Relief, sharp and bitter, flooded him.
“To be clear,” she went on, rising from her chair with liquid grace, “you’re certain she’s dead?”
“Yes,” he said. The word scraped his throat. “Majesty, I swear it.”
“The horse?” she asked.
“Gone,” he said. “He leapt after her. Or ran. I didn’t see. But he didn’t come back up.”
She tilted her head, studying his face, weighing every short breath, every twitch of muscle.
Hunter forced himself to hold her gaze. Bitter experience had taught him that looking away only made her suspicion bloom.
After a long, taut silence, she nodded. “Good,” she said. “Very good, Captain.”
Relief sagged his shoulders. “Majesty, I—”
“You look tired,” she observed, crossing the space between them. “Come closer. Let me see what my loyal hound dragged himself through for me.”
He obeyed.
Her hand slid up his chest, palm warm through his shirt. Her fingernails grazed the line of his jaw.
“Blood?” she asked softly.
“No,” he said. “The river took everything.”
“Even so,” she murmured. “You did what was necessary. You have my gratitude.” The words—a rare currency from her—lit something in him he wished he could kill.
“And my reward?” he said before he could stop himself. The need in his voice embarrassed him.
Her smile sharpened. “So eager,” she said. “Have you been thinking of nothing else?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.
She laughed quietly. “Men,” she said. “Always so sure they are the hunters.”
She leaned in, lips brushing his cheek, the ghost of a kiss.
“We have time,” she said. “Time to plan. Time to arrange… everything.”
He stiffened. “You promised—”
“You will get what you’re owed,” she whispered, lips brushing his earlobe. She grabbed his jaw with her hand and turned it towards her lips, kissing him with one deep motion. She walked back toward the mirror, her robe trailing. “Go,” she said over her shoulder. “Wash. Sleep. You smell like death.”
He ground his teeth, torn between anger and guilt, hope and desire. In the end, he bowed. “As you wish,” he said. He turned and left, the lie he’d told her sitting heavy on his tongue.
ForSnowWhite,theworld was Grimm’s back, the endless rhythm of hooves, and the darkness of the forest. After leaving Hunter in the clearing, she pushed Grimm as far as she dared, moving quickly when they could, and moving slowlywhen they couldn’t. Fear and shame and fury snapping at her heels like wolves. The adrenaline that had fueled her escape eventually ebbed, leaving only exhaustion and a nagging ache everywhere his hands had been.
She did not have the luxury of stopping for more than snatches of sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Liora’s face, the glitter of the comb, the flash of steel. Every crack of a twig behind her made her whip around, half expecting to see Hunter’s shadow. But nothing followed.
Days blurred. She rode through rolling meadows where wildflowers nodded in the wind, their bright heads bobbing like gossiping courtiers. She slipped between stands of fir trees that made their own dark cathedrals, the air beneath them cool and sharp with resin. She forded shallow streams, cold water numbing her toes, watching as curious fish scattered when Grimm drank. More than once, she caught herself thinking that the moment would all have been beautiful—if not for the bruises, the soreness, and the fear. She kept believing that right after that next ridge she’d see a village, or just around this path’s bend she’d come across a farm—any kind of civilization—people to help her, a place to live, a place to start her new life.
At night, she rested under low-branched trees, cloak wrapped tight, Grimm standing watch nearby. Dreams came in a tangle: her father’s laugh, her mother’s hands, blue eyes in a stable, rough hands on her body, the press of a knife. But what she thought about most was the way she felt when Hunter looked at her body.With shock? With amazement? With hunger? With greed?She didn’t know exactly, but she knew it felt powerful.
Food was whatever she could find: berries along the path, water from streams. She wished she was a horse and could sustain herself on grass and water. She wasn’t good at survival in the forest. She didn’t know which mushrooms or roots she couldeat. She didn’t know how to find safety from bears or snakes or how to keep warm at night. She didn’t know how to ensure she wasn’t riding for days in circles. She had never had to survive. She had never had to struggle. She had never had to worry much at all. She just assumed there must be neighboring villages nearby, but in truth, she didn’t know.How much longer until I find someone—somewhere? How much longer could I survive, starving and cold? How much longer before the wolves closed in?She was thankful to have Grimm. Without him, she would have certainly given up.
Her mind circled the same questions over and over.What had I become in that clearing? What did it mean that I had used my body like that, as a bargaining chip, a distraction, a shield? Was I now more like my mother than ever?Sometimes she gripped the falcon pendant at her throat and thought of the prince. Of the way he’d looked at her without calculation. Of the gentleness of his hands and the kindness in his eyes. “Would you still see me the same?” she whispered once into the dark. “If you knew?” The trees did not answer.
