Court of Shadows (Indefinite Hiatus)

PART 22: AELIN

Aelin quickly made her way further into the woods, sprinting nearly silently through the spread of trees and using the golden glow of the near-setting sun to judge her direction. Though she predicted she had an hour or two before the landscape fell to darkness, Aelin's unfamiliarity with the land propelled her to push forward. She moved mechanically, controlling her breathing with fixed counts and pumping her muscles in a steady rhythm. As her feet ate up distance, Aelin relished the unhindered movement of her limbs, liberated from the iron chains-- while also cursing the weakness of her body.

Though she moved remarkably fast for human standards, the progress she was making in her fae form was noticeably slower. She had expected the poor physical condition of her body to be impeding, but the disorientation brought on by her unaccustomed fae senses proved far more surprising.

Her heightened hearing and vision put Aelin on unstable ground as she ran through the strange territory. An abundance of magical creatures and potent flora assaulted her senses incessantly; were it not for the visibility of the light from the sun, Aelin suspected that her progress would be even slower.

She knew that Maeve would have already sent males to track her, and though the Queen's males had had more time to adjust to the other-worldly Spring Court, Aelin expected that the new sensations of running through these forests were equally-- if not, more-- overwhelming to their more refined senses.

Soon, her pace began to slow, her ravaged body becoming heavier and less responsive. The air could only enter and leave her chest in dry, heaving gasps, her throat tasting of blood from the rawness of her lungs, and her legs threatening to buckle. Her chest constricted further as she acknowledged the implications of her exhausted body and hindered progress.

The surrounding trees suddenly began to thin, and Aelin purposefully slowed her pace as the coverage became more sporadic. She quickly reached the edge of what she had mistakenly assumed to be a dense forest.

Shit, she whispered raggedly, the breaths clambering out of her mouth in raspy puffs. Keeping just a few steps within the shadowed treeline, Aelin looked down upon a large village. Rows upon rows of brown buildings and branching streets, harboring hundreds of moving figures. The lights and constant buzzing of village-life spoke of non-stop activity, and no doubt thousands of occupants-- thousands of eyes and witnesses.

Aelin retreated a couple of steps back into the treeline. She recalled the appearance of the fae who had welcomed Maeve upon their arrival at the Spring Court house-- their pointed ears and stature very similar to her own; however, without the slight protrusion of canines that she possessed. If the occupants of this village were of the same fae species, Aelin would easily be able to slip through undetected; however, in a village residing in the far outreaches of any land-- there were bound to be more differences than distance and money which separated its occupants from that of their ruler. And in a land that also possessed heightened levels of magic, she was unwilling to take the risk of hoping her human form might draw less attention than her fae one.

So, Aelin retreated even farther into the small woods, returned to a particularly hospitable-looking tree, and clambered up, where she stretched out her legs, balancing on a branch and leaning her back against the trunk. Nearly every bone in Aelin's body rebelled against her staying in one location, the adrenaline of near freedom and the knowledge of her pursuers pulsing in her veins. Urging her to run. Some part of her swore that she could hear the pacing of Maeve's fury and the quiet formidable thudding of her fae males spreading throughout the Court, throwing their senses around them in wide arcs, searching. Tracking her.

Aelin's thoughts won out over her instincts, though, as she knew that she could not afford being singled out in that village any more than she could afford staying still. She would wait for dark, and then she would use the cover of night to slip through.