Running wasn’t an option as the fae before her had wings and had trapped her between two towering roots. If she tried retreating, razor-sharp talons would cut her down.

No, she’d have to fight her way free.

The harpy-like fae preened triumphantly as it sauntered back and forth, utterly confident in its victory over the cornered prey. Its keen-edged beak snapped with the sound of a gunshot that echoed through the trees. Not wanting to test her remaining fingers against that beak, Autumn instead grasped the iron horseshoe as tightly as she could in what remained of her right hand, while her left gripped that crooked wand.

With bent knees, she slowly paced forward towards the fae.

She lifted the iron horseshoe like a shield while the wand pointed outwards with a Jinx brewing. It’d be her first time casting anything. She hoped beyond hope that it’d work.

At her approach, the bird-like fae rose in aggression and outrage.

Feinting forwards Autumn caused the fae to retreat in panic and upon seeing her grin it grew angrier still. Again and again, Autumn pushed the cowardly bird backward till it could take the taunting no more and lunged.

Before the fae could strike, Autumn unleashed the Jinx she had been nervously holding. From the tip of her wand sprung a fear-fueled tendril. The pulse of purplish dark energy lanced forth, curling and twisting through the space between the two combatants before slamming into the fae’s feminine chest.

The sound of shattering glass and the crunch of metal reverberated in Autumn’s ears.

Terror flooded the creature’s mind in an instant as the raw fear that Autumn had unleashed upon it ran rampant. Its limbs locked up and fouled its leap, sending it down to the earth below. Before it could right itself, Autumn was upon it with fury and iron. The rusty horseshoe came down upon its thin neck and pinned it to the loamy dirt; driven deep with all the weight Autumn could muster till it was bound tight.

Smoke billowed up from where the cold-iron touched it. It thrashed, bucking and screeching in agonized torment as its nature rejected the metal. Already its form flickered between nonsensical colors. As much as Autumn wished to finish it, its cries were drawing too much attention. Already she could hear the barks of hounds and the hoofbeats of pursuit.

With a final parting kick that cracked its beak, Autumn turned tail and fled.

Well aware she had gotten lucky and was now forced to leave a weapon of iron behind, Autumn was all the more motivated to escape. She knew the next fight wouldn’t be so easy.

Further into the forest, she hauled her aching, exhausted limbs. She moved quickly through animal trails and the flowing streams, only pausing once to refill her waterskin in the clearest of them. Roots guided the flow of water and Autumn too as she hoped, perhaps naively, that they’d flow out to a sea.

If the Feywild even had them.

Time passed like a fog, thick and thin at differing intervals.

So she slowed, lagged, and faltered under the burden of exhaustion and leaded limbs.

Yet she couldn’t stop.

The fae were still tracking her, and despite her dips and dives with streams and over lower roots, she hadn’t shaken them. It wasn’t surprising as it was the Wild Hunt and she was but a lone schoolgirl who was hardly adept at covering her tracks. Haunting quietness followed her every breath, every footfall. The forest listened to her panic. It listened to the baying of hounds and blowing horns. It listened and waited.

Suddenly, without warning, the forest just ended. It was as if a giant had drawn a line in the earth, creating a canyon that now stretched out before her. Beyond the pine wood, it yawned. While the gap across wasn’t that wide, a mere few meters, the depth was another matter. Darkness threatened to swallow the world within its hungry maw.

It looked bottomless.

The other side of the canyon was open and devoid of the trees that dominated hers. Rolling hills disappeared into the night sky. On either side, the break in the earth went on and on into what seemed like infinity; no end was in sight and no bridge or other passage spanned across. Threaded through the walls of the canyon were the roots of the trees, larger on her side than the other.

Rocks beneath her feet began to skip and sing as the quake of a thousand hooves beat the earth.

A Wild Hunt in full had gathered.

As the quaking grew and grew, pieces of rock and stone cracked free of the canyon walls to tumble to their doom below, Autumn heard no sound of an impact. With a frustrated growl, Autumn cast her gaze across the blockage in front of her. Freedom was just in sight, and there was no way back now.

Not that far across. If she ran and jumped, she might just make it.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

Autumn pulled the fear from her chest that strove to falter her at the edge, that feeling of standing at the precipice and having your stomach fall away. She limped forward, picking up speed as she went.

At the very edge, she leaped as the ground crumbled beneath her.

Her body smashed against the rocky wall across, driving the air from her lungs. Down she tumbled into the abyss below.

End over end.

Crash after crash.

Down and down she went once more.

Leafy vines snapped and pulled free from the canyon wall as she desperately flailed. But it was no use and further into the void, she fell. Tumbling and bouncing in freefall against roots and rocks.

Far above, the sky shrunk to a small pinprick of light. Fear dominated Autumn’s mind as she still snatched after vine and root to no avail.

Fate had other intentions for the wayward traveler than a swift death in the endless void. Autumn slammed down upon a thick root, her ribs creaking under the sudden impact. Fiercely, she clawed at the slick surface as pain flared up her side. Slipping off the side, her foot lurched to a halt as it caught upon a cluster of roots. With a sudden halt, she slammed once again against the rocky wall of the canyon beneath the twisting root easily the size of herself.

“Owww.”

Autumn whimpered as she hung upside down.

The heavy weight of her crumpled hat still sat upon her brow, seemingly unbothered by the fresh change in Autumn’s orientation or the gravity that pulled upon her. Inside her chest, her heart beat wildly as it etched a rhythm of distress upon her battered and bruised ribs. The air had been driven from her lungs with the impact. Now she sucked down gulps as she struggled to catch her breath.

All the while, she dangled upside down.

From above, rocks and stones still clattered and tumbled into the canyon as the drumbeat of thousands of fae approached.

With a quickness of thought and action, Autumn pulled herself closer to the twisting vines and roots, squeezed herself into a deep groove underneath. She ended up wedged tightly and securely, hidden from view from above. Just in time too, as the sound of the fae grew louder and louder, their echoing approach deafening within the split in the earth.

Until it stopped.

Now the only sounds she could hear were the pumping of her blood rushing through her ears as she desperately strained to hear the searching foes high above.

Cramps began forming in her limbs as her body protested. The aches and pains her flight and fall had gained, finally announced themselves. It took every ounce, every scrap of willpower to hold in the groans of pain. Slowly, as the minutes ticked by, the adrenaline waned. Autumn’s eyes drooped as she listened. Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t hold on much longer and sleep captured her. There she slept, hanging by the ankle and wedged tight under root and rock.

Dreamless was her sleep.

Exhaustion fended off those pesky visages.

When she next awoke, she didn’t know how long she had slept. What she knew, however, was that her head was pounding and her body was stiff. Resting under the roots hadn’t been comfortable in the slightest.

Her clothes had fared little better than her body. The flight from the woods had torn the relatively threadbare fabrics. Now ragged tears spread all along her new shirt and pants. Her hat and coat had survived somewhat better, although it was hard to tell amongst the weathered look they already sported.

A rattling hiss interrupted her examinations.

Autumn slowly turned ever so slightly to the chilling sound. There, she spied a rattlesnake. Its long tongue flickered in her direction as it tasted her presence in the air, awakened as it was by her sudden movements.

How long had Autumn rested with it nearby?

Dull coppery scales glinted in the dim light. Above black eyes, a row of golden scales rested like eyebrows. Easily the width of her wrist and longer than Autumn was tall, it coiled up tightly in its hole like a taut spring.

Autumn held as still as she could as she hung there.

Through the pulse of fear and the rush of blood in her ears, Autumn didn’t hear the stomp of the Wild Hunt above. If the snake was bold enough to hiss and threaten, then perhaps the fae had moved on to search for her elsewhere.

While that was a relief, it still left her in mortal peril before the rattlesnake. A single swift strike could spell her doom.

Hot sweat trickled along her face and stung her eyes as the standoff stretched into a tense silence only broken by the rattle of warning. It would be impossible for her to flee unscathed, as her cramped form was too close to the serpent. As soon as she moved, she’d be struck numerous times.

Carefully and slowly, Autumn grasped the hilt of her knife as she kept watch on the snake, eying for any sign of movement.

The flicker of its tongue and rattle of the tail were her only replies.

As her knife left the leather sheath, the snake struck like lightning, the movement too much for the taut creature.

It slammed into Autumn with fangs that bit deep.

With a cry, she crushed the beast against the tight confines and drove her iron blade deep within its skull, biting through tough scales. The beast died pinned to the hard-packed wall, twisting and squirming in place. Hurriedly, Autumn patted herself down in search of where the serpent had bitten. A heaving sigh of relief escaped her as she only found a pair of holes in the sleeves of her robes; the billowing material had caught the fangs and saved her from being envenomed.

Her luck held out.

“Fucking hell.”

Autumn didn’t know what to do with the dead snake before her. Retrieving her knife from its brains, she let it collapse. She didn’t know how to skin or cook it, but it was food, something she was running low on.

“Fuck you, stupid snake fucker. I’m gonna enjoy eating you.”

Autumn cursed as she rolled the large creature up as best she could and tied it to her already heavy pack. Once done with that task, she leaned out from under the root that had sheltered her. Far above, the glint of moonlight shone down upon her. No fae could be seen or heard, as best as she could tell, at least. And so she crawled free to rest on top of the root this time.

“Thanks rooty.” Autumn patted the root that had hidden her. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I hope I’ll never see you again.”

With that, she began the long arduous journey upwards, laden with the spoils of her travel and kill.