Page 128 of The Simurgh

‘Which is why I must free them from it.’

Pitch nodded, keeping his unhappiness to himself, for now.

They made their way deeper into the cave, sloshing through the water that lapped at their ankles.

‘Your feet must be freezing,’ Silas said through lips he was sure were now blue.

‘What feet?’ came the reply, joined by a nonchalant shrug. ‘Let me worry about frostbite. You just get this done so we can leave this blasted place.’

‘I think we are close.’

At that precise moment, the ground disappeared from beneath them. Pitch swore heartily, and Silas joined him. Their fall was brief, the landing hard and wet in shallow water. Barely had Silas lifted his hands and found the walls right there, pressing in against him, and he was moving again, headed downwards. He began to slide, feet first– into pitch darkness.

The descent was rapid, breathtaking even, considering how bloody cold the water was. They had fallen into a narrow chute, a smooth-floored tunnel that curved this way and that so sharply Silas’s sides scrapped the walls as he moved. The roughness of the rock shredded his already tattered coat. The weight of mournful souls like a stone-filled pack upon his back.

‘What the bloody gods is this?’ Pitch cried from behind.

But Silas was preoccupied with trying to stop their slide. He braced his palms against the walls, a terrible idea. The lacerations were not deep but they stung mercilessly. Silas pressed his thumb to the ring, considering fashioning the scythe into a hook, digging it into the wall, and perhaps halting them both before they ended up in the very bowels of the Faelands.

The prince’s lighter weight saw him racing up behind Silas with far greater speed than the ankou’s own.

‘Coming through,’ the daemon cried.

Though it was only his legs that did so, either side of Silas, slipping into the desperately narrow space between Silas and the tunnel walls. He wrapped his arms about Silas’s waist, his body plastered against his back. Silas held Pitch’s knees in tight, trying to keep his legs from being cut open by the jagged rock.

The tunnel’s direction curved right, then left, then right again, turns that grew ever sharper, a steeper slope racing them faster. A descent more terrifying than what Silas experienced through the stained-glass window.

And all the while, the weight of the Sluagh grew. Silas’s shoulders bowed, it was a fight to stay upright, and he knew his weight more and more upon the daemon.

‘Hold on, Sickle.’ Pitch’s voice was at his ear. ‘Do you hear me? Hold on.’

Silas lifted his head, ready with a reassurance, when the frantic ride came to an end.

They were spat out into darkness, crashing down into a pool of water. Silas’s head went under, but before terror could sink its claws in Pitch grabbed him, pulling him upward.

‘It’s not deep, it’s not deep, Silas, I promise. On your knees, take a breath.’

Silas hadn’t realised he’d been holding his breath till Pitch shouted at him, slapping a hand to his chest, reminding him he had lungs. He inhaled shakily, and let the daemon man-handle him onto his knees. It wasn’t deep, just as Pitch had promised. The water played at Silas’s belly.

Christ, it was dark.

Pitch lit his hands. There was little to see but water, curiously still despite their manic landing. Old Bess’s cloak floated atop it, torn off the daemon in the wild ride.

The silence, every inch as thick as the darkness, suddenly gave way to a terrible cacophony.

Silas buckled, covering his ears, crying out. The Sluagh’s roar was deafening. The cries of all the hundreds of dead crackled through his bones and sinew.

He felt Pitch’s hands upon him, and he knew the prince would be calling to him, asking him if he was all right.

He was not.

The angst of the souls was a travesty.

Silas knew, if he raised his head, what he’d see. That rock face where the ravens had perched upon jutting stone, the altar upon its raised step where the teratisms had lain and the goddess had eaten them alive.

And here she was.

The goddess Morrigan’s screech was the highest of the notes that assailed him. A god woken too early, not yet ready to birth. Furious at the disturbance.