Page 105 of Lady Knight and the Thief

“I’m not teasing. I’m… testing. Training. How do you think she knows her name already?”

“Who knows? None in Faerie has been bold enough to adopt one of the hounds of the Hunt,” Torren said while he unbuckled the girth strap to his saddle.

Cypress leaned against a tree and called to the Hound. “Come on, Deja.”

With her feathered tail wagging, the Hound trotted over to near the middle of the Faerie ring, sprawled across the grass, and then set upon the carcass of the Griffin. Bone cracking and crumbling between Deja’s large teeth filled the circle with horrendous noise while Cypress and Torren finished with the horses.

By the time a hot meal was in Cypress’s belly, the Hound was fast asleep on her side. From nose to the tip of her tail, Deja crossed the diameter of the circle. If the beast were to stretch, Cypress thought that her limbs would breach the ring.

“By nightfall tomorrow, we’ll be in Westshade. What are you going to do with the Hound while we’re in Human lands?”

“Hope that she listens to me and stays out of sight.”

Torren sighed. “Lass, I told ye.”

“What else can I do? It’s not like I can force her to do anything.”

“Maybe not naming the beast could have been a good place to start.”

“What does naming it have to do with anything?”

Again, Torren sighed, and the muscle on the side of his jaw feathered.

“If you think I did something to make Deja find us and become oddly attached to me, you’re sorely mistaken,” Cypress said and crossed her arms.

“No, of course not, Lass.”

“And yet, you’re acting like an ass.”

“You didn’t need to claim her as yours, Lass. You could have walked away.”

Cypress scoffed. “Yeah. Sure seemed like I could have walked away when she was growling with every step I took.”

“If she follows you into Grethnah, word will spread. We won’t get the scepter, and more of my people will die!” Torren shouted.

“I understand that,” Cypress said through her teeth. “I didn’t ask her to follow us!”

Torren shook his head. “It’s on your head if this all goes to shit.”

Cypress threw her empty metal mug at him.

“You’re an ass,” she said, then grabbed her bedroll from beside the fire and marched over to Deja.

The hound cracked one amber eye and silently lifted the edge of her wing. Cypress crawled in without another word to Torren and arranged her bedroll.

Sleep was slow to come, but when it did, Cypress dreamt of fire, blood, and blades.

33

Manners, Lass

Howwasitpossiblethat the lass did not know of her heritage before now? How had no one put it together, much less him?

Cypress’s skin gleamed like Pixies in the light. Her eyes mirrored the moss, loam, and leaf litter of the forest floor. She bathed in Fire Vine blooms. The Wylds embraced Cypress in a way Torren had never seen—an unmistakable sign.

Not to fuckingmentionthe Winged Hound trailing them. The enormous beast moved like a phantom, the forest shifting, branches bowing to help conceal it in shadows.

Torren shook his head and continued on. He was once again at the head of their voyage through the Wylds and back to the Keep of Grethnah.