Because the damned Svarestri couldn’t see us, either. Not hidden by all the foliage and with a firestorm billowing up behind us. The staff fanned the flames into a whirlwind and then what looked like a solid wall of fire as we left the fey in the freaking dust.
There was only one small problem.
Namely the lifeline above our head. Which wasn’t a second later, when a burning tree fell in the wrong direction and toppled over right on top of it. And sent us flying again, only this time, headed straight for the forest floor.
Chapter Fifty
We landed in a bunch of prickly bushes I didn’t feel because there was something in between us. Something that snapped the next second and sent us tumbling to the ground as whatever shield Pritkin had been able to throw up gave out. We hit hard, because even the bushes were more like little trees around here, and high off the ground. But the next second we were rolling back to our feet, and running.
Because they were coming.
I knew that, even though I couldn’t hear anything. Except for the crackling of a not-so-distant fire and the sounds of scurrying animals diving for cover and a random bird overhead, tweeting a confused note. But I knew they were coming anyway, because I knew them.
And really wished I didn’t.
And then we slammed back into the hollow of a tree, and a hand went over my mouth that I didn’t need, because my throat had already closed in terror at the sight of a silver-blond head passing by just outside.
I froze in place, more out of instinct than sense, because he had to see us; he had to. We were almost close enough to touch. And then we were close enough, as he backed almost into the tree, to give himself the widest possible field of vision over a deep, dark forest filled with flickering flame light, and then flickering fey light as several more ghostly Svarestri ran by. And then he was running, too, following them as they moved deeper into the forest, searching for a prey they’d already found but for some reason hadn’t noticed.
We didn’t move. And a moment later I realized why, as several more Svarestri passed us, silent as ghosts in the night. And then several more. And then what looked like a whole damned battalion.
There hadn’t been this many before, had there? I wondered, but not for long. Because the last group had barely passed when we were stumbling out of the tree as well. I turned to Pritkin to ask what the plan was, and then stopped. And suddenly understood why the fey hadn’t seen us.
Because, for a second there, neither did I.
I was holding his hand; I could feel it, hard and strong and clenching around my palm. He was there—he was right there—but he wasn’t. And then he moved, and I saw a faint shimmer against the night, one that ran with reflected flame around the edges, like a man wearing some kind of mirror suit.
Damn, those fey had taught him well, I thought, right before he collapsed.
I grabbed him, but he only went to one knee, and stayed there gasping against my shoulder. A shoulder that I could suddenly see as well as I could see the rest of him, because the reflective camouflage coating was draining away like water. Until it reached our feet and vanished entirely, leaving me looking at a corpse-pale man who was shaking from effort.
And was all too visible even to human eyes.
I glanced around, my heart thudding, but the fey weren’t there. They weren’t there. But they’d be back and we needed to be gone when they did, but gone where?
We couldn’t go back to the village. It looked like we’d managed to draw them away from the trolls, and we couldn’t lead them back. Even if the guards could help us, there were children, old people . . . and the Svarestri hadn’t seemed to care who they hurt. Their entrance alone might have killed dozens, if these people didn’t have reflexes like cats and the paranoia to create a system for flying through the trees.
No, we couldn’t go back there. We couldn’t go anywhere and be safe, not in faerie. And anyway, I didn’t want us in faerie, I wanted us—
I grabbed Pritkin’s shoulder. “You said we could go home.”
He nodded, looking a bit dazed still, but less like he was about to fall over.
“Then there’s a portal near here. There must be!”
He nodded again. “There’s—” He stopped and licked his lips. “There’s one just over the border.”
“How far?”
“A few minutes, but that—” He broke off. And looked around as if he was trying to see a solution in the trees, one that didn’t appear, because when he looked back at me, his eyes were as dark as I’d ever seen them. “That won’t help us.”
“Why not?” I asked, right before we froze in place, undergrowth covering us more than the night, as several more Svarestri picked their way through the brush, going the other way. They were already starting to circle back around, to establish a perimeter, to begin closing in.
Whatever we were going to do, it had to be now.
“That’s where the Svarestri are,” he whispered as the fey moved in the opposite direction. “It’s one of their portals. And they’ll expect us to try for it; there’s no alternative at this point—”
“We could hide. What you did before—”