Crown of Moonlight (Court of Midnight and Deception #2) - K.M. Shea Page 0,70
breath as Comet stood in the shadow of a massive tree. The shades paced for a little bit, settling farther down the trail.
The sounds of the hunt grew closer as hounds bayed and sun stallions neighed.
“What happened?” Birch shouted above the chaos.
“Something spooked the stag, it’s running west now.”
Well done—we’re doing great.
Something crashed down the path, snorting in its effort to breathe. A flash of white, and the stag passed us.
“Comet!” I shouted.
My night mare took off after it, the shades falling in behind us as we neatly cut around to the front of the hunt, blocking Fell and the others.
“Leila? What the—” Fell broke off into a string of expletives that were actually the sort of thing I’d like to scream at him as I shook him until his teeth jostled loose.
But violence is never the answer! Until it is, anyway.
Unlike Fell, Comet and I kept pace with the stag, practically riding on his tail.
The shades with us surged forward, creating a half circle behind the stag as they kept pace.
I saw the stag move to follow a much more narrow trail that broke off to the left, and I shouted “Block him!”
Whiskers leaped from a tree, his body stretched long as he released his angry goblin scream. He landed in the center of the path that split off, and the stag veered straight again.
“Hey, hey, hey!” I called into the forest.
Please be there. Please be there!
Three night mares emerged from the dark patches of the forest, streaking ahead to box the stag in.
They didn’t stop him—we couldn’t risk him slipping out of our trap because this was likely going to be the only chance we had.
But with the stag completely surrounded, we could more easily control what direction we wanted him to go.
The trick was finding a spot where we could corner him.
Come on, Eclipse. My heart pulsed in my throat as I looked over the formation.
Faintly, I heard the high pitched, glass-shattering scream of a night mare.
“There!” I shouted. “Next left!”
The night mares obligingly parted, creating a slight gap in our formation.
When the stag charged left, they let him zoom up the path, running shoulder to shoulder with him.
Please, please, please, please. My breath hitched as the stag almost left our careful circle.
Like shadows, Muffin, Patches, and Fluffy surged out of the underbrush, screaming at the stag as their fangs gleamed in the faint light of the forest.
The stag jerked back, falling back into our formation as we moved in the direction Eclipse had called from.
We did it. The trickiest part of our trap was over. Now for the most dangerous part.
I loosened my death grip on my reins and ignored Fell—who was still complaining loudly somewhere behind us.
I could see the bright line ahead where the forest opened up into another field. A smear of black marked out Eclipse.
We bore down fast on the field—the stag’s breath sounding more and more labored.
Once we burst out of the forest I had to blink in the early afternoon sunlight to adjust my eyes, then I saw the giant rock formation.
A pile of massive boulders the size of cars had been clustered in a curving line, creating a sort of rock wall.
That was our target.
“Drive him!” I shouted.
The night mares opened up at the front, creating a clear path to the rocks, while the glooms pressed hard from the side.
My shades started snarling and howling behind the stag, driving it into a frenzy. Frantic, the stag turned toward the rock formation.
The night mares held back just long enough for the stag to get closer to the rocks before they surged ahead, cutting the stag’s path off to the left.
Eclipse barreled across the field, joining the glooms and neatly pinching off a gap between the boulders and the cats—who couldn’t move as fast as the night mares—blocking the right side.
Flanked, and with no way to run, the stag backed into the rocks, its hide twitching and quivering as it struggled to catch its breath.
Behind us, the baying of the other monarch’s hounds grew closer.
And this is where the danger begins.
I slipped from Comet’s back and shoved my prism into my right glove.
It was bulky and made the glove uncomfortable, but I didn’t want to have to worry about holding it with what could possibly come next.
“Easy, boy, easy,” I called to the stag, hoping against everything that my natural magic for animals would be able to calm him despite the scare we’d put him through.