Fae High Summer Hunt Read Online Free PDF

couldn’t live away from court for another year.”
    “Yet you stayed away for five cycles,” Baylor rebuked. “All you had to do was show yourself during a Hunt to secure your return. The Queen’s moods are mercurial, but she never expected you to stay away for such a long time. All Fae are expected to attend the great gathering to contribute to the Greening.”
    Unnerved by Baylor’s admonishment, Naeme pulled back from him to gape up into his face. “What are you talking about? It was just last summer in a fit of pique Titania sent me into exile.”
    Her lover transformed into a warrior. The slumberous, sated gleam in his eyes vanished, replaced by a watchful glitter. She pulled back from Baylor. The menace he exuded had turned him into a cold stranger.
    “No, Naeme, it’s been five years since you left.” He released her hips and lifted her off him. The water returned to its natural state and they sank into the chilly liquid. The warm sensual languorousness dissipated.
    Eyes and face hard with resolution, Baylor gripped her by the upper arms. “What do you remember of your time away?”
    “What does it matter?”
    “You’ve lost time, Naeme. Don’t you find that odd?”
    Fear was alien to her, yet she shied away from delving into her memories. What she could recall came to her as blurry images with no fixed sense of time or place. “Well, I spent some time wandering through the forests.”
    “Did you spend all your time alone?”
    She tilted her head and quirked a brow at him.
    “Of course not, you’d find a companion.”
    “I am gregarious by nature. I like company, while you’re almost reclusive.”
    “People are a pain in my ass.”
    “Only because you intimidate them with that glacial stare of yours.”
    Speaking of his icy glare, he fixed it on her and demanded, “Who did you spend time with?”
    She thought long and she thought hard. Remembering wasn’t as easy as she’d expected. “Well, I recall spending some time with Eldritch and his Waterfolk.”
    “The elves.” The flat intonation had her rolling her eyes at him.
    “Yes,” she stressed. The elves were welcoming and generous. “I remember wintering with them.” Naeme frowned—she had no recollection of parting from Eldritch, yet her next memory was with Panos. She didn’t think she had spent all that much time with him, but…
    “My most recent memory is my time with Panos.”
    “The satyr?”
    She heard the disapproval in his voice and bristled. “Yes, Panos. He’s a lot of fun,” she stated emphatically as if she had to say it by rote. “That was until I wanted to leave.”
    “Tell me, how did he react?” The bland question didn’t give any hint of what he was thinking.
    “Well, that’s the peculiar thing—he was almost desperate to keep me with him. It was out of character—satyrs are not known to form attachments.”
    “Did he now? I think you need to come back to court with me.”
    Naeme pushed at Baylor’s chest and he released her. She paddled in the water, putting some space between them. “I have not agreed to your claiming.”
    “Something’s afoot here. I don’t have time to bandy words with you, Naeme. I had two reasons to join the Hunt. One was to find you. The other was to see to it that my men assembled as many Fae as they could find for this gathering. For the last couple of years, the winters have been long and a bitter coldness has lingered far into the spring. All life in the forest depends on the change of the seasons for it to flourish.”
    “Nothing can stop the natural order of things.” Perturbed by what he’d said, she bit her lip to stop it from trembling.
    “If the winter is longer, the plants won’t germinate in the spring, ripen in the summer, so that we can harvest in the autumn. The animals will be confused. We of the Fae have a duty to heat up the Earth with our sex magic to sustain the land. I have a suspicion that someone is about to piss on our parade and I don’t like