AN: Fair reminder that this story is rated 'M'.

Violet awoke to a quiet, restrained hiss, pitched perfectly to draw the attention of her sleeping mind.

The last breaths of unconsciousness vanished in a flash of icy cold, and Violet rolled to her feet, biting back a sharp gasp as a line of pain rushed through her torso, reminding her that deep tissue damage would take even her impressive healing a few days of soreness to recover from. Cat, in her feline shape, prowled in front of Sirius and hissed again, a soft, warning sound. The first rays of dawn were shining through a window over the cabin's table, and even in the middle of a swamp, birdsong could be heard.

A heavy clunk sounded from the vicinity of the door. Violet had just enough time to put on her robes before the door opened. It was fortunate that she had purchased robes of a softer fabric—the more common and inexpensive wool would have irritated her skin without the undershirt, especially the sensitive burns inflicted inflicted by pseudo-lightning. She paused for a moment, hand resting on the pocket that held her invisibility cloak. If she concealed herself, the owner of the cabin would see only two animals, possibly averting confrontation entirely. Unfortunately, if they were able to see through Sirius's or Cat's disguise, that all but guaranteed conflict. In the end, the decision was made for her as the door swung open.

A wizened little woman stepped through the doorway. She carried a comically large sack over her shoulder, and swayed with its apparent weight. With her deep laugh lines and wild, frizzy gray hair, she could have been a beloved grandmother—or something else.

"A guest?" the old woman said as her gaze reached Violet. Her eyes were clouded, and she had a perpetual squint.

"Of an unwitting sort," Violet replied. She approximated an apologetic smile. "I didn't know if anyone lived here, but the door was unlocked, and there were all manner of frightening sounds. The moon turned red!"

The old woman frowned. "Oh, you poor dear. So very, very far from home you must be. The Wild ones are a boisterous bunch, but they've always been good to old Louise." She broke into a dry giggle that devolved into coughing. "Are these your little friends?" she asked, looking at Sirius and Cat.

"Ah… yes." Violet looked away, blinking forcefully until tears came to her eyes. "I was just taking my dog and my, uh… cat… for a walk and then I got so turned around, and that was days ago."

"Poor thing," Louise crooned. She dropped the sack on the floor with a heavy thud and slight squelch. "And what are their little names?"

"Uh…" Violet hadn't thought quite that far ahead. "Spot and… Catherine. I'm Valentina."

"So sweet." Louise smiled widely. "You must be hungry. Have you tried the soup?"

The fireplace still burned, though logic would have suggested it should be reduced to ash by now. The heavy pot above it continued to let out the occasional puff of steam through its lid, smelling better than ever. Violet was pretty sure she could see how this was going. Though this being that wore the skin of a woman managed to get about ninety percent of the way to acting in a reassuringly friendly manner, it had an inhuman edge that a legitimately lost mortal in the Wyld would almost certainly fail to notice. It was probably not a coincidence Louise's cabin was situated so near to one of the Wild Hunt's haunts. The only question was how to extract herself from the situation without violence, if possible. Between her own injuries and Sirius's coma-like slumber, direct confrontation was not an ideal option. She had underestimated the Hunt, and it almost killed her.

Violet shook her head. "I didn't want to presume."

"Oh, but you are my guest. You simply must try it."

"You are too kind—and the smell is lovely, if I may say—but I'm afraid I can't stay long."

"Nonsense, dear. Nonsense," Louise said. She hefted the sack and lifted the lid of the cooking pot—more of a cauldron, really, it was quite massive.

Violet started edging toward the door but stopped in sheer astonishment when she saw Louise dump the contents of the bag into the pot. It was meat. Raw, unevenly hacked, lumps of red meat. There was a lot of of it.

Water splashed out of the pot, bursting into puffs of steam against the hot coals below. Violet started moving again, but then her eyes caught on Sirius's sleeping form, barely a meter away from Louise. This would be delicate.

"Oh, your little friend isn't well, is he?" Louise said. "Not to worry. I know just the thing."

She took a large ladle from where it hung on the mantle and dipped it into the pot. Though she had just added the raw meat, when she lifted the ladle, it appeared fully cooked and tender. An indescribably delicious smell filled the room as the old woman bustled though a cabinet for a bowl.

Violet's eyes narrowed. "What sort of meat was that, exactly?"

"Oh, a little of this, a little of that. Just the thing for when you're not feeling well, soup. Just lovely."

It really did smell good. Too good. Violet took a deep breath, forcing away the delicious scent, her soreness, and the and the lingering unease from her brush with death until there was nothing left but a deep, throbbing cold that could be neither deceived nor denied.

The cabin remade itself. Violet had been expecting to see something shocking. In her time, she had seen mutilated corpses, tortured until insane, a ballroom painted in shades of red, and the worst of the depravities that Knockturn Alley could offer. She still reeled back at what she saw.

The fireplace was cold and unlit. The delicious scent was replaced with something foul and almost chemical. Louise was stooping to offer the bowl to Sirius, but what had been a steaming stew was now cold lumps of raw meat that teemed with writhing worms, burrowing and digging deep into the chunks before emerging on the other side.

The tiny old woman had been replaced with something bulging and monstrous. It barely fit under the ceiling, having to stoop to avoid the rafters. Its appearance defied decency.

The creature was naked. Wet, clammy skin and poorly defined features on a flat, square head jutted from its shoulders without any apparent neck. Its skin was smeared and pasty, like poorly smoothed clay. But the worst were the dozens of faces, most seemingly human, but some animal, all crudely stitched and hooked into the thing's skin. Their eyes were gone, and their mouths hung open. Open sores littered the faces, and those same worms crawled in and out of the eyes and mouths and the sores. All were screaming.

Revulsion filled her. Sirius's canine nostrils flared even in sleep, and before she could so much as hesitate, her wand was flying into her hand.

"Crucio!"

The flash of dark magic bit into the creature, and the screaming of one of the faces reached new heights of anguish. Louise itself merely grunted and staggered away from Sirius, slamming into a wall and knocking a candlestick to the floor.

"Little witch," it said in a deep, grating voice. "You pay for that. You'll make me strong."

Then, it reached down with one clawed shovel of a hand and dug into its own flesh around the screaming face, pulling it free along with a large chunk of its own tissue and hurling it to the ground. The flesh immediately began to seize, teeming with worms, and expanding outward. Flesh beget flesh, and bone snapped into place. Something like a human, flayed of its skin and half-devoured by maggots and worms, thrashed under the Cruciatus. It still wore the same stitched-on face.

Violet curled her lip. Injuries forgotten under disgust, she drove her wand forward as if it were a sword. Fortis Lancea!

Louise had only a chance to snarl before the lance of magic slammed into it, lifting the hulking creature off its feet, smashing it straight through the cabin's wall, and driving it ten or twenty meters through the swamp muck beyond. Violet stalked after it, dispatching the hideous flesh-creature with a Killing Curse. She wasn't sure if anything remained of the man whose face Louise had stolen, but she suspected that if there was, he was thanking her.

"My house!" Louise bellowed in an utterly mutilated dialect of the fae tongue. "You smashed my house!"

It pulled itself out of the mud, dug its claws into another of its faces, and ripped outward. Then again, and again. The inchoate fleshlings wriggled and bubbled, bloating into foul mimicries of humans and animals, shambling toward Violet in a staggering charge. Stars above, that was just repulsive.

"Oh, go fuck yourself."

Fiendfyre boiled from Violet's wand in a flock of blazing ravens, curtains of black and red fire trailing them. The meat puppets exploded as the Fiendfyre tore into them, gouts of vaporized blood spraying into the air; the swamp water boiled instantly, sending a shockwave of expanding steam rippling through the standing water, and the now bare mud in an area ten meters across was desiccated as dry as baked pottery. Louise let out a hissing shriek as the cursed fire reached it, and as carbonized flesh riddled with worms peeled away, black fire burned in its exposed ribcage.

"I suppose that's one solution."

Violet started at the unexpected voice, and the Fiendfyre took that opportunity to try to turn on her, but with a snarl, she dragged her wand in an arc, and the flames guttered and faded. Slowly, the water that had been pushed away by the heat of the flames began to flow back, steaming as it flowed over the heated surface of the baked mud.

"Fine time you picked to show up. Friend of yours?" Violet said, a little more sharply than she had intended. The fiery wrath of the Fiendfyre still lingered in the air.

"Hardly," said Cat from behind Violet's shoulder. Her expression was neutral, but Violet thought she could sense a slight impression of distaste. "Far be it for me to criticize a condemn a predator for its nature—nor can I deny finding pleasure taken from the plight of prey—but that thing was quite disgusting, was it not?"

Violet laughed briefly. "I can't disagree. Sirius all right?"

"I fear he missed the excitement entirely," Cat whispered, her lips close enough to the back of Violet's neck that she could feel her breath. "A most potent magic. Scarcely can I recall such destruction as well controlled. Your reputation is well founded, it seems."

"I have a reputation now?"

Cat laughed, a soft and musical sound. "The Lady in Iron, they call you. I'm not sure they even realize you're human—or once were. Summer fears you, but I think Winter may fear you more."

Violet turned around, meeting Cat's orange eyes with a raised eyebrow. "You're privy to the private mutterings of Summer and Winter, are you?"

"Why, of course. Perhaps I will even tell you how before we part, from close enough that none will overhear. You'd like that, would you not?"

Violet grinned. "Oh, you've got me. I'm a girl who loves her secrets."

Cat winked and stepped back, shrinking to her feline shape in a blur of black and white.

Violet tucked her wand into her sleeve and looked out over the marsh's expanse. Ash and hints of sulfur drifted through the air as she began to make her way over to the scene of her clash with the Wild Hunt. Corpses lay, half submerged in the murky water. Where the flying horses had fallen, only pools of inky black smoke remained, heavy and pressing against the water's surface but with tendrils occasionally drifting off to dissipate upward. Portions of the corpses were missing too—eyes, fingers, and other mementos of violence made right by the strange magic of the Hunt and now undone in death. Other, presumably post mortem, injuries were also visible, flesh carved away as if by a butcher's knife. It seemed she had found the source of Louise's sack of meat.

She found the site where she had nearly breathed her last. The titanic expanse of the leader of the Wild Hunt's body was still and silent, empty eyes staring up into the sky. His furs were blood-soaked and muddy, and his dented and riven breastplate had lost its luster.

A moment passed. Violet swore she could feel the wind around her neck like the ghost of the titan's gauntlet. In the Wyld, she wasn't necessarily even imagining it. She looked up. Sunlight pierced the cloud cover with a hint of the day's coming heat. Violet drew a breath, her gaze falling to the corpse, and spoke.

"Closer than most."

She turned away and did not look back.

~#~

"Dicey one."

Violet turned at Sirius's voice. They had been traveling for a few hours by now and had just left the marsh behind for more grassland. "Suppose so," she said tersely.

"What happened to the hut?" Sirius asked.

"Spirited disagreement with the proprietor."

Sirius nodded. "Were they really the Wild Hunt, you think? Or just… faeries?"

"Does it matter?"

With an audible sigh, Sirius looked away. A moment passed before he said, "You got away all right though, right? I was going to come back for you, but I, uh, passed out. And I saw your shirt…"

"I'm fine, Sirius," Violet said, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Bloody hell, it's not like this is new for me. I've been fighting since before I even saw a wand. The Hunt wasn't any different. I just should've been paying more more attention, that's all."

Sirius snorted and raised his hands in front of him. "Fair enough. But this crotchety old man's feeling a bit insecure after nearly dying in his first scuffle in decades, so if you could pretend to need a little reassurance here and there, it'd go a long way for my ego. Thanks."

Violet laughed despite herself. "I'll keep that in mind."

She'd been in a somewhat surly mood since the morning, unable to stop dwelling on the memory of the massive gauntlet's crushing grip, gasping and flailing futilely. It wasn't the possibility of dying that bothered her. She was under no illusions as to her own mortality, and her life was not a peaceful one. But to be made so helpless with no option but what was essentially spiteful suicide, to need to rescued galled her. Cat's teasing didn't really help.

She cast a Compass Charm, oriented herself, and nodded once. "We're making progress. A few more days and we'll be there, I think."

"Music to my ears," Sirius said, and she could hear the relief in his voice. "What's it called?"

"Don't know."

"Hmm?"

Violet shrugged. "All I know is it's a court, presumably of significant size, and it's supposed to have some sort of healing spring. If that doesn't work out, we'll look into other options." Seeing Sirius draw a breath, she continued, "And yes, I know that doesn't make any sense. We'll just have to find out together."

"Got it."

They walked in silence for a few minutes before Sirius cleared his throat.

"Say, in your expert opinion, how do the fae ladies like handsome, roguish, humans?"

~#~

Violet could feel something getting closer. Or, more precisely, they were getting closer to it.

Its weight was grand; its authority, absolute. An unseen shadow it cast, and all of Summer enjoyed its shade. Violet wasn't sure what it was coming from, but she was certain she would soon find out. Something was itching in the back of her mind, perhaps a barely remembered passage from one of the beautifully calligraphed epics by the old poets, where history and legend were set to the same verse. She had read hundreds of such works in her time in Satria's court, and frankly, they had a tendency to blur together. Now, she rather wished she had paid more attention.

For four days they had traveled since escaping the Wild Hunt, following Cat's cryptic direction. The land had grown only more mystic and beautiful as they moved deeper into Summer. Now that she had had enough time to get her bearings, she was fairly sure that they had appeared near the eastern border of the Wyld, not far from the endless impassible mountains that ridged it to the east and west. Since the third day, the three of them had been traveling through another forest, this one drier and more temperate than the last, not entirely unlike what could be found in Britain. The trees were older, though, the sounds more eerie, and the night was broken by the lights of tiny faeries and other lesser Sidhe.

It was a few hours past midnight, probably. Violet couldn't quite muster the motivation to cast a charm to be sure. The night was beautiful, the stars bright and strange. Here, a constellation formed of a man, noble in stature, with a crown upon his brow. A moment later, she blinked and it changed, and the man seemed to be plunging from the sky, points of starry blood trailing behind him.

She hummed softly to herself, a gentle tune that she couldn't remember learning. These times in the early morning, when she had her fill of sleep, but hours yet before Sirius would stir, were pleasant. They reminded her a little of when she was younger and often explored the frozen wildness of Winter entirely alone for days or even weeks on end. These days, she found herself so occupied with thoughts of conspiracy and war and the accumulation of power that she had little time for the simpler things. Perhaps she would take a few years to wander the desolate outskirts of the Wyld once Voldemort was dead and Esrid a threat no longer. Millennia stretched out ahead of her as long as she avoided Death's pointed gaze. A few years was no time at all, really.

A soft warmth butted against her leg, and Cat whined softly as she unceremoniously curled into Violet's lap. She laughed lightly, careful not to be too loud. She was a few dozen meters away from where Sirius slept, and she was pretty sure he could sleep through a cannonade anyway, but it didn't do to announce one's presence too loudly in the dark.

"Sirius thrashing too much in his sleep again?" Violet asked. "I do hope you're keeping your promise."

Cat's tail thrashed, as if in irritation at the question, then settled when Violet began scratch her neck, purring softly.

A few minutes passed in peaceful silence before, without warning, Cat blurred, and the slender woman lay sprawled over Violet's legs.

She drew a short, surprised breath. The moonlight spilled over Cat's impossibly white skin, casting it nearly into shades of blue. Her fingers rested over Cat's sternum, just above the neckline of her dress. The smooth skin of her collarbone and neck caught beautiful shadows as her head dangled half off Violet's leg, her eyes faintly glowing in the darkness.

Cat was very, very nice to look at.

"An older song," Cat said, tone light and amused. "And not one I have often heard."

Violet stopped humming. "It is?"

"You don't know?" Cat laughed silently. "Oh, that's perfect."

Violet sighed. "I don't suppose you'd consider telling me?"

"Mm," Cat said. "Convince me."

Before the last breath of her words left her, Violet reached her free hand around Cat's neck and pulled her into a searing kiss. Cat laughed again, the sound gentle against Violet's lips, and threw her weight to the side, sending them both rolling over the dry, dusty ground. Brief pain flared in her torso in a dull echo of the Wild Hunt's gunshot and her fading burns as they scratched over the ground, but the sting only sharpened her desire. She knew her expression must have been a hungry thing.

Cat wound up on top, staring down at Violet with utterly inhuman eyes. "You have made good company, huntress," she whispered. "I almost wish I could stay."

Violet twined her fingers into Cat's hair and pulled her down against her lips, who responded with the wanton glee of the immanently unfettered. Violet gasped for an uneven breath and grinned. "But you can't, can you?" she said. "You may be able to lie and grasp iron, but there's still a price to what you are, isn't there?"

"Aye," Cat said, as a wonderfully cold hand slid into Violet's shirt—it had taken over an hour to get the blood out—and danced, feather-light, over her skin. She closed her eyes, and said, sounding almost as if she was reciting something, "'Til nine I count, I wander, ne'er to stay, but, oh, the things I see through all eyes in the dark!"

Her body was hot, and her hands were cold, and Violet was quickly starting to wonder whether Cat's insight, however fascinating, could possibly compare to other uses for her mouth. Winter within her howled in approval, urging her to drink as deeply as she could, to leave no urge unsated. To feast, to fight, to fuck—such were the primal pleasures that not even immortality could hope to dull.

So she did not deny herself, grasping freely at beauty that was easily the equal to any she had seen before. Pearly laughter escaped Cat as she responded, biting Violet's lips hard enough that she tasted iron.

"So sweet," she said, and Violet could see her tongue was red.

Unknowable moments of burning pleasure and cold satisfaction passed, before Cat spoke again, her voice nearly a hiss.

"I've watched you, little huntress, since you were but a kit, through eyes countless. You carved them out once and reveled in the kill. Through dark alleys of mortal squalor and from frozen pines, I watched you grow. And now I see you."

Something between a gasp and a moan escaped Violet. "Through the cat's eye, have you? I know I'm beautiful, but I might succumb to pride if you flatter me so."

"Such is the right of the strong."

Some part of Violet's mind was aware that what Cat was implying would make her more than just a powerful being. Patron of all cats, the ability to see through their eyes—that bordered on divinity. She was aware of that. She just didn't care.

"And what else do you see, O Wanderer?" Violet asked, though a sharp, blissful sound rather ruined the dramatic phrasing.

"T'would be wiser to ask what I do not," Cat whispered from no more than an away from her ear. "There are few places a cat cannot walk. I see the ancients stirring once more—myself too, though I never truly rested. The Cursed Riders once more darken the night sky after many a thousand years nigh unseen. The Fallen Fair take up iron and flock to the banner of the Third, which approaches no longer, for It is here." She curled a finger through Violet's hair. "You have no idea just how important you are, huntress."

That was probably all important, and it would get its due consideration in time. Right now, though, Violet had other things on her mind. She pulled Cat to her, and thought no more.

As passionate oblivion took her, murmured, sultry words lingered: "We will see each other again, I think, before the end…"

~#~

Dawn streamed through the crevices where leaves were not, and a shadow swept across the little camp with the inexorable advance of the sun. In the far distance, a pillar that seemed to be as thin as a hair and as tall as the sky was haloed by daylight's golden glow.

Cat was gone.

Though it should have been no surprise, her absence brought a pang of something unpleasant to Violet. Perhaps it was simply dissatisfaction at Cat leaving her indebted, or perhaps it was the lingering warmth from where her skin had pressed against Cat's. Either way, if she was gone, it could only mean one thing: they had nearly reached the healing spring she spoke of.

Violet managed to recover her robe and scattered undergarments, though not without some considerable searching. The previous night had been… energetic. The memory was a pleasant one, and any melancholy didn't last long. She began to hum, that same little ditty that Cat had never got around to identifying.

Sirius woke up a few minutes later. "Morning," he grunted. "We have any food left?"

"Afraid not," Violet said. "Finished the fish last night."

Sirius dissolved into a string of muffled profanity as he began the laborious process of extricating himself from the grasping strands of a bush he had rolled into the previous night. Violet raised an eyebrow.

"No food, no tea. Bloody uncivilized is what it is. Remind me why—" His eyes narrowed. "You're in a fine mood."

"Nothing like a sunrise to lift one's spirits."

Sirius snorted. "Sure. Where's the damned cat? We could eat that."

She couldn't help but giggle. Crassly speaking, she already had.

"What is wrong with you?" Sirius groused. "Nearly a week in the sticks, and you still look like bloody royalty. Meanwhile, I'm wading through mud, crawling through roses, bathing in streams, and I can't even do it as a dog because the damn curse knocks me out when I try. Tell me we're getting close?"

"Look for yourself," Violet said, pointing to the distant spire. Now that she was taking a longer look at it, the vague memory that had been bothering her since leaving the swamp finally came into focus. "Huh."

"What?" Sirius asked.

"Let's just say that not everyone has the same definition of what a fountain is," Violet said wryly, eyeing the spire core of the mountain upon which Olumnus, last King of Summer, died.

~#~

With a flutter of dark fabric, Nymphadora Tonks swept through the subterranean halls of the Department of Mysteries. An Unspeakable passing her in the hallway grunted a laconic greeting, as unable to see under her hood as she was his. Or, at least she thought they were a guy. Between their flowing robes and voice modulation, it was hard to tell. Either way, they didn't seem offended when she didn't reply. The Unspeakables were a strange lot at the best of times who tended to prefer the secrets of the universe to such trivialities as politeness.

Left two. Right one. Left on, and then—

That was it. A patch of the wall, at first glance looking like any other, had a slight shimmer when viewed from the right angle. If she hadn't known to look for it, she never would have spotted it. Tonks wasn't entirely sure how Dumbledore had managed to get directions to this place, let alone an authentic set of Unspeakables' robes. He was Dumbledore, though. The odd miracle was expected from him.

Tonks checked both ways, then drew her wand.

"Finite Incantatem," she said firmly.

For a second, it seemed like her spell had failed, but then the brick wall shivered and dissolved into motes of light, the intangible barrier collapsing a moment later.

"Ha," she said. "No one beats me at Charms."

She stepped into the unlit room. "Lumos."

She gasped. It looked like an army of Christmas trees had tried to fight a gargoyle. Unfortunately, she didn't think Dumbledore would find that description very helpful, so she went to take a closer look around.

Shorn shards of pinewood, boughs ripped and crushed, churned into earth turned muddy by water completely coated the floor of the chamber. It was hot; four metals rods had been pushed into the mud at the center of the room, each set with a small, orange gem that pulsed and throbbed with radiant heat.

Tonks approached the heating gems, holding her arm to shield her face. A fine chain connected each of the poles, and a sign hung from the nearest one.

PERMANENTLY DECOMMISSIONED

DO NOT APPROACH

Stopping short of the chains, Tonks peered over them. It wasn't worth risking whatever protections the Unspeakables might have seen fit to place on the encircled area to get any closer. Shattered fragments of stone littered the muddy ground, and two jagged shards jutted upward, a moderate distance from each other. The broken structures were scorched black, and cracks through their structure.

Bloody hell. When they said something was decommissioned, they weren't kidding. Tonks cast a nervous look back at the entrance. With the barrier dispelled, anyone who walked by could hardly fail to notice her, and since this "Cold Room" had apparently been involved in the recent break-in, she doubted even genuine Unspeakable robes would be enough to talk her way out of that.

She turned and left, retracing her steps through the mystifying design of the Department of Mysteries. Dumbledore would know what all this meant—hopefully. It was a bit above her pay grade. Dark wizards, she could handle—dark government agencies, not so much.

She ducked into a supply closet that had probably been last used in the eighteenth century and doffed the robes, stuffing them behind a stack of moth-eaten parchment. She let her disguise lapse, reverting to her preferred appearance. Closing the closet behind her, she let out an unconscious breath. If she was honest, the Unspeakables freaked her out a little, what with their eerie voices, strict secrecy, and reputation for disregarding unnecessary bureaucracy—like laws against human experimentation. Spying on the Ministry was risky, but not really dangerous. They wouldn't actually act against her without concrete proof. The Unspeakables, on the other hand, would probably consider it a fine joke if one of their captives mentioned something like "burden of proof" or "human rights."

And that was why she was quite surprised to see Dawlish and Petersson approaching her, wands drawn, blood-red robes swirling dramatically.

After a brief moment of panic, she quickly came to her senses. Maybe she'd tripped some alarm even with the robes. If so, they'd be looking for a rogue Unspeakable—or, even if they could somehow see through the robe's hood, a witch that looked nothing like Nymphadora Tonks. Hell, she was probably going to end up searching for herself. The thought was more than a little funny.

"All right, Dawlish? Petersson?"

Dawlish grimaced, looking like he had been asked to swallow something unpleasant. "Nymphadora Tonks," he said, "you are under arrest for treason, conspiracy in service of a criminal organization, accessory to abduction, and suspicion of murder. You have the right to legal representation."

Oh.

AN:

I was a bit surprised by the number of people wondering why Violet initially thought the Wild Hunt was mythical. The fae like to think that they're far superior to anything else in the Wyld, and that nothing escapes their gaze. The existence of a powerful, uncontrolled force that makes no overtones of partaking of their games, that they aren't even aware of, would be nearly unthinkable to them, especially since the Hunt has scarcely been seen in the Wyld except for its very outskirts for aeons. Of course, that might just change in the future…

Panndora: Oh, please don't apologize for long reviews—those are my favorite kind.