Radiant Shadows Read Online Free PDF Page B

off as distorted images from her fears formed around them.
    A faceless faery reached for Tish.
    Hands covered in blood swung at Rabbit.
    Ani’s mother, Jillian, lay dead outside a cupboard.
    Ani was trapped behind a too-small barrier as a faceless faery reached for her.
    Unlike the tea and food, these weren’t things Rae created. They were the terrors of Ani’s imaginings. Here, where Ani felt safe, she envisioned a mix of memories and fears. Rae could alter reality, but the dreamer’s mind also held sway.
    “These aren’t real memories,” Rae reminded. “This is not what happened. You don’t even know—”
    “She was there, and then she was gone.” Ani glared at Rae. “There was a monster. There had to be. He took her and… did something. Hurt her. Killed her. He had to have. If she was alive, she’d have come home. She wouldn’t have left us. She loved us.”
    “You’re a creature that creates fear in others, not one who should dwell in it.” Rae concentrated on remaking the landscape around her. She removed the faceless faery, the dead mother, and the trembling girls. She wiped it all away, and—hopefully—Ani’s fear with it. “Tell me aboutyour court. Think about that. Tell me how things go with the Hunt.”
    “I rode again. The wolves were at our feet; the steeds were like shadows…. It’s perfect when it happens. I want it always like that…. I want a steed; I want to be stronger; I want… oh… I want everything.” Ani’s eyes glimmered the strange green of the Hunt’s beasts. Despite her mixed parentage, she was meant to be among faeries; it had been obvious to Rae since she first met the girl.
    Ani had no awareness of the vows they’d made and broken so Ani could live. Rae did. She remembered it each time Devlin refused to talk about the Hound, each time he refused to go check on her. They’d spared Ani. The time was coming when they’d have to deal with the inevitable consequences.
    Rae reached out and squeezed Ani’s hand. In the dream- scape where Rae walked, she could do that, touch another body. “You’re too impatient.”
    Ani pointed at herself. “Hound. What do you expect?”
    “Exactly what you are,” Rae said.
    Ani wandered into the dreamscape. To her, this was just another dream where her mind worked through fears and worries. And, just then, Ani didn’t want to work through them—so she walked away.
    Rae followed in what was now a vast shadowed forest.
    Time was running out, and neither Devlin nor Ani was any closer to finding their rightful places. And I can’t tell them without undoing everything.
    From the depths of the forest, wolves’ songs rose. A space between the trees opened up, and as Rae walked she could hear the pad of their feet on the needle-covered trail. Rae shuddered as the wolves drew near. Beside her, Ani sighed: the wolves were a comfort to her.
    Ani spun to face Rae and blurted, “Do you think the monster was High Court? They hate my court. They steal halflings. They are monsters.”
    “Monsters are called such by those who are doing the naming.” Rae tensed as a sulfurous green glow illuminated all of the wolves’ eyes in the forest. “Mortals write stories of the beauty of Faerie, of the delicate fey creatures of other courts, and your court’s creatures are the fiends.”
    “He wasn’t my court. That’s for sure.” Ani crouched on the path and the wolves began to slip from among the woods. Their muzzles butted against Ani and Rae. Furred sides brushed against them. Howls rose into a cacophony.
    Ani opened her arms to the wolves. The creatures began circling them in a blur of white teeth and green eyes, musky fur and growling throats. They ran faster and faster, pressing against Ani.
    Rae visualized herself outside the circle, at a far distance up the path.
    One by one, each wolf dove into the center of Ani and disappeared there. They were a part of her, the part that would wake and change the world.
    If. That was the worst part