Page 65 of The Death Wish

Chollima answered the Red Horse’s call, and pushed at Pitch’s arm, urging him forward. Silas waited with arms half-lifted, treating Pitch in that way he sometimes did, as though he were a skittish horse himself, ready to bolt.

But they had long ago run out of places to run. And Lucifer was right, Pitch was a bloody fool if he lingered.

He’d brought about the downfall of the djinn horse, and now he stood here in the open, lit by moonlight, in a landscape where a seraph licked his wounds, and those who travelled with him were vulnerable.

Where a daemon king lay stripped and wounded and hardly recognisable.

Lucifer would not survive, if Michael did.

‘We can’t leave him here,’ he said.

Silas nodded. ‘Shall I carry him?’

‘Don’t you dare,’ Lucifer hissed. ‘You will leave me. Do not disgrace me with your pity.’

But Silas understood. He always did. The ankou turned his attention from Pitch, albeit with a reluctance he made no effort to hide, and crouched beside Lucifer.

‘Can you stand at all? Or shall we have Sanu –’

‘Are you deaf? Get on with you. Don’t touch me. I warn you,’ the daemon hissed, and grimaced, and spat more of the dark spittle. But the fact that he did not get to his feet, nor even try, told Pitch enough. Lucifer’s wounds were nefarious.

With his own back still aching from his meeting with the ground, Pitch took one arm, whilst Silas took Lucifer’s other, and together they began the laborious climb carrying the king between them. Chollima followed behind, picking his waycarefully, supporting Lucifer when the shale slipped beneath Silas’s feet, or Pitch stumbled against a rock he’d not had the foresight to notice.

As they struggled along, Lucifer berated them, and insisted they release him at once.

Pitch gave his sire a withering look. ‘I’m blamed for one seraph’s death, perhaps now another. I’ll be fucked if I’ll add a daemon king to my tally. Now shut your fucking mouth.’

After a few more feeble attempts at protest, Lucifer fell quiet, his chin bobbing at his chest, his body weight suddenly more cumbersome.

‘Is he still conscious?’ Silas asked at one point.

‘No, thank the gods.’

‘He’s a grumpy one to be sure.’ A hobgoblin with swollen cheeks and a red-tipped nose was seated upon Chollima’s saddle, appearing from apparently nowhere. ‘But to be fair, that other angel gave him a right seeing too, and I don’ t mean in the pleasurable way.’

‘Gods, how did the daemon build such a following of miscreants?’’ Pitch’s thighs strained with the load and steepness. Each step drew them ever nearer to where Lalassu lay, with Sanu standing guard. The red horse watched him, he felt keenly the sharpness of her gaze.

‘We found him, not the other way around. Though truth be told, the altercation was hard to miss. And when we heard it involved Silas Mercer, well, we couldn’t just stand by. Such a good fellow you are, putting up with troublesome company and all.’

‘Stop with that.’ Silas scowled at the ground; most of Lucifer’s weight rested on him. ‘Pitch is as decent and brave as I. More so. And you’d do well to hold your tongue if you are going to say anything else to the contrary. He has endured more than you or I could ever hope to survive.’

Pitch flinched, thankful for the bulk of Lucifer between them, so he could avoid the look he knew Silas directed at him. The one that said he believed every word he’d just spoken.

‘That’s what Billy’s cousin Gilmore is always saying. He works down in that Holly Village he does, and says he’s never seen a fellow in more pain and yet still standing. Says you’re a right prick, Mr Astaroth, but one who has a heart he tries to hide. They’ve seen it, mind you, down in the Forest of Dean, and in Sherwood. Your heart that is. But we aren’t sure why you need to be so darn wild and frightening and bloodthirsty.’

‘Another word,’ Silas growled. ‘And you’ll find there are two such creatures in your midst. Help us, or leave us.’

The hobgoblin said not another word. Who would dare after such a command? Pitch allowed himself to thrill, just a little, at being the object of the ankou’s formidable defence.

Sanu sent aid, in the last few feet, by way of the threads of her mane. She wove them about Lucifer’s middle, and took most of his weight, doing a decent job of keeping him somewhat upright. Pitch stepped away as the horse and ankou took over Lucifer’s care.

Then, there was no more time to avoid Lalassu, and her frightful, sickening injury. The halo’s burn was not so different to that which marked Sybilla’s skin. The curious green-grey of Lalassu’s coat replaced with vile black tightness that still smoked. Her eyes, usually the colour of a daisy’s middle, were dull. The glow that reflected from them came from Scarlet, who sat in the hollow beneath Lalassu’s ear: where the curve of her cheek met her neck. The wisp crooned to the horse, humming in their nonsense way, for which Pitch would be eternally grateful, because he felt it…the comfort in the sound.

He sank to his knees beside the Pale Horse. His stomach a painful knot, his throat, his body, aching with what it was to see his mistake laid out so plainly.

‘What do we do?’ His hands hovered over her muzzle, but he feared touching her. He’d done damage enough already. ‘How do I take away your pain?’

Lalassu lifted her nose, stretching towards him. Pitch drew in a shaking breath, and gods, his eyes pained him. He shuffled nearer, and the Pale Horse rested her head in his lap, a heavy sigh leaving her. Scarlet sang softly, the nearest to a discernible tune he’d yet heard from the wisp. Lalassu’s eyelids dragged, the horse fighting the urge to sleep.