Page 7 of The Fulbourn: Pitch & Sickle

‘No. Not yet. It would be foolish for you to gorge yourself.’ Silas pointed to a bush with bare branches and creamy-white blooms with yellow stamen. ‘Winter honeysuckle. Lovely, isn’t it?’

‘Hardly the word I’d use.’

Pitch was not going to receive another tart for some time.

‘I think it’s beautiful.’

‘It’s not terribly ugly, I suppose.’ Pitch snapped a bloom free. He twirled it between his fingers, and quite out of the blue, he said, ‘If we hear nothing from the hag by dinnertime, I’m going to take matters into my own hands. I will go myself to search for your little friend and Mr Charters, whether Satty permits it or not. I must. It is as simple as that.’

Silas thought Lady Satine allowing such a plan unlikely, considering all they had told her of the Morrigan’s exploits at the greensward, but his heart lightened to imagine it.

It was Pitch who had informed the Lady of what the sorcerers were calling themselves. He had learned the name from the Alp daemon. Pitch said very little else to the Lady about what happened between him and Onoskolis. Silas would guard that secret forevermore, if that was what the prince wanted.

Pitch touched at the flower’s stark-white petals.

‘Whatever plan you have in mind to find them,’ Silas said, ‘I’m going with you, of course. If Charlie has been harmed in any way…’ He couldn’t finish that train of thought. ‘Tyvain should never have sent him off on such a foolish task.’

‘Now, now, Sickle. I’m sure your little friend is quite well. Mr Charters is hardly one for dangerous pursuits. He’s dreadfully sensible…most of the time. Perhaps Charlie has chosen to disappear.’

‘Absolutely not.’ He shook his head, his fingers curling about a flower-laden branch of honeysuckle. ‘You saw for yourself how keen he was to remain with Old Bess at Harvington Hall. He wouldn’t simply disappear.’ If only he could speak to Pitch of the connection he had with Charlie’s family line, the ancient blood that somehow bound them to Silas and the bandalore. But he could not speak of such things without revealing too much of his Nephilim origins. And the prince had far too many concerns weighing him down as it was.

‘Fine,’ Pitch said. ‘Then maybe it is Tyvain’s carrier pigeons that are to blame. That is how the messages from your lad were coming, was it not?’

‘Yes. I believe so.’ Silas nodded, clinging to the idea that Charlie was likely fine but the bird carrying his message was not. Caught by a farmyard cat perhaps, or in the sights of a hunter’s gun.

‘But, Silas, I have to admit, I do not care much about the whereabouts of your lover –’ The prince raised his hand at Silas’s attempts to protest. ‘Well, you fucked, did you not?’

‘Once only –’

‘Apparently that was more than enough for you to develop an unseemly softness for the lad.’

Silas blinked. Pitch’s words were spiked with a strange accusation. ‘I care for Charlie’s welfare,’ he said. ‘Yes, of course. And this is not an easy world for him.’

Pitch fluttered his fingers as though the conversation bored him. He tended to act this way whenever Charlie was mentioned, and yet it was often he who brought up the lad to begin with. ‘Whatever the case may be,’ he said. ‘He is not who is important here. Edward is, according to the watch my dear old papa shoved at me. If there is ever to be an end to all this, I need to find him.’

‘Weneed to find him,’ Silas said, pointedly. ‘I’m terribly worried about Charlie, but I fear for the lieutenant as well. He was such a troubled man when I saw him last. The angel’s possession had left him in a terrible state.’ Silas actually bit his tongue. ‘I did not mean to be so –’

Pitch traced a finger over the petals. ‘Truthful? Edward is a wreck, and I made it far worse by continuing to see him. That is the way of it.’

‘No, that is not the way of it at all.’ Silas shook his head, angry all at once. ‘How were you to know? You had troubles of your own. If it brought you some comfort to…to go to Edward’ – Silas swallowed – ‘then you should not feel guilty for that. He is unsteady because of Seraphiel. The angel toyed with both your lives. I was there when Lucifer said it, I heard it clearly. Seraphiel used you, and he stole the life of a man you…had some care for. That angel made you a prisoner in that bloody Sanctuary it seems, and now you are to run about cleaning up a mess he made thousands of years ago. Christ, if I had the chance to meet him, I’d…well, I’d…’ His heated words lost a little of their steam when he saw Pitch’s bemused smile. ‘What?’

‘Slap his wrist and tell him what a naughty boy he was? You are quite a dolt but a fetching one at that.’ The prince raised the blooms to his nose, the petals glancing at his cheeks. ‘Can I tell you something though, Silas?’

‘Of course.’

Pitch cleared his throat. ‘If I ever reach this Blood Lake, wherever it may be, for Satty seems content to let me wonder…’ He paused, shaking his head, verdant gaze distant. ‘I fear she and Lucifer, and Seraphiel, are expecting a miracle from me when I can only deliver ruin. It is lunacy, sheer and utter lunacy, to believe I am a deliverer of any kind.’

‘One step at a time,’ Silas said. ‘And I will take each one of them with you.’

Pitch lowered the blooms, the air between them white as warm breath met frigid air. ‘You are quite set on staying with me?’

‘I am.’

‘It won’t be a lark to the seaside, you know.’

‘I’m aware.’

‘Fine.’ Pitch’s gaze traced the collar of Silas’s coat. ‘But I should tell you that if you manage to get yourself killed…again…for the sake of my foolish little quest, I shall be most pissed off at you.’