Page 112 of The Fulbourn: Pitch & Sickle
Fuck. Don’t let the vagabond be dead. Silas would be inconsolable.
‘Charlie,’ Pitch shouted.
Limp and bare foot be damned, he ran.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
THE SORCERESSappeared beneath one of the arches, stepping out from the relief as though she were stone come to life.
Silas edged back, uncertain if what he saw was real or another illusion, as Macha walked one purposeful, slow step at a time around the monopteros. She had her hands clasped behind her, lost in the folds of her cloak, her face obscured by the mask of feathers. Only her lips were visible, and they were curled in a small smile. Perhaps – Silas grasped at a rather long straw – he had luck on his side and she’d not heard him speak of royalty.
‘You’ve done very well to make your way here, Mr Mercer.’ She waved a hand towards the columns. ‘But do you think you are any less trapped than your beloved souls?’
‘You have no right to imprison them here.’
‘And yet, here they are.’ A lopsided grin bared teeth. ‘Seems I do not need a right to take what I want. Isn’t that wonderful?’
The Sanctuary chose then to rumble through its newest tremor, and Silas relished the slip of the sorceress’s smile. The moment was brief though. She regathered her poise in a heartbeat.
‘What purpose do you have for all these souls?’ Silas demanded. He took another step back as she drew closer. The sway of her coat was real enough to stir dust as she went.
‘Oh come now, Mr Mercer. It doesn’t suit you to play stupid.’ She touched at a column, running black-nailed fingers down its length. The veins of cobalt lit up, and the lost souls raised fear-laden cries. ‘The light of Azazel is with me, as it is with my sister and brother both, and you have already seen what it is our lord’s magick allows me to do.’ She brushed a limp-wristed hand against the next column. The cobalt responded again, highlighting the mass of sigils carved into the stonework. The markings were intricate, all manner of whorls and helixes and loops. All told the designs were elegant and undeniably beautiful, but his gut churned to look on them. ‘You know I should be quite upset with you, Silas. tearing the heads off two of my sweet children not so long ago…after I thought I’d taught you a lesson about how unhappy that makes me. But to watch your brutality really was quite rousing.’
He shook off her words. ‘You seek to make teratisms of all these innocent souls.’
‘Good grief, hardly innocent. Why do you think they are susceptible to the Blight to begin with? These souls are all rotten in some way.’ She sighed. ‘But as much as I think myself quite useful in crafting teratisms, I can only aspire to the Watcher King’s brilliance when it comes to making monsters. For he is the Blight’s true master, and I am a fledgling apprentice at best.’ She glanced at Silas, a hint of the white of her eyes showing through the mask’s netting. ‘So, tell me more about how your prince is going to best him, then? It all sounded so very exciting.’
The world seemed to fall away beneath Silas’s feet, and his blood turned cold in the vein. His face must have betrayed his horror, for her smile widened.
‘So there it is, I did hear you correctly. Goodness, Onoskolis will be delighted to learn she rode a royal cock.’ She tilted her head, hand at the ready to stroke at a pillar that was far too close to Silas for his liking. ‘But what a pity I shall have to inform Nemain that she was right.’ She winced, lips peeling back as though she’d sucked on a lemon. ‘My dear sister has had it in her head that Mr Astaroth might well be the famed and feared Berserker Prince ever since Onoskolis came back to us in such a tizzy, claiming it was no regular daemon she had ridden. As Iblis knew of only one higher daemon in Arcadia who could not be accounted for and would have a decent reason to want to hide away…well…’
Silas was silent a moment too long. ‘I’d not be in any rush to deliver such news.’ He did his best to appear scornful. ‘If your Iblis knows anything at all, it is that the prince is imprisoned in an abaddon beneath White Mountain.’
‘Well, that is certainly what Arcadia would have everyone believe. But I dare say His Royal Highness is in no such place. Goodness, you don’t look well, Mr Mercer.’ She tut-tutted, shaking her head. ‘You were not chosen by the goddess for your ability to keep a secret, were you? You are absolutely terrible at it.’ She laughed, a high and rather too pleasant sound. ‘The Order will be horrified with your loose lips, I’m sure. But never mind, you are both idiots, you and the prince. For if you were not, you’d not have travelled here quite so alone.’ She reached to touch at the column nearest to Silas, as though daring him to strike out. ‘I suppose if you’d not been so idiotic, that boy of yours might not be dead now either.’
Now it was heat roaring through Silas’s body, as though Pitch’s flames moved in him. ‘Charlie.’ His voice was scratchy, parched dry. ‘If you have harmed him…’ Silas threw himself at the sorceress.
Macha raised one hand, palm up, whispered quickly, and blew against it. A puff of yellow dust flew from her palm. The particles swelled, and a buzzing filled the air. Silas braced as the dust took form, and a swarm of yellow-and-black wasps drove at him. Silas waved his arms about like a fool, dancing and shifting around in violent contortions, swatting at the tiny creatures that darted at him. The souls were a bubbling cacophony in the background, unsettled by his assault.
Not.
He caught the word, but it was hardly his greatest concern. The air was awash with insects. They darted at him, driving stinging tails into the backs of his hands and where his neck was bare, no longer hidden beneath lengths of dark hair. For such tiny things, they delivered a whopping pain. It was like being driven at with the sharpest of knife tips. The wasps slashed shallow cuts, making him holler in rage and discomfort.
‘Now you will tell me where he is, ankou.’ Macha’s easy manner evaporated, replaced by an icy steel.
Silas hissed beneath the onslaught of tiny attackers. ‘What…do you…mean?’ His ankle turned as he was driven off the platform, still slapping about like a deranged scarecrow. Perhaps if he could make his way to the walls, he could escape to another section of the Sanctuary and find Charlie.
The sorceressmustbe lying. Charlie was not dead. He’d know it, would he not? Surely if the lad had passed, Silas wouldknowit.
‘Shit…damn it…’ He swiped at the cloud of buzzing fierceness surrounding him.
A pity he could not see a step ahead to make his escape. He dared not open his eyes too wide for fear of receiving a barb right to the eyeball. His cheeks were on fire from the strikes. The infernal critters were bloody everywhere.
‘Tell your pretty prince to come out of hiding, for it will not do you, or your souls, well for him to conceal himself much longer.’
A wasp found his lip, and Silas slapped at his own face to rid himself of it. But his thoughts were not with the attacking insects; rather they were settled on Macha.
Come out of hiding?