Leanan Sidhe's Arc

Chapter 2 of 6

The Leanan Sidhe crouched in the reeds and watched her partner pace. The Puca had worn its horse shape for two nights now, huge and black, gold burning in its eyes. It struck the peat with one hoof and steam came up. It was done waiting. It wanted the bog man dead tonight, and it did not care that she needed him alive. "Not yet," she said. "He is mine to take whole." The Puca turned its head. Its voice was low and wet. "He was mine first. I finish what I start." It bolted before she could answer. She followed on foot, wings tight against her back. The Puca thundered through the bog toward the little arbor where the bog man played his music. She saw him there, seated on the mossy bench, a fiddle in his lap. He looked up. He saw the gold eyes coming through the trees and he did not scream. He stood, tucked the fiddle under his arm, and ran. He ran toward the witch. The Leanan Sidhe cursed and cut sideways through the reeds. She knew where he was going. The witch kept a hut in a clearing ringed with salt and hung with yellow flowers, the ones that burned fae skin. The bog man reached the edge of the clearing and crossed the salt line. The Puca skidded to a stop at the ring and reared, screaming. The witch came out of the hut barefoot. She saw the horse. She saw the bog man on his knees inside her circle, breathing hard. Her face went white and then it went hard. "Get away from my house," she said. The bog man reached for her hand. "Florence." "I'm here," she said. She did not look at him. She kept her eyes on the horse. "I'm here. Stay down." The Leanan Sidhe stepped from the reeds. The witch's head turned. The two women looked at each other across the salt. Inside the ring, the bog man set his hand flat on the ground. Something in the earth answered him. The yellow flowers on the hut brightened. The witch felt it and her shoulders dropped an inch. She reached down and touched the top of his head, once, and the light around them both thickened. The Puca reared again and struck the salt line with a hoof. The line held. It burned him. He screamed a second time, higher. The Leanan Sidhe walked to him. She put her hand on his neck. "I told you," she said, quiet. "Not yet." She closed her fingers. The Puca shuddered under her grip and went to its knees in the mud. Gold drained out of its eyes until only black was left. It did not rise. Inside the circle, the bog man was already reaching for the witch's hand again. The Leanan Sidhe watched their fingers meet. She had kept him alive. She had also watched him choose.