Page 23 of The Wicked Lies of Habren Faire
“Fy chwaer!”
Ceridwen.
I wrench my arm from his grasp and without another thought I race after my sister.
9
y milwr
(THE SOLDIER)
I barely hear Neirin calling for me; the forest is a blur as I race toward the sound of the screaming. Even though it shoots ice through my veins to think of Ceridwen in danger, a spark of relief ignites within me. She isn’t far and I can save her.
That spark is doused quickly when the forest grows darker around me, as if I’ve run straight into the dead of night, the screaming getting louder and louder until finally it fades into a pathetic, wet sob.
“Ce–” But I stop myself before I give her name away again, and stagger to a halt. “Hello?”
Beneath my feet the mud feels sticky, like it’s rained here and nowhere else, but I can’t see it through the layer of thick white mist that creeps up to my knees. The trees are bare and brittle. It’s full dark, but when I turn my head up to the empty, twisted branches, no stars peek through.
My body grows rigid as the sobs start again, ever closer.
I’m alone and blind to the woods, bright and loud in my own ignorance—an easy meal. There’s an overturned log ahead and something draped over it.
Pale arms hang over the rotten wood, disappearing into the mist, a head and shaking shoulders buried between them. Thick black curls conceal the figure’s face. It could be Ceridwen. With no light, her hair could look like that.
No, it doesn’t work. I’m a good liar, but I can’t convince myself.
The arms are far too long.
I back away. With my eyes fixed on the woman, I don’t notice the branch until I step upon it.
A deafening crack shoots through the forest.
The sobbing stops.
I take a shaking breath as first one arm, then the other, creeps up to brace the body on the log. The woman leans forward, her hair a mask. Her arms are pale, withered. Her fingers are taloned, the skin around them shriveled like a corpse’s, the nails caked in decades of dirt and blood, and they dig into the bark like knives.
I glance behind me, willing Neirin to appear, but I’m alone, unarmed and still without sight—this creaturewantedme to see her. She lured me and I took the bait.
The hag lifts her head with a grotesque snap like bones breaking. The skin of her face is pulled tight across prominent, overdrawn features. Her lips are nonexistent as her mouth parts to reveal rows of pointed teeth, and where her eyes should be, there is nothing but gaping black holes, boring right through me.
The groan of a dying woman rattles in her throat.
“Fy chwaer!” she calls. “Fy chwaer!”
My sister! My sister!
The hag calls out for those who will die, lures them close and brings their death faster, but whether she calls for me or for Ceridwen I don’t know. I don’t have time to wonder. Her distended arms lurch over the trunk and her body follows. The bones of her shoulders and collar look ready to slice through her rotting, corpse-purple flesh, cracking and groaning with each jerky movement. Her talons scratch through the muck and, on hands and knees through the mist, thegwrach y rhibin—a hag of the mist—scrambles toward me.
I race away, arms and legs pumping as I try to double back to escape the mist and the dark, to find my way back to the road. The thump of her limbs never ceases, never slows, and she’s chanting something as well.
“Lawr, tywyllwch, lawr, tywyllwch, lawr, tywyllwch.”
Down, dark, down, dark, down, dark.
It’s in my very head, pounding at the back of my eyes. The words bleed into a garbled mess. I gather speed, but the hag matches me step for step, even as the trees begin to bear leaves again.
I can’t stop, I can’t fight, I can’t even think. My heart reaches my mouth and threatens to claw its way out.
