Page 63 of Renegade Queen

The rushing sounds of the wind whipped around us, and for one perfect moment, I sunk into the fantasy of what I wanted to happen here.

But then the world just kept fucking turning, and fate all but laughed in our faces.

“If you can keep it in your pants for five minutes, perhaps you’d like to start running now,” Fizzle quipped. “The Endless are upon you, and I’d suggest hiding before you’re drawn into yet another fight you’re ill-equipped for.”

That furry fucker.

What was worse was that he was actually right.

Dean grabbed the packs and tossed one my way as Tank shouldered the remaining one. I could hear Alyssa muttering quiet words to Maddox behind me, and I had to trust that she had him.

The reality of what this journey would be like slapped me in the face as I felt a wrenching lurch inside. It wasn’t like the other times. There was no subtle sensation of fur brushing against my skin. This was a jolt, a rip, as the wolf inside me revolted at the idea of being pulled away from something he wanted. The horny fucker was going to have to get on board with the idea of running, though, because until we knew more about how many were coming, we needed to get out of view, and we needed to do it fast.

My eyes fell on the forest in the distance, but when I turned to where Fizzle was getting the rest ready to go, hurrying them along, he was pushing for the other direction.

“We should hide in the trees until they pass,” I blurted out.

“If you want to take refuge in the Wildling Forest, you can do it alone,” Fizzle sassed back at me.

I turned back to the trees. There was safety there; I could feel it. But all of the stories everyone talked about told of a terrible place that all of the fae seemed to fear. Only Dean’s gentle shove in the opposite direction made me move.

Fizzle and Alyssa knew more about this place than any of us. And I had to trust that they knew better than whatever gut feeling I was having.

Chapter 28

Alyssa

We’d been running for nearly a full day, and I could tell the guys were feeling it as much as I was.

The Endless were keeping a constant pace with us; no matter what we did, we couldn’t gain any ground. But at least we weren’t losing any, either.

The feeling of being hunted was far too familiar for me. Arik was never going to stop unless someone made him. But with The Endless, he had an unquestioning army at his fingertips, and he didn’t need to be with them to have total control. I couldn’t free an entire army of people the way that I had Ezra. There had to be another way.

“This is pointless. Arik’s herding us straight to where he wants us. There’s no way we’ll be able to get inside and rescue Damon this way,” Dean complained.

He was right. This was madness. We could see the trap, and we were still running toward it like we’d magically make our way through.

“We need to split up,” Maddox suddenly said.

My mouth dropped open as I automatically went to tell him that was insane, but slowly I closed it as my brain engaged, and I reluctantly saw he was probably right.

Even Fizzle didn’t try to argue.

“Or we make a stand and fight,” Dean decided, looking around like he intended to do that immediately.

His eyes cut to me, and I knew what he was leaving unsaid; he wouldn’t leave my side, and I doubted he entirely trusted me not to do something stupid even if he didn’t.

We stopped by a copse of trees, seeking shelter amongst their trunks while gulping down what looked like the last of our water. We should have gotten horses at the last village. Any amount of preparation would have been better than what we’d done. None of us had gone into this with a level head, and as a result, here we stood, absolutely fucking screwed.

“Splitting up could work,” I started. I expected Dean to shut me down immediately, but he just crowded in closer. Maddox kept a watchful eye on the two of us. I wasn’t entirely sure how far beneath the surface his lion was right now, and that was another situation we desperately needed to address.

How was everything going to hell so quickly?

Oh, right, we’d come to Nymeria with nothing but good intentions and idiotic ideas and then picked a fight with the one man who wasn’t supposed to know I’d come here.

I’m coming for you. Had I lost my fucking mind?

There was nothing to do about it now. I’d thrown the gauntlet, and this was Arik catching it. It did raise one interesting point, though. Why was he sending an army after me and not coming himself? Either he wasn’t as cocky as he used to be, or something else was happening here. Either way, it didn’t get us around our original problem.