My sword lay in the mud a few feet away. As I reached for it, I became aware that I was not alone after all.
“Good,” rumbled the Wolf, somewhere above me. “You’re still alive. It would be extremely annoying if I had to tell Mab I let her son drown while on this ridiculous quest. Dragging your carcass out of the river isn’t something I’d want to do again, prince. I hope it doesn’t become a habit.”
He was lying on the bank a few yards away, watching me with intense yellow-green eyes. As I pulled myself up, he nodded approval and rose, his pelt still spiky and damp from his plunge into the water.
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“Where are the others?” I asked, gazing around for their bodies. The Wolf snorted.
“Gone,” he said simply. “The river took them.” I stared at him, letting the words sink in. Loss was nothing new to me.
I’d shielded myself from the worst of the pain; not caring for anything ensured I wouldn’t miss it when it was gone. Attachments, as I’d learned, had no place in the Unseelie Court. But I could not believe that Puck and Ariel a were gone.
“You didn’t try to help them?”
Shaking himself, the Wolf sneezed and looked back at me, unconcerned. “I had no interest in saving the others,” he said easily. “Even if I could have gotten to them in time, my only interest is keeping you alive. I warned them f loating downstream was a bad idea. I suppose we’ll have to find another way to the End of the World.”
“No,” I said quietly, looking across the foaming river. “They’re not dead.”
The Wolf curled a lip. “You don’t know that, prince. You can’t be sure.”
“I’d know,” I insisted. Because if they were gone, I’d have no way to reach the Testing Grounds myself, no way to honor my vow to Meghan. If Puck was dead, my world would become as cold and lifeless as the darkest night in the Winter Court. And if I had let Ariel a die a second time, it would’ve been better if the Wolf had left me to drown, because the pain would do more then crush me this time—it would kill me.
I let out a breath, raking a hand through my wet hair. “We’re going to find them,” I said, looking back down the river. The water roared and 116/387
foamed, clawing angrily at the rocks, rushing by at a breakneck speed.
The Wolf was right— it was difficult to imagine anyone surviving that, once the raft had smashed apart, but Robin Goodfel ow was an expert at survival, and I had to believe Ariel a was safe with him. Grimalkin I wasn’t even worried about. “Believe what you will,” I continued, glancing at the Wolf, “but Goodfel ow is still alive. He’s harder to kill than you might think…perhaps even harder to kill than you.”
“I very much doubt that.” But his voice was f lat with resignation, and he huffed noisily, shaking his head. “Come on, then.” With a last show of teeth, the Wolf turned and started padding down the riverbank.
“We waste time standing about here. If they survived, they will likely be farther downstream.
However…” He paused and glanced back. “If we reach the Falls of Oblivion, you might as well give up. Nothing can survive that plunge.
Not even me.”
He turned and continued loping along the riverbank, head lifted to the wind to pick up the scent of his prey. With one last look at the foaming River of Dreams, I followed.
For an indefinite amount of time, we walked along the riverbank, searching for any sign, any hint of Puck or Ariel a. The Wolf loped tirelessly along with his muzzle pointed sometimes at the ground and sometimes at the sky, tasting the wind, while I searched the bank for footprints, broken twigs, overturned rocks, any sign of life.
Something near the edge of the water caught my eye, and I hurried over. A splintered length of wood lay trapped between two rocks at the water’s edge. It was part of the raft, bobbing limply in the waves, smashed almost beyond recognition. I stared at it for a moment, 117/387
refusing to acknowledge what that could mean, and turned away to continue the search.
Farther downstream, the Wolf suddenly came to a stop. Lowering his head, he sniffed around the rocks and mud, then straightened with a growl, baring his teeth.
I hurried over. “Did you find them?”
“No. But a great many creatures were here recently. small things, very unpleasant smell. Slimy. Faintly reptilian.” I remembered the pale, newtlike creatures, shooting at us down the riverbank. And their shaman, calling up river nightmares to crush the boat.
“What are they?”
The Wolf shook his bushy head. “Hobyahs.”
“Hobyahs,” I repeated, recalling the tale of the small, unpleasant fey.