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Dawsyn’s stomach rises to her throat again and again as the Glacian jumps from branch to branch, lower and lower until one long plummet makes the ground rush up to claim them. Ryon’s feet take the impact, the branches of trees trembling around them.

Dawsyn swallows a lungful of air, a strangled sound escaping her. “Let me go,” she says, her voice low and shaky. “Let mego!”

And to her great surprise, Ryon does. The cage of his arms falls swiftly away. Cold air fills the space where his chest crushed hers and she sighs in relief.

Ryon takes several steps back, his hands up. Her blade glints from one of them, its tip pointing down to the snow. His eyes carefully watch her, wings retracting behind him. “Any more knives hidden somewhere in that dress?” he asks evenly.

Dawsyn shakes her head. Ryon nods once and goes to pocket her blade. Dawsyn takes the opening. She’ll only have one.

Ripping away her cloak, she spins, her hand flying over her shoulder to her spine, finding the neck of the ax. She tugs as her body twists, the hatchet coming over her head, upside down. She flips it midair, catches the handle her palm knows so intimately and completes the rotation, her knees bending as her wounded shoulder protests. She hurls the ax toward the Glacian with all the deadly accuracy her years have gifted her.

Ryon curses, his body flattening to the ground at the last possible moment. The ax, spinning toe over heel, whistles over his head and lands with a heavy thunk in a mighty tree.

Ryon spits out a mouthful of snow. “Fucking hell,” he says darkly, eyes drinking her in. He stands cautiously, body now tense.

Dawsyn recognizes the stance of a fighter – she holds the same one.

“That wasn’t very nice.”

Dawsyn steps to the side, hoping to coax him into circling her.

“I don’t think so,” Ryon says, his feet planted. “You’re not getting any nearer to that ax than you are a knife.” He frowns. “I have no time for games. What other surprises have you got in there?” His eyes slide down her dress.

“Come closer and find out,” she says, more bravely than an unarmed person should.

“Tempting.” Ryon smirks. “But I like my limbs where they are. A simplethank youwould have sufficed.”

In answer, Dawsyn spits into the snow.

“I presumed as much. Unfortunately for you, I am your best chance of getting off this mountain alive.”

Derision bubbles from her lips. “Ha! Is that so?”

“It is,” the Glacian presses, his eyes darting to the sky. “As it happens, I need to reach the valley just as much as you, girl.”

CHAPTERTEN

Dawsyn eyes the strange Glacian. “What need would you have to leave your own kingdom?”

“I have a world of need and no time to walk you through it. I also have no use for you, so make your decision, girl. Either try your luck with me or I leave you here. Just remember that it took three out of four of us less than a few minutes to track you down. You’ll meet your maker when it happens again.”

Dawsyn’s temper prickles at the implication, at the truth of it. “I’ll go nowhere with you,” she says, her feet adjusting in the snow. She cannot help but watch his teeth glinting behind his lips.

He notices. Chuckles. “Do not worry,” he tells her. “Mine are not the venomous type.”

He could be lying. She has no hope of outrunning him. If she wants to escape, he will have to be killed, but which way to do so?

She does not get the chance to make her choice.

Instead, the strange Glacian nods. “So be it. Good luck, girl.”

Turning his back on her, he hauls her ax from its lodging in the trunk. His muscled arms hurl her weapons, hatchet and blade both. Instinctively, she dives into a roll, but the weapons fly wide of her, landing one after the other into a tree by her side. She races to retrieve them and when she turns back, the Glacian is gone.

Dawsyn’s breath falls rapidly, fogging before her. He left her alive. The Glacian she’d watched hauling her people from that insipid pool saved her and then left her unharmed, and even returned her weapons. Was it a trick? Was this the game the hunters had alluded to?

She has to start running again. She cannot afford to stand still, out in the open. And hiding is clearly pointless if she cannot conceal her tracks. Her best chance lies in the density of the trees, giving her at least some coverage from above.

She runs and stumbles, stumbles and runs. She is physically strong, fit enough to run quickly for a long time yet, but only until the next blizzard comes, only for as long as her toes in those small boots hold, only until her lungs give out. And the likelihood that it will all be for naught drags on her, slows her. They will catch her.