dense expanse of Fae trees with barbed trunks and spiky leaves. We hadn’t gone that far, but we must have crossed another line of demarcation into another sector.

Puck hadn’t been exaggerating. If this is The Passel of Boars, it’s indeed very close to where we’d come from.

The piglet hits a dead end of bushes. We corner the shoat there and kneel before it. Puck whispers in his language, relaxing the little creature. For a while, it oinks joyously and wrestles with Puck over the pack.

“You’re getting nowhere,” I boss, curbing my grin. “Let me do it.” I take my turn and attempt to wrangle the bag from the piglet. Eventually, I’m able to pry my supplies from its mouth.

Another grunt rumbles from ahead of us, this one louder and larger, coming from someplace above the bushes. We go still, but the shoat trills with pleasure.

Puck considers the approaching sound, then sighs dramatically. “Ah, fuck.”

The hairs across my nape stand on end, but I dare not look yet. I stare at the ground and ask under my breath, “What is that?”

To which the derisive satyr replies, “It’s the mother.”

11

A shadow looms over us, larger than in my world. The Fables tell of mystical fauna in every magic realm across The Dark Fables—Middle Country, the Northern Frosts, and the Southern Seas—and their abilities to shift sizes from miniature to mountainous. Likewise, I’d witnessed this in Puck’s doe companion and the herd of deer who’d joined in the hunt’s commencement.

As such, it shouldn’t be astounding when the sow’s outline transforms into a monolith. It should be no surprise when her silhouette bloats, dwarfing both mine and Puck’s.

Perked ears, stubbled in whiskers. Bristling threads of hair. Two monstrous tusks that splay into the lances.

My head cranes, tracing the jumbo shadow until I meet a pair of furious, parental eyes. Two bottomless pits of malachite flash, the gemstones reflecting my blanched complexion. The mammoth sow looms atop a knoll situated beyond the shrubs, which accounts for the dead end.

“Juniper,” Puck draws out. “Don’t move.”

The sound of my name uttered from his mouth jolts me out of the trance. I keep my eyes pinned to the shifter. “Do I look like a novice to you?”

“You look like a mortal to me.”