Page 1 of Huntress

Prologue

It was busy and loud inside the barrier wall. Elsie watched a dozen soldiers training in a field behind a fence. They shouted with every repetition, and another group belted out a cadence song as they ran the track. She scowled, innocently unaware that her thoughts were broadcast all over her face.

She already didn’t like it here. It smelled bad, and the energy was all wrong, making her uneasy. It felt dark, angry, and unfamiliar, and that wrongness buzzed beneath her skin. She’d been in hell dimensions with a friendlier atmosphere.

Her mother squeezed her hand, and Elsie looked up, squinting to see her face against the bright sunlight. Long, dark hair curled out from under the hood of Santa Muerte’s robe; the fabric cut so generously it brushed the ground. The goddess exuded confidence in everything she did, and it calmed Elsie’s discontent.

They’d traveled to more dimensions and worlds than the girl could ever hope to remember, but none like this. If Elsie had learned anything in all her seven years, it was that her mother could be unpredictable. Santa Muerte must have a reason for coming here.

A raven stood unnaturally still nearby. Twice the size of a regular raven with a ten-foot wingspan, Stolas was the prince of a thousand hell dimensions, and her mother’s favorite pet. He was uncommonly wicked, and nothing she asked of him was too depraved or cruel. It had earned him a place at her side.

Elsie didn’t see the other one, but she didn’t look for him either. The demon without a name. The Shadow King, who took the form of a wolf. He was even scarier than Stolas, and he wasn’t the Goddess of Death’s companion by choice.

“I don’t like this place,” Elsie complained. She’d rather spend the day playing with the bat demons they’d spent the past week with. At least they’d been friendly.

Stolas quorked in response, his usual scolding. He scolded her a lot. Santa Muerte crouched down to Elsie’s level.

They looked a lot alike. Santa Muerte had passed her thick, silky tresses down to her daughter, but where her mother’s hair shifted from red to purple, then black to blue, Elsie’s stayed a constant blue. Her pale lavender eyes and soft tan skin were traits gifted from her mother, along with a Latin accent from a time before human society had come crumbling down. The magic had come from her, too.

“We’ve talked before about your father trying to find us,” Santa Muerte said quietly, and Elsie nodded. It was a serious subject, and it frightened her, but Santa Muerte had not spared her the details. The goddess believed it was better to prepare her child rather than hide the truth, so she told the girl everything. “He’s getting closer.”

Elsie looked over her shoulder, expecting to see the mad fae king looming over them. He’d been a dark figure in their lives since before she’d been born, tricking and then holding her mother captive in the months it took to forcibly impregnate her.

Her father had expressed interest in Elsie while she was still in her mother’s womb, but Santa Muerte escaped before he could set eyes on her. He spread his seed among witches far and wide, and had a reputation for killing the bastard children that were not up to his standards.

He’d relentlessly hunted her mother, who was the only woman who’d dared to defy him and live. Kings, especially fae kings, were a prickly, pride-filled sort.

“Are we hiding here?” Elsie asked, thinking it unlikely. They rarely spent time on Earth, where other ravens prowled the skies, searching for Elsie and her mother, each vying to bring news of their location back to her father.

Too many fae on this planet were looking for the redemption that granted passage through the many doors, gates, and connections to Underhill, where he lived.

“I must face him, Elspeth,” Santa Muerte said. Elsie’s eyes widened. Her mother had fought her father once before, as a diversion until Stolas had gotten Elsie safely away. “You need to be somewhere safe while that happens. You’re too precious to be lost.”

Her mother was always saying that.

“Am I going with Stolas?” she asked. Santa Muerte never left her alone, and the girl spent any time apart learning the ancient language and her family history from the raven prince. Her mother insisted that it was important for her to learn.

“Not this time, mija. I will need Stolas and the shadow wolf. I’ve made arrangements for you to stay here with the hunters until I return. They’ll keep you safe and hidden until then,” Santa Muerte told her. Elsie’s eyes filled with tears, and she shook her head in denial.

“The demon hunters? I don’t want to stay with these people, Mamá, they’re not like us,” she whimpered as her mother stroked her long hair softly.

“I know, my love. But he will not give up this vendetta, and he will use you to his advantage. That man will not hesitate to take you from me, but he will not think to find you here, among the hunters,” her mother reasoned.

“My father wants to take you away from me,” Elsie said bitterly, hating him all the more because he was hunting her mother. The woman who’d shown her countless worlds and always had time for games and conversation. Elsie loved their life together. She had friends in dozens of universes. She was loved, and never lonely.

Her father was a constant threat to that life.

“Yes, and he will use you against me if he can. You are my final daughter, the last of the reapers. You are my legacy, Elspeth. Your name will become legend. You will be the greatest of my children. It is your destiny to outshine them all, and the only way you can fulfill that destiny is if I keep you out of your father’s hands,” Santa Muerte pressed.

“I know,” Elsie grumbled. The fae king had many bastard children, just like Elsie. Any progeny that survived inspection were cast out of Underhill. Sentenced to a life on Earth as half-breed nobodies. Most of their mothers were dead, her father finding them useless after he’d gotten what he wanted.

She called on her ethereal magic, letting it pool in her hands until she held warm, eerily glowing blue power. The magic that would one day allow her to travel between dimensions on her own.

“Can’t I hide somewhere else?” she asked.

“I’m afraid not.” Santa Muerte shook her head. “We cannot risk what he might do to those found hiding you. His malice grows, and he will inflict deep suffering on anyone who helps us. I can not stand by while he tortures people in my name. This ridiculous game must come to an end.”

A wisp of black smoke appeared behind her mother, and Elsie shivered. The shadow wolf had arrived. Santa Muerte glanced his way as the smoke shifted and swirled, thickening before forming a massive, solid black wolf with shaggy hair and glowing red eyes. His lips were drawn back, showing pearly white fangs the length of her mother’s forearms. He gave her nightmares.