RUN and hide.
Run.
Run.
Run.
A hare scent trail. Tasty. Have to keep running.
Jack leapt over the log and kept going, flying over the forest floor. Heat spread through his muscles. The scents of the Wood bathed his face. He kept going, faster and faster, leaping from one moss-covered trunk to the next. Above him, leech birds circled with guttural cries somewhere high above the canopy.
Run and hide. No leech birds.
He dashed to and fro, confusing his scent trail just in case, leaped and ran deeper and deeper into the Wood, until finally he grew tired and scrambled up the trunk of a huge pine into the dense blanket of needles and lay on a branch, panting.
Birds chirping, little tiny fat birds. Tasty.
A squirrel poked its way out of the hole in the tree.
Jack lay still for a long time. Long enough to make him sleepy. He yawned, closed his eyes, and sank into a warm, happy nap.
A long twisting sound echoed through the Wood, jerking him awake. It wasn't like any noise he had ever heard. Like a long wail. It pricked his ears, and he rose to a half crouch.
It was a trap.
He lay back down.
It was a trap, because Declan was smart.
What made that sound? What if it wasn't Declan? Jack rose again and lay back down. Run and hide. He ran and he hid.
He waited for the sound to come again. He waited and waited, but the Wood was full of little animal noises and no wails.
It didn't hurt to look. He would be very, very careful. Very careful.
Jack slunk up the tree branches, higher and higher, digging his claws into the fragrant bark, until he reached the top of the pine towering above the foliage. The sun shone from high above - he had slept for several hours.
In the distance a tiny star sparkled among the greenery.
Jack crouched in surprise.
The star winked at him, a little shiny spot. Oh, he wanted to see it. First the sound, then the star. Curious.
The spot of light trembled and swayed back and forth, glinting.
He had to see it up close. Just to find out what it was. He would be careful. Nobody would know.
Jack slid down and set out through the branches.
He moved quietly and slowly, like a shadow on soft paws, leaving no sign of his passing, taking his time. Up and down the branches, through the tangles of wild whiteberry, through the sea of dense feathery ferns, up the mossy fallen tree, onward and onward, until he came to the edge of a clearing and melted into the darkness between the branches.
In the clearing a long lean sapling bent nearly to the ground, held by a rope. The rope was attached to a piece of wood, and that piece of wood was thrust into a stick driven into the ground. A spring snare. Jack had seen those before. The piece of wood was a trigger bar. There would be bait attached to the trigger bar by a rope. Jack slunk through the shadows, circling the snare. Sure enough, a taut rope was attached to the trigger bar and on the end of that rope hung a star. Jack lay down and squinted against the glare. Not a star but the knife, the wicked, sharp, pretty knife he had cleaned in Declan's room.
Ooooooooooooh.
Jack forgot to breathe.
The knife rotated on the rope, glinting in the sun. Sharp. Shiny.
He had to have the knife.
Jack lay still, listening, waiting. Traces of Declan's scent hung above the clearing, but the blueblood was long gone.
The moment he touched the knife, the rope would yank the trigger, and the sapling would jerk straight, pulling a hidden loop. The loop would catch him and send him flying through the air.
Jack swallowed. This had to be done very carefully.
"SHOULDN'T you be out looking for my brother instead of sitting here eating lunch?" Rose passed the potatoes to Declan.
"You're supposed to want me to fail, remember?" Declan snagged two additional Edge burgers off the platter. He seemed to really like them. They weren't anything special. She'd seasoned the ground beef with garlic, salt, pepper, and a pinch of swamp spice, added an equal amount of cooked rice, shaped the mix into oblong patties, rolled them in bread crumbs, and fried them. The rice made the meat go twice as long, and nobody could taste it.
Declan ate like a horse. If he did manage to catch Jack, which she seriously doubted, Rose vowed to go down to Max Taylor's and exchange the two doubloons now in her possession for some money. She would need more groceries to feed him.
Having him in her kitchen was like trying to serve lunch to a deadly tiger. Declan was too large, his shoulders too broad, his eyes too predatory. His face was inscrutable. She wished she could search his head and find out what really went on in there.
He caught her looking and hit her with a direct stare. His gaze lingered on her face.
On the other hand, it probably was best she didn't know what he was thinking.
Declan sliced a piece of the burger, put it into his mouth, and chewed with an expression of complete happiness. "My wife will never have to cook," he said.
"Why?" Georgie asked, imitating Declan's surgical precision with his own knife and fork.
"Because I employ a cook. But I want you to promise me, Rose . . ." He put another piece of the burger into his mouth and paused.
"You really should cut your food into pieces small enough so you don't have to swallow before you can talk," she said. Take that, Mr. Manners.
"I wasn't busy chewing. I was savoring the taste. It might surprise you, but when I find something delicious, I take my time to enjoy it."
His gaze caught hers just in case she missed his innuendo.
"You don't say," she said dryly.
He ate another bite. "Promise me that when we marry, you'll occasionally make these. As a special treat."
"You're impossible," she told him and slid the platter of burgers closer to him in spite of herself.
Georgie poked his burger with his fork and leaned over to Declan. "Her fried chicken is better," he said.
"Georgie!" She glared at him in outrage. "Whose side are you on? You're not supposed to tell him my fried chicken is good."
Georgie blinked in confusion. "What am I supposed to say?"
"You're supposed to tell him I'm a horrible cook, so he'll go away and leave us alone."
Declan made an odd noise that sounded somewhat like a strangled cough.
Georgie glanced at Declan. "He'll never believe me. He likes your burgers."
"You have to convince him. Be charming. Use your Edger wiles."
Georgie furrowed his eyebrows in thought and looked at Declan. "Don't eat her fried chicken. It tastes good, but she puts rat poison in it."
The inscrutable mask on Declan's face shattered. He leaned forward and laughed.
KNIFE. Knife, knife, knife.