‘Feck. Fine. I ain’t gonna lie to ya. Don’t deserve it. But promise me ya won’t get your knickers all knotted over somethin’ I don’t know for certain.’
‘What does the card mean.’ He felt unnaturally still, calm in a way he knew utterly false. It was either this way, or turn catatonic with fear.
‘’Tis true the tower card can be a bastard of a thing. Most of the time.’ She brandished the card. It was gilded, beautifully so, as were the others. The tower at its centre was white as chalk, not a single window or door evident, and with a peaked blue cap trimmed with a gold rim and spiked with large pearls, like an over-sized coronet. The lightning had struck at it, lifting it from its proper resting place, the entire peak set to tumble the great distance to the ground. ‘I’ve been laying the cards most of the morning, and this infernal thing won’t stop showing up. But ya know what, Mercer? I ain’t afraid…like I normally would be with this type a card. See it can mean catastrophe, sure. Destruction, crisis, all that guff.’ Silas said nothing, he could barely swallow with his throat so dry. ‘But it can also mean unexpected change, big sudden shifts in how things look to be turnin’ out.’ She looked up at him, sharp and focused and steely. ‘More importantly, it can mean liberation. And when I look at this card, that’s what gets my water’s churnin’. Liberation. You’re gonna find ‘im, Mercer. Don’t doubt it.’
Silas could only nod as she handed him the card. He took it, sliding it quickly into his pocket, not wishing to linger on the chaotic scene depicted.
A doorway loomed out of the gloom at the end of the passageway. Silas was struck by how reminiscent the design was of the door Pitch had laid behind at Harvington Hall. The prison that Silas had to fight to find.
Tyvain rapped her knuckles against the wood.
And her request to enter was met with a low, agonised moan.
‘Go away.’ Lucifer’s imperious tone was unmistakable.
Silas took a breath, steadied himself. ‘We shall not.’ He urged Tyvain aside and opened the door. Heat rushed at them. And something far more unpleasant.
Silas coughed, his hand flying to cover his mouth. The reek of excrement was horrendous.
‘Oh fuckin’ balls,’ Tyvain cried, lifting the hem of her shirt to her lips.
Ernest Weatherby sat in a cabriole-style dining chair, on a water-stained grey rug. He was wide-eyed. Streaks of dirty tears ran down pale cheeks, his lips were parted with drool at their creases, and his breath was terribly quickened.
Lucifer had paid no heed to Mr Ahari’s request to keep the suffering minimal.
‘You are very quickly testing my patience, Mr Mercer.’ Lucifer did not turn as they entered. He stood with arms folded, peering down at the pained kitsune the way one peered at livestock they were considering purchasing. ‘Go sit with your ailing pony, I do not want you here.’
‘I assure you, sir, I do not want you here either. What have you learned from him?’
The king cast Silas a sideways glance, the edge of his lip lifting with a sneer. Which only served to make his ridiculous moustache look all the more so. ‘I do not like your tone, ankou.’
‘I do not like many things about you, least of all how you seem to be ruining this man with nothing to show for it.’
The curt words had Tyvain touching at his hand in warning. She was likely right to caution him, but Silas was on a mission even the King of Daemonkind could not sway him from.
Silas lowered his hand from his mouth. With the opening of the door, some of the gravity of the stench had lessened. ‘Does he know where Pitch is?’
The stone-walled room was every bit a dire dungeon. And a far too warm one at that. The heat came from the considerable fire crackling in a small cast-iron hearth. Weatherby was certainly feeling the heat. His tattered clothing was plastered to his body. There were no visible restraints upon him, but his body remained as rigid as when Silas stepped into the room. He appeared like a man in the process of being electrocuted in his chair.
Lucifer dusted at the cuff of his coat, one element in the room that was far too fine for it. ‘He barely knows his own name now that I’ve had my time with him.’ The bastard sounded too proud of the fact. ‘I’ve one more layer to peel back, but I would say it safe to assume that the kitsune truly knows nothing of import.’
‘Nothing of import?’ Silas snatched at the suggestion. ‘Are you to be in charge of assuming what is important? Tell me what he’s said.’
‘Oh Christ,’ Tyvain muttered at his side. ‘Keep that up and you’re gonna lose an eye, if you’re lucky.’
‘What a wise old hag. Take heed, dead man.’ Lucifer turned his back on them, taking a white kerchief from a pocket, draping it over his fingers. ‘Now then, shall we flay you wide open, little useless fox?’
A pitiful whimper came from Weatherby, his eyes still wide. Silas realised he’d not blinked once since they’d entered the room. The spread of the kitsune’s eyelids was being forced. This was torture, there was no doubt of it, and nothing notable had been learned.
He should stop the king from laying another hand upon the unfortunate Weatherby. Step forward, right now, as Lucifer touched his kerchief-draped fingers beneath the kitsune’s chin, and prevent the daemon from leaning forward and exhaling a breath so heated that Silas could see the ripples in the air where he stood. A breath aimed at the natural’s unnaturally widened eyes.
Weatherby’s stiffened body bucked, his arse coming off the seat.
Silas watched. He did not move.
The sounds escaping Weatherby’s locked jaw were awful, the torment of an animal caught beneath a carriage wheel. His violent jerks looked set to break his bones. Black fluid ran from his nose and eyes.
Tyvain made a choked sound. ‘Oh, I think I’m done. Fuck this.’
