they even touching the ground? Could the others get away, too? She ran beside Loch, back along the footprints they’d left in the snow, and didn’t dare stop to look back. Ohgodohgod, we left them, we left them . . . Behind her she heard Burke fire again and again, the sound loud even over the wail of the wind and the engines and the howling of the hunters. Tears of relief mingled with those of terror as Spirit heard running footsteps crunching and skidding in the snow behind the two of them—she was certain on an instinctive level that the Wild Huntsmen didn’t make those sounds.
She thought she was running as fast as she could, but Muirin passed her and Loch—and then, incredibly, skidded to a stop. Muirin slid to her knees in the snow and didn’t bother to get to her feet as she readied her slingshot again.
Spirit hesitated, but Loch grabbed her arm again and yanked her onward so violently she slipped and nearly fell before she could recover her balance. Her throat was raw and burning with cold, and her chest ached as if she’d been punched. If she hadn’t survived the accident that had killed her family, if she hadn’t undergone months of painful grueling physical therapy to learn to walk again, she could never have kept up the pace that Loch set. But pain was an old friend to Spirit White. It was the one thing she wasn’t afraid of. This wasn’t any worse than the hospital. This wasn’t any worse than waking up, knowing her whole family was dead, so broken that there weren’t enough drugs in the world to keep her from feeling the pain of broken limbs and a broken heart.
Behind her Spirit heard another eldritch shriek as another of the not-trucks was sent back to the Hollow Hills. She heard Burke fire again—two shots, then he had to stop to reload—she heard Addie shout for Muirin to come on, come on—
“Okay, okay,” Loch said, gasping for breath and slowing to a staggering walk. He waved behind him, obviously wanting to convey information but too winded to do it. Spirit stopped, leaning over, hands pressed against her thighs, breath whistling in her throat, coughing and choking as she sucked in great lungfuls of the bitterly cold dry air. She reeled, staggering as she finally turned to look behind her, squinting as she was painfully buffeted by the storm-wind the Hunt had summoned.
There were only five vehicles now instead of the dozen there’d been at the beginning. The Wild Hunt could have overtaken them in seconds if it had wanted to, Spirit thought, but the vehicles were moving forward at a speed no faster than a slow walk. Her friends were running away—but so slowly! And they were staggering as if they were sick or hurt.
“Come on, come on,” Loch muttered.
Then Addie fell. The Super Soaker skittered out of her hands, spinning out of reach across the surface of the snow. She lunged for it, but Burke hauled her to her feet and dragged her onward.
“What’s—?” Spirit gasped, still panting for breath. What’s wrong with them?
Then she felt it. A wave of abyssal cold, rolling toward her through the wind as if somebody had just opened a giant freezer. It made the bone-chilling temperature of a moment ago seem balmy by comparison. Too cold to breathe, too cold to do anything but lie down and . . .
“Come on,” Loch said, but this time he was speaking to her. “We have to . . . get out of . . . range.”
Out of range of the spell, Spirit supplied mentally. But for a moment she couldn’t move. She was staring at the driver of the single surviving SUV. The rider, rather, because he was standing on the front seat staring at them intently. Though he was dressed like his hunters in ragged hunting clothes, he had antlers—either attached to his cap or growing directly from his skull—and beneath the shadow of the cap’s brim, his eyes glowed with a baleful crimson light.
“—demon—” Spirit gasped breathlessly. Not just ghosts. Not just elves. There was a demon as well. They’d need Loch’s spell-trap. And they’d need her spell. But I don’t remember the words!
For the first time since that terrible night when she’d lost her family, Spirit believed—she knew—she was going to die. They were all going to die. Banish the ghosts, banish the elves, none of it would matter, because the demon would