Page 113 of The Herlequin: Pitch & Sickle 6
I am offering a deal. Sever the whip, ankou. I know you have that power.The ethereal whisper sent a chill over Silas’s skin.Hurry. I cannot withstand it much longer.
‘Do you think me foolish enough to go anywhere near you?’
Do you wish to save your daemon or not?
‘Of course I bloody do.’ Silas riled, struggling to fathom what was happening. The teratism had beseeched him to come here. The gnome said the headless horseman waited for him. None seemed afraid. ‘But you are the Morrigan’s servant–’
I saved you from the true aim of the Nephilim’s horse. And I will be no servant to those maleficent fools.The hiss was caustic, enough to make Silas grimace.Sever the whip. It is what binds me. Break the curse and you have me at your side.
Truly, did this creature think him moronic? Besides the fact his attempt at blackmail was worthless–Silas could summon the scythe, and did not need this creature to simply hand it over–the Dullahan had cut him until his bones were on show, and hunted them down in the Fulbourn like a mongrel chasing rats. He’d eaten a piece of Pitch’s flesh at Macha’s command.
But, Silas had seen the bones about his wrist before the horse struck. And the gnome had said it too. The headless horseman had kept him clear of a catastrophic blow.
‘Why do you seek my favour now? After all you’ve done?’
I don’t seek favour, I seek release.
The peri went into a fluster, tinkling like miniature church bells in the grip of a fit, jabbing teeny-tiny fingers at one of the bodies lying nearby.
He yearns for freedom. The same as which you gave us.
This from the teratism, standing nearby, watching Silas, as all the gathered peri were.
‘Freedom?’
‘What’s this then?’ The gnome emerged from the soil, a few paces from where Silas stood in a quandary. ‘Why’s he still having to pin himself beneath that tree? Thought you’d be done and on your way by now.’
‘Pin himself?’ Silas shook his head, truly lost. ‘Did the forest not trap him?’
‘Only because he asked us to. So we obliged. We owed him, after he’d done all this.’ The gnome gestured at one of the corpses. ‘What? Did you think we forest folk went about cutting off all these heads? Best I saw was a couple of brownies tripping up one of the fae. It is the headless rider who is to credit for destroying the Wild Hunt.’
A grunt came from nearby.The massacre has my hand upon it too.The teratism was unimpressed with being overlooked.
Silas glanced between him, the Dullahan, the decapitated body, the gnome, and the jingling peri.
‘The Dullahan truly did this?’ He wasn’t sure whom he was asking, but it was the teratism who answered first.
He truly did.The hunchback could not nod, seeing as their chin was already upon their chest, so they made a stunted bow instead.
My king has lost his way.The Dullahan’s night-breeze whisper filled Silas’s head.He lusts after the Morrigan’s promises and deludes himself that the Watcher King will grant him power in this world if he sides with the sorcerers. But the UnSeelie Court will fall under Lokke. If you want your blade returned, you will unbind me from the curse.
Silas paced out his confusion. Delay was costly, a mistake here could see him pay a dear price, but the right choice could see him with an unexpected ally. ‘What on Earth makes you imagine I can release you at all?’
I know what you did at the Fulbourn. Bent the Blight to your will. You are the messenger of death, and my curse is built from the dead.
‘But that was human dead at the asylum, and an entirely different curse.’ Silas ran an irritated hand through his still-damp hair. ‘The whip is what binds you?’
Bones of fae dead. Those who fell at my hand, when the Seelie and UnSeelie Courts divided. I am punished rightly, but I serve the UnSeelie court, not the Morrigan.
Silas had no time for a fae history lesson. ‘But your head…the Morrigan have it, do they not? Can they not control–’
They showed you nothing of mine in that asylum. Six hundred years I’ve been cursed. My head has long since crumbled to dust. They used some other to frighten you, whilst they stole a piece of your prince for their own magick. The sorcerer relishes dramatics.Words flowed like the wind upon a beach, the sand humming as it was swept through the air.The daemon’s debt to the UnSeelie Court is real, but was not sealed by pushing his flesh between the lips of a corpse. Hurry, ankou. Make your choice. Shall you use your blade? Free me as you did your dead?
He may doubt the horseman’s trustworthiness, but he did not doubt that of the forest folk, nor the teratism. And they had seen the Dullahan turn on his own kind.
‘Do you know where they have taken him?’
Yes. And I am the only one with a horse to carry you there.