Page 19

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T he next morning, Teryn Alante gripped his spear in his right hand, relishing its comfort, its familiarity. With his left foot forward, right foot back, he angled his body to the side. In one fluid movement, he raised his spear, rotated his hips, and brought his right arm down in a smooth arc. He released the shaft and sent the spear soaring straight ahead. It landed with a thud in the dirt. He wiped the sweat from his brow and retrieved his weapon, then returned to his previous spot. Set his feet. Angled his body. Threw the spear. Then again. Again.

“Are you going to do that all day?” Lex asked in a bored tone. He sat in the shade at the base of a tree, a novel in hand. The morning sun was warm with only a mild spring breeze to interrupt the heat of its rays.

“Shouldn’t you be practicing as well?” Teryn asked, taking aim for another throw. “We’re close. You heard Helios this morning.”

“Oh, I heard him,” Lex said, then returned his attention to his book. “Mostly, I heard when he told us to wait here because we’re—what was it he’d said? That’s right. Bumbling idiots who he wouldn’t allow to mess things up now that we’re close to our prey .”

Teryn threw his spear with extra gusto this time. It landed several feet farther than the last. Lex was only slightly exaggerating Helios’ parting words when he left them after sunrise. Before that, Helios had spent an hour studying the tracks around the clearing they’d bedded down in for the night. He was certain he’d found additional unicorn tracks, no more than a day old, but was befuddled that they only appeared alongside the smaller set of human footprints, separate from the rest of the hunting party’s tracks. Helios wouldn’t say more than that, only that he’d spend the day scouting, convinced they were closing in on the hunters’ location. That was when he’d told Teryn and Lex to stay put and added some insult over their intelligence and capabilities. It had taken much restraint on Teryn’s part not to throw his spear into the other man’s back as he walked away. Which was why he’d decided to funnel all that pent-up aggression into throwing practice. Spear was his weapon of choice for hunting. If Helios’ observations were correct, he’d have reason to put it to use very soon.

Teryn retrieved his weapon, then stood before Lex. “You do plan on actually helping me, don’t you?”

Lex looked up from his novel. “I am helping.”

“Are you, though?”

“I already told you I don’t hunt.”

“Have you any skill with weapons?”

Lex put a hand to his chest, affronted. “Are you questioning my integrity now too?”

Teryn shrugged. “Just curious how much of this alliance benefits me at all.”

Lex turned a page in his book. “You’ll get your beloved princess.”

His stomach turned at the word beloved . Planting his spear tip in the dirt, he slouched to the side and propped an arm on the end of the shaft. “Oh? And how do you suggest we do that? So far, our plan is to return with a tie.”

“Don’t know,” Lex said absently. “Maybe we can slit Helios’ throat in his sleep.”

“Are you offering to do the throat slitting?”

Lex quirked a brow. “Of course not. I’m skilled with a sword, not a dagger. Besides, I’m not going to war with Norun. My kingdom has been avoiding that for a decade.”

Teryn frowned. He remembered when the Kingdom of Norun conquered Haldor and Sparda, two smaller kingdoms that had been south of Norun’s borders. The other Risan kingdoms, including Teryn’s own, feared Norun would seek to conquer other neighboring lands. Thankfully, the conquest never went any further. Menah had the benefit of having two other kingdoms standing between them and Norun. Lex’s kingdom, however, shared a border. “Don’t you have a wall?”

Lex shifted awkwardly in his seat as if the question annoyed him. “Yes, we have a wall. Don’t you have traps to check?”

Teryn held up his palms. “I didn’t realize a wall was such a touchy subject.” Even as he said it, though, he remembered Lex’s rant about his brother stealing the wall-building project from him.

“Yes, well, I’m starving. I get cranky when I haven’t eaten.”

“You know, you could check the traps yourself.”

He turned another page in his book. “And get blood on my shirt? No, thank you.”

Teryn rolled his eyes, but there was only amusement in the gesture. Lex was probably the least helpful ally he could ever want, but he was entertaining in his own way. Best of all, he wasn’t Helios.

“What are you reading, anyway?”

Lex glanced at the cover. “Some naughty romance. It’s about an earl who falls for his sister’s lady’s maid.”

Teryn’s grin split his face. “You read naughty romance?” He wasn’t even sure Larylis read such fare, and he tended to devour almost anything of the written word.

Lex lifted a shoulder. “I do now. Stole it from the library at Verlot before I left.”

“You stole that. From Verlot Palace.”

“Figured I’d want some reading material for the journey.”

“You do realize you’re a prince, right? You could walk into any bookstore and probably take any book for free.”

Lex continued as if he hadn’t heard a word Teryn said. “I didn’t realize it was the naughty variety, but I daresay, I’m finding it rather informative.” He waggled his brows at that.

Teryn shook his head with a chuckle. Then, spear in hand, he left the small clearing and entered the cover of trees. He peered overhead for any sign of Berol, but the falcon was nowhere to be seen. She’d left to hunt half an hour ago. Which was what Teryn now set out to do himself. Well, perhaps not hunt, but fetch lunch just the same. He’d set a few traps nearby for small game and one in a stream for fish. Unfortunately, the first three traps proved empty. Damn. That left the fish trap. He shifted course to the east where he’d found the stream earlier that morning. Walking along the bank, he sought signs of where he’d left the trap. He remembered a boulder that reached about waist high. And a cherry tree standing just above it, pink blossoms clinging to its boughs. It was rare to find trees with that many blossoms still intact this late in the spring, but there was one hardy variety—the Rosa Solara—that carried pink petals almost until summer. That should make it easy to find. Sure enough, a hint of pink caught his eye upstream. He took a step?—

And froze.

A flash of movement snagged his attention. He turned, seeking what had fled the opposite side of the stream. There was nothing there, just ripples amongst the rushing current. He held still for several moments, keeping his breaths slow and steady. When he witnessed no further signs of movement, he continued along the bank, slower this time. He kept a more mindful grip on his spear, used his front foot to test the ground ahead before fully taking a step. Teryn should have been doing so all along. Regardless of whether his traps proved successful, any found prey would do for lunch.

The foliage grew denser around the stream the closer he came to the tree. He navigated around it with silent steps, creeping up a slight hill until he found a slim trail that led back to the stream. As he drew close to the cherry tree, it became clear it was not the one he’d been looking for. There was no boulder. No trap. Still, there was something in the music of his surroundings that kept him moving forward. A light cadence punctuated by birdsong. It was the sound of hooves. A deer, perhaps. Too graceful to be a boar. His mouth watered at the thought of venison. He’d fed the rest of the dried strips of meat to Berol last night.

He held his breath and waited for the sound again.

There.

It was coming from near the stream behind the densest patch of foliage. With slow, careful steps, he moved forward, softly prodding the earth with his lead foot to avoid snapping twigs or kicking loose stones. The hoofbeats grew clearer, approaching the stream from the opposite side of the brush. Then it stopped, replaced with a gentle splash. Then another. The creature was likely drinking from the stream. Teryn edged closer and closer until he was finally able to glance around the edge of the brush to the rushing waters on the other side. His breath caught as his eyes took in the animal facing away from him. But it wasn’t a deer at all. It was…a horse. An enormous white stallion with hooves the size of?—

His foot shifted, caught on a loose rock. He regained purchase, but the sound had already caught the creature’s attention. It stopped drinking at once and swiveled its head toward Teryn.

He blinked several times, certain his eyes were deceiving him. Perhaps it was hunger. But no matter how he tried to battle both reason and visual evidence, there was no denying the white horn protruding from the horse’s head.

It wasn’t a horse after all.