Hozier Bogman's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Hozier knelt in the peat and pressed his palm flat to the wet ground. He was trying to teach Florence how to listen the way the bog had taught him. He had come back from the water wearing moss and dark wool, remembering her face but not the song she used to pull him up. He owed her a lesson worth the price she paid. If he could show her how to root love-magic in the earth, she would carry that power long past her mortal years, and he would leave her something that outlasted him. Florence sat across from him in her yellow dress, daffodils bright in her red hair. Her hut stood behind her, thatch dark from morning rain, herbs strung along the eaves. She placed her hand beside his in the muck without flinching. "Close your eyes," he said. "Listen for the small voices first." She closed them. He closed his. But the earth was wrong today. Beneath the usual hum, Hozier heard whispering he did not know. A woman's name, spoken like a question. His own name, spoken like a claim. He opened his eyes. At the pond's edge, three shapes crouched among the reeds. The bog hags. Moss dripped from their arms. They grinned at him with wet teeth. "Keep listening," he told Florence. He stood. "I'll be a moment." He walked to the hags alone. They knew him. They had watched Florence sing him up. "Who's been asking after us," he said. The tallest hag tilted her head. "A winged one. Purple as a bruise. She wants the bog man for her bed and the witch off her map." "The Leanan Sidhe," the smallest said, delighted he did not know. "She feeds on lovers. She empties them." "And she does not come alone," the third said. "Her runner sniffed the reeds last night. Shadow-shaped. Eyes like coals." Hozier went cold under his peat. He knew that runner. He had ridden it once and paid with his life. "The Puca," he said. The hags nodded together. He looked back at Florence. She sat with her eyes still shut, hand in the mud, trusting him to teach her. The unseen thing that had been watching the bog now had a name, and a partner, and a want. He could not train her here while both of them circled. He returned and knelt again. He took her muddy hand in his. "Open your eyes," he said. "We stop for today." "I almost had it." "I know." He kept his voice level. "Something is here that shouldn't be. A fae woman. And the horse that killed me." Florence's face did not move. She looked once at the reeds. Then she stood, pulled him up, and walked him inside her hut. She barred the door behind them. "Let them try," she said.