The Burning Man

16

From the line of pine trees two miles distant, a silver hand caught the moonlight as it traced patterns in the crisp snow. Veitch watched Church and Hunter make their way back to the hotel. He could almost feel their raw emotion.

‘Life hurts, doesn’t it, mate?’ he said quietly.

Behind him, horses that were not horses stamped their hoofs and blasted steaming breath from their nostrils. Etain and the other Brothers and Sisters of Spiders stood silently. Frost rimed their hair and faces, but they were oblivious.

Ruth was nestled in the crook of Veitch’s arm. He gently brushed the snow from her cheek. The blanket in which he had swaddled her would soon bring warmth back into her limbs.

‘It’s a funny old world. We see everything around us, and we know what it’s like, but we always want something more. So we’re never able to rest, never happy.’ He kissed Ruth on the forehead. ‘I love you, darlin’. Always have and I always will. We’re setting off on a long road now. It’s not going to be pretty, but it’s the only way, right up to the bitter end. Ryan and Ruth, side by side against the world, like it was always meant to be.’

In Etain’s dead eyes, there was a faint glimmer, like the twinkling of a star in the furthest, coldest reaches of space. And the cold wind blew, and the snow fell, and silence lay across the land.