I licked my lips. “Why did you vow to kill Puck?”
He jerked. I felt his eyes on the back of my neck and bit the inside of my cheek, wishing I could take it back, wondering what made me ask in the first place. “Never mind,” I told him, waving a hand. “Forget it. You don’t have to tell me. I was just wondering—”
Who you really are. What Puck has done to make you hate him. I want to understand. I feel I don’t know either of you.
A few more drops of rain hit the ground, hissing in the silence. I chewed my jerky strips and stared out into the rain, hyperaware of Ash’s body, of his arms around my waist. I heard him shift to a more comfortable position and sigh.
“It was a long time ago,” he murmured, his voice almost lost in the rising wind, “before you were even born. Winter and Summer had been at peace for several seasons. There were always minor skirmishes between the courts, but for the longest time in centuries, we actually left each other alone.
“Near the end of summer,” he went on, a bit of pain creeping into his voice, “things began to change. The fey don’t deal well with boredom, and some of the more impatient members started mischief with Summer again. I should’ve known there would be trouble, but that season, I wasn’t thinking of politics. The entire court was bored and restless, but I…” His voice broke, only for a moment, before continuing. “I was with my lady, Ariella Tularyn.”
I felt the breath sucked out of me. His lady. Ash had been involved, once. And, judging from the veiled hurt in his voice, he’d loved her a lot. I stiffened, suddenly too aware of my breath, of his arms around my waist. Ash didn’t seem to notice.
“We were hunting in the wyldwood,” he went on, resting his chin atop my head. “Following the rumor of a golden fox that had been seen in the area. There were three of us that day, hunting together. Ariella, myself, and…and Robin Goodfellow.”
“Puck?”
Ash shifted uncomfortably. Thunder growled in the distance, shooting threads of green lightning across the sky. “Yes,” he muttered, as if it pained him to say it. “Puck. Puck was…he was a friend, once. I wasn’t ashamed to call him that. Back then, the three of us would often meet one another in the wyldwood, away from the condemnation of the courts. We didn’t care about the rules. Back then, Puck and Ariella were my closest companions. I trusted them completely.”
“What happened?”
Ash’s voice was soft with memory as he continued. “We were hunting,” he explained again, “following our quarry into a territory none of us had seen. The wyldwood is huge, and some parts are constantly shifting, so it can be dangerous, even for us. We tracked the golden fox for three days, through unfamiliar woods and forest, making bets on whose arrow would finally take it down. Puck boasted that Winter would surely lose to Summer, and Ariella and I made the same boast in reverse. All the while, the forest around us grew dark and wild. Our horses were fey steeds whose hooves didn’t touch the ground, but they were growing increasingly nervous. We should have listened to them, but we didn’t, stubborn pride leading us on like fools.
“Finally, on the fourth day, we came to a rise that plunged down into a vast hollow. On the other side, trotting along the ridge, was the golden fox. The hollow separating us wasn’t deep, but it was wide and filled with tangled shadows and undergrowth, making it difficult to see what was down there.
“Ariella wanted to go around, even though it would take us longer. Puck disagreed, insisting we would lose our quarry unless we rode straight through. We argued. I sided with Ariella—though I didn’t see the reason for her apprehension, if she wasn’t willing to go forward, I wasn’t going to make her.
“Puck, however, had other ideas. As I turned my horse around, he let out a whoop, slapped Ariella’s horse on the rump, and kicked his own steed forward. They plunged over the edge, racing down the slope, with Puck yelling at me to catch up if I could. I had no choice but to follow.”
Ash fell silent, his eyes dark and haunted. He gazed off into the distance, until I couldn’t take it anymore. “What happened?” I whispered.
He gave a bitter laugh. “Ariella was right, of course. Puck had led us straight into a wyvern nest.”