I practically jumped out of my skin when the Erlking suddenly revved his bike again. The Huntsmen broke their circle, freeing us as they lined up in formation behind their leader.
“Remove his glamour, Finn of the Daoine Sidhe,” the Erlking said. “Then you will understand why my gaze affected him as it did.”
With another laugh, he put his helmet back on. The roar of the Wild Hunt’s bikes was deafening as they rode away.
* * *
I didn’t exactly feel safe now that the Hunt had left, but I did at least feel capable of turning my attention elsewhere. I looked at Lachlan, who was holding his hands up in front of him in what looked like a defensive gesture as he backed away from Finn.
Magic built in the air, pouring off Finn in waves, and the look on his face was not promising. I had a good guess what was going to happen when Finn cast whatever spell he was about to cast, and it made my stomach do a flip-flop.
Finn released his magic, and it hit Lachlan like a physical blow, knocking him back—and blowing away his glamour. Without his glamour, he should have looked like a monster: a massive, ugly troll with clawed fingers and a mouth full of fangs. Instead, there was a muscular man of middling height with the uptilted eyes of a Fae, but sporting a scraggly beard that said he had a good dose of human blood in him.
One thing was for sure: it was not Lachlan.
Finn reached for me—no doubt to shove me behind him—and the moment he took his eyes off the imposter, the bastard turned tail and ran.
“Stop him!” I yelled at Finn, but I knew before the words had left my mouth that he wouldn’t. His job was to protect me, so he couldn’t chase the imposter. But if the imposter got away, then we might never know who had sent him—and what he’d done with the real Lachlan.
In retrospect, what I did next was flat-out dumb. Keane might have been training me in self-defense, but I was still a beginner, at best. Usually, I’m a pretty cautious person, into the look-before-you-leap philosophy. But being in Avalon, learning to fight, and constantly being in danger was changing me in more ways than one.
Fake-Lachlan was going to get away because Finn had to babysit me, and I didn’t want Fake-Lachlan getting away. So I dropped my bag of groceries and ran after him.
My reckless charge took Finn completely by surprise, so he was a beat too slow when he tried to reach out and grab me. I heard him yell my name as I dodged out of reach, but I ignored him and kept running. The arrival of the Wild Hunt had effectively cleared the streets, so both the imposter and I were able to run full speed. I heard the sound of Finn’s feet pounding the pavement behind me, and I allowed myself a little smile of satisfaction. I might not be much of a match for the imposter, but the guy wouldn’t be running like his life depended on it if he thought he could handle Finn.
The smile disappeared when the imposter suddenly stopped in his tracks, whirling around to face me. I tried to put on the brakes, but I’d been running headlong and couldn’t stop in time.
I crashed into the imposter’s body, my momentum pushing him back a few steps as his breath whooshed out. But apparently, he’d been ready for me, because he recovered his balance much faster than I did, and he wrapped his arms around me, turning me around so my back was to his chest. One of his arms pinned mine to my sides, while his other arm came around my neck.
“Stay back!” he yelled at Finn. “Come any closer, and I’ll break her neck.”
Finn stopped much more gracefully than I had and glared daggers at my attacker.
But I hadn’t been taking all those self-defense lessons from Keane for no reason, and we’d practiced any number of different escapes from this particular hold, which was apparently an old standby for bad guys. Without a moment of hesitation, I did three things in quick succession. I stomped down as hard as I could on his instep. Then I lowered my head and sank my teeth into his forearm. He screamed and started to let go, and that was when I snapped my head back as hard as I could.
Whoever he was, the guy wasn’t particularly tall, and the back of my head made satisfying contact with his nose. The crunching sound made me wince, as did his howl of pain. But he let go of me in a hurry.
I was wondering if I should turn around and give him a good kick in the knee to make sure he couldn’t run away, but before I could decide, Finn yanked me away and planted his fist in the imposter’s face. Every muscle in his body went limp at once, and he collapsed to the pavement in a heap.
Chapter seven
Despite my frequent complaints about how visitors from Faerie can practically get away with murder in Avalon, the city does have a justice system and a police force. By the time the Lachlan impersonator went down for the count, the Wild Hunt had been gone long enough that people were starting to poke their heads out to see if the coast was clear. Someone must have seen what happened, because before Finn had a chance to round on me and congratulate me on my brilliant performance—hey, it could happen!—we heard the sound of sirens approaching.
The look on Finn’s face said he was considering grabbing me and making a run for it, but by now there were enough witnesses that the cops would have tracked us down if we tried it, and that couldn’t be a good thing.
Finn shook his finger in my face. “You are not to speak to the police, Dana,” he said. “You’re a minor, and they can’t question you without your legal guardian’s permission, so just keep your mouth shut.”
I frowned up at him. “Why? It’s not like we did anything wrong.” At least, not as far as I knew.