Page 40 of The Simurgh

His lips were feeling odd enough with all the whistling he’d been doing, seeking out any teratism that may be nearby to aid him, but the guilt was far more uncomfortable. Striking at him each of the three times he’d kissed Sybilla, so as to pass on her magick that clung to him.

The soothsayer and Valkyrie were not in the stables but around behind them, where a narrow passageway ran between the brick perimeter wall and the wooden stables. They both had their backs to him. Tyvain stood behind Sybilla who was in her chair, hands pressed up against a section of the wall that had clearly been a doorway at some point but had since been bricked in.

‘Quickly, Silas, we will try one more time.’ She needed to draw a breath for each word. The search was wearing her thin. Wearing all of them thin. ‘I shall need more of my magick.’

‘I thought you said there was barely anything left the last time?’

Sybilla shook her head in an irritated flick. ‘Yes, yes, but perhaps if we go longer.’

Tyvain snorted. ‘Syb, you cheeky devil. Didn’t think anythin’ with a cock was your cuppa tea?’

The angel didn’t reply, her fingers working at the mortar in the section of wall that had been bricked up. Her lack of fingernails was blatantly obvious from where Silas stood. The familiar pains swept over him. Even though he’d not caused the angel’s injuries, his subsequent intervention had done nothing to heal them, either.

‘Silas, come on. What are you waiting for?’

Sybilla’s curt tone buoyed him. She may not be in peak condition but she was very much alive.

‘Coming,’ he said, negotiating the pitifully narrow corridor. His broad shoulders brushed either side. ‘Tyvain, can we swap places?’

‘Look at you and me, look at the space. It ain’t ’appening. ’Ere, this will have to do.’ She bobbed down, crouching low behind the wheelchair. ‘Lean over me, get ’er that way.’

Sybilla shifted in her chair, a move that she could not keep from hissing at. She half turned about, leaning her head back at an angle that must have been terribly uncomfortable, even for someone not so injured.

‘Quickly.’

‘Yeah, hurry it up, smells like cat piss down here,’ Tyvain said from her lowered position.

Silas leaned over her, resting his hand against one of the wheelchair’s handles, and lowered his face down towards Sybilla. Her lips were parted, her eyes closed. But with barely a few inches between them, Silas faltered. Stupid, he knew, but he couldn’t help himself. Partly because this felt akin to kissing a sibling, but mostly because he was selfish. He could not feel the magick Sybilla spoke of, but if it was there, it was because Pitch had, somehow, put it there. Silas didn’t want to let it go. Just in case…What if the daemon needed it to find his way back?

‘Done yet?’

Tyvain’s grumpy question put an end to the senseless sentimentality. Silas pressed his lips to Sybilla’s. Cracked and dry as the angel’s were, he was gentle as could be. So far they’d kept to brief pecks, the casual kiss of acquaintances.

The Valkyrie widened her mouth, and stuck in her tongue.

‘Christ,’ Silas cried, pulling back. But Sybilla moved swiftly, managing to wrap a hand at the back of his neck and hold him fast. The rest of his protest was mashed behind their joined mouths.

The kiss was uncomfortable, long and invasive. Sybilla worked her tongue against his. She moved in rhythmic waves, wetting his lips and the prickling of hair around them. All Silas could think was how it was not right, how she didn’t sigh into him, or nip at his bottom lip, or fit into him so perfectly as Pitch did.

The angel drained him. At least, that is how it felt to Silas. A headache pulsed, his neck pinged with being held tilted for so long. He was a heartbeat from pulling away when Sybilla did so first.

She dropped back into her chair, having risen up off her backside. Sybilla exhaled. Emptied out every breath. And there was deep satisfaction in the sound. She slumped deeper into the chair, fingers wrapping about the arms. ‘Oh gods, I miss it so,’ she whispered, touching at her lips with a blackened fingertip. ‘That was the last of it.’

Silas’s pulse tripped, his concerns of earlier cutting deeper.

‘And?’ he said, after steadying himself. ‘Can you feel anything of the linchpin?’

‘I personally can’t feel me ankles no more.’ Tyvain grunted. ‘And can ’ardly breathe on account of a giant standin’ over me.’

Silas stepped back sharply, the comparison like a whip strike. He muttered an apology. ‘Sybilla? Did it help at all?’

‘Only to show me that what we seek is not here.’ Sybilla gripped the wheels, trying to turn them, but the angel was painfully weak.

‘Jesus, woman. I ain’t here for decoration, let me do that.’

Silas backed down the passageway, grimacing as he sought to turn around and his coat caught on rough patches of brick. They emerged alongside the stables.

‘How’s the little game of hide-and-seek going, then?’ Byleist stood a few feet away, his features not quite so obvious as they’d been when backlit by the brightness of the fire inside. His purple-hued hair moved like a breeze caressed it, but there was no wind at all in the courtyard.