Page 66 of The Fulbourn: Pitch & Sickle

Pitch made it clear what the kitsune could do with his instructions. And Silas was about to add his two pennies’ worth when his head was turned by movement beyond the flick of the roan’s tail. The horse danced on its hooves, suddenly ever more restless, prancing off to one side and affording Silas a clear view now down the length of the ballroom.

The platform with the plant life was no longer empty. A figure cloaked and masked sat upon a scroll-footed chair, their pale hands draped over the edge of cushioned arms. The chair’s crest rail arched above their head, the elaborate carving giving the whole arrangement the air of a throne.

Weatherby cleared his throat. ‘Gentlemen, I present to you, Macha of the Morrigan.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

A COLDchill settled on Silas. The sorceress did not stir any revealing tune within him. The absence of a melody for Pitch was a puzzle, but Silas was less confused when it came to the necromancer. Her magick was a learned skill, bestowed on her bloodline by Azazel’s teachings. But this sorceress, like her siblings, was born a purebred.

Macha.

Sister to the sorceress Nemain, who had been so delighted in outdoing her sibling when she trapped Silas in her greensward. She had been scathing of Macha’s failure to bring the ankou down with her ash men.

Clad in identical costume to her siblings, with a heavy cloak and a feathered mask that shielded the eyes, Macha had painted her lips a complimentary black hue, all the more prominent against her bone-white skin.

‘Mr Mercer, so lovely to see you in the flesh.’ The sorceress had an annoyingly pleasant voice, one that would fit nicely in a Mayfair parlour. ‘You looked ever so well when I saw you last through one of my children’s eyes, but I must say, you present far better in actuality. I do like the shaven face. It is very fetching. Not certain about the grey-speckled hair though.’

Pitch rattled his chains. ‘This is how you are going to do it, then? We are to be destroyed by a church bell’s inane chatter.’

Black lips flirted with a smile, and Macha spent far too long studying the prince before she spoke. ‘We weren’t sure who was coming to the Fulbourn. Mr Fothergill told us a fine specimen of a woman had been asking after Edward…a beguiling lady whose rather burly brother arrived in quite a huff, making all kinds of untoward accusations about the treatment of his…sister. Amusing, certainly, but hardly concerning. A pretty lady seeking a reunion with her once-lover, only to find herself being pawed at by a drunken man of business. Hardly enough to pique my interest.’ Macha crossed her legs, and her cloak slipped from her knee, revealing black trousers and thick-soled boots. ‘And I had to sit through Mr Fothergill’s endless, dribbling apology, for divulging Edward’s location. We’d made it very clear he was to fob off any queries, and pass on the names of those who were asking to Dr Severs, or he’d lose the reward we were paying him to ensure Mr Charters came into our care. The silly chap went on and one, I was hardly listening…said he didn’t know what had come over him. Felt like a man possessed. That was when he had my interest. I thought to myself, what on Earth would cause a man’s tongue to run away from him like that?’ Macha tilted her head, her gauze-hidden eyes very clearly set on Pitch.

‘I can’t imagine,’ Pitch said, as caustic as he’d ever been.

‘No I don’t suppose you could, if you were truly the frail human you’ve tried to appear. Mr…what was it now?’

‘Thaddeus Yates, madam,’ Weatherby added, most unhelpfully.

‘Thaddeus…goodness.’ Macha uncrossed her legs, parting them to lean her elbows against her knees and lean forward. ‘You cannot lose the grandeur, even in disguise.’ She flicked her fingers. ‘Whatever little trick you conjured to conceal yourselves has failed you now. But I was quite sure we’d snagged a true prize when you asked for five sugars in your tea, and then heaped in more when you thought no one was looking. Very incubus of you.’

Silas decided there were moments where nothing needed to be said. He took in the surrounds, noting that Weatherby now stood near the door he’d entered through, looking, to Silas’s mind, a little anxious. The Dullahan was not much more than a statue upon his restless mount that shifted about on Pitch’s far side, too close for Silas’s liking. But more worrisome was how, behind the dais, the shadows were fluid, changeable things. Shapes of all sizes, but with no clarity he could determine.

‘Are you seeking a round of applause?’ Pitch was haughty. ‘A small token of reward for your guesswork perhaps?’

‘I have my reward already.’ Macha seemed to find the whole occasion quite amusing. ‘I have you both. And truly, I could not ask for more. I am still rather gobsmacked that you both just waltzed into my humble abode the way you did. So soon too…that caught me off-guard, I’m not too proud to say, and with no fanfare, no djinn horses, not even a note home to tell your masters when to expect you back. What naughty boys you are.’ Her laughter cracked against the walls and he thought it echoing through the vast room until he recognised the trill of childish laughter joining in with that of the sorceress. Silas grew ever colder with dread. She had harpies with her, hidden in the shadows.

‘Oh you have no idea,’ Pitch replied. ‘I can be shockingly bad when the occasion calls for it.’

Macha rolled back in her chair, still chuckling away at how reckless the Lady’s Horsemen had been. Silas found it far less amusing, but no less true. The plan to sneak off to Fulbourn whilst still masquerading as human had made some vague semblance of sense at the time. But he’d been too absorbed with needing to find Charlie to keep his wits about him, and the liaison with Pitch at the Crimson Bow had certainly done nothing to appease the situation. The prince could have talked him into standing on his head after they were done with ravishing one another. He’d been too cock-teased to consider how deeply the Morrigan had dug themselves in. Too absent-minded to suppose Fulbourn might be every inch the trap Gidleigh House had been.

They were not naughty boys, that was far too kind. They were imbeciles.

‘Oh your badness is quite legendary. The poor lass at the Moon Inn will not be the same, I’m sure,’ Macha continued. ‘That will teach her for peeping, I suppose. And goodness, wasn’t she upset that you had passed her over in order to pound the lieutenant into a mattress instead. A woman scorned, and all that…was quite handy when it came to loosening her tongue. But her story wasn’t all that interesting to us at the time. Just because you are rumoured to fuck anything with a pulse, dear daemon, doesn’t mean you don’t say no to a lass every now and then. But to say no and then ask the poor, heartbroken thing to watch over your lover after you paid for his room and board…now there is something worthy of note. Tobias Astaroth giving a fuck about who he fucks? Well, that made Mr Charters a touch more interesting. It was rather a boon when he needed committing, as I just happened to already have a perfectly wonderful little asylum to put him in.’ The giggles rose again out of the shadows, and a thin girl and a boy with his arm in a sling clambered up on the stage, coming to sit beside Macha’s poor attempt at a throne. They were dressed in ragged, dirty clothes, which seemed to be the harpies’ preference when in their human form. The boy’s shirt might have been white in another lifetime. Now it was marbled with unpleasant smears and run through with tears. The sling was flecked with what appeared to be blood, or raspberry jam. Whichever it was, no attempt had been made to clean it away. The sorceress reached for the nearest, the girl, and twined dirty, oily strands between her fingers. Both the harpies gazed up at her with toothy grins. ‘He did bad things to your brothers and sisters, didn’t he, the nasty daemon?’

Two heads jogged in vehement agreement. The girl picked at a nail on her dirt-stained foot.

‘If they are feeling left out, I’m very happy to see to it that they join their brethren.’ Pitch’s eyes danced with hard shards that caught at the glitter of the chandeliers.

Macha laid a kiss upon the top of the girl’s head. ‘Did you hear that? He’s being ever so mean, isn’t he? Would you like to see me hurt him?’

The cackle that spread through the entire blasted ballroom had every inch of Silas’s skin crawling. For it was not only the sound of harpies, dancing about in delight at the suggestion. Another throaty shudder of laughter joined them from the shadows behind the dias.

Macha played at a put-upon sigh. ‘Oh goodness, all right. I suppose we shall know then for certain that we truly have Onoskolis’s pretty daemon in our midst.’

Silas’s breath froze beneath his ribs, but his body had no such care for stillness. He lunged forward, caring little for the savage wrench to his shoulders. ‘Leave him be, you wench.’

‘Steady now, Mr Mercer.’ Pitch’s laughter held a hollow ring. ‘I don’t need you defending my honour. There was none to protect to begin with.’

It was a curse and a delight to know the daemon so well now. For Silas could hear more clearly when he was pained. Silas pulled forward, the drag of metal at his wrists taking skin. Bloody hell, whatever these chains were forged from it was formidable metal.