The Vampire & Her Witch Chapter 1808: A Horse Named Poppy

Dame Sybyll Hanrahan emerged from her tent mere minutes after the last rays of sunlight faded away. Behind her, like a crimson shadow, Cossot followed at a respectful distance, carrying the only piece of Sybyll’s famed crimson armor that her lady hadn’t donned.

The helm Cossot carried, with a visage shaped like a grinning vampire’s skull, weighed as much as a sack of grain, but after weeks of following Dame Sybyll’s demanding training regime, Cossot had slowly become accustomed to the weight, just as she’d become accustomed to the crimson gambeson that had replaced her usual dresses and the light arming sword that rode at her hip everywhere she went.

"Yer gettin’ better wit’ tha’ buckles, lass," Sybyll praised, flexing her right arm and inspecting the fit of her vambraces and intricately articulated gauntlets. "Keep goin’ at this rate and ye’ll be up ta’ fittin’ me tassets and cuisses in a month’s time."

"I promise, I’ll work harder, my Lady," Cossot said as a pink blush spread across her cheeks. In the dark of night, in a caravan lit mostly by torches, few people would be able to see the visible sign of embarrassment, but Dame Sybyll was different. Even on the darkest of moonless nights, her crimson eyes saw every detail, and it was impossible that she’d failed to notice her squire’s embarrassment when she called for four strong men to help her don her Darksteel hauberk and cuirass.

As a squire, she should have been the one to help Dame Sybyll don her armor but even after weeks of training, the larger plates of the Crimson Knight’s armor still felt impossibly heavy.

"Ye needn’t rush it, lass," Sybyll said as she approached a horse that stood patiently waiting beside a full-figured young woman wearing a crimson cloak over her black and crimson dress.

"I promised ye," Sybyll continued as she placed the point of a fingernail against the corner of her jaw, pressing hard enough to draw a single drop of blood from her bone-white skin. "Tha Potence o’ Blood will transform yer flesh in more ways than one, but like a flower, it flourishes in fertile soil," she said as she extended her hand toward the horse’s lips, watching as it eagerly licked her finger clean.

The horse chuffed happily, revealing teeth that had begun to transform into fangs. Its once dull eyes now possessed a faint crimson gleam, and when it pawed at the ground with an iron-shod hoof, it left deep grooves in the frozen soil.

"Ain’t that right, Poppy," Sybyll said, reaching out to gently stroke the dark horse’s neck as it tossed its head happily.

No ordinary horse could hope to bear the Crimson Knight in her full armor, but it had been more than twenty years since the War of Inches ended and Amaryllis had passed long ago. Now it was time for her to prepare a new Blood Steed, and she’d chosen one of the sturdiest mares available in the Hanrahan stables for the task. Each night, she bestowed a single drop of her potent blood on the mare, and each night it grew not only stronger, but fiercer and more clever.

It would be months before Poppy could bear her weight in battle, and even now, it was all the mare could do to walk an hour or two with the weight of the Crimson Knight and her armor. But Sybyll could afford to be patient.

Ian Hanrahan was dead and Aiden’s line would never again rule in Hanrahan. The fires of fury that tormented her heart until they’d burned away everything but the need for vengeance had been snuffed out the night that Ian Hanrahan breathed his last.

Without that drive pushing her to recklessness, she could take her time to do things the right way, even if it meant that neither her steed nor her squire would be ready for battle if the spring thaw plunged them into war. She’d fought by herself long enough; she could do so a little bit longer if the need arose.

"Just like Poppy ’ere, ye have some growing yet to do," Sybyll said, shaking herself free of thoughts of the future as she looked from her squire, Cossot, to her handmaiden, Roseen. "Ye both do. An’ ye have choice ta’ make tha’ canna’ be unmade. In six months, I’ll hear yer answers, an’ so long as yer’ ready, tha’ blood o’ Hanrhan will flow in yer veins."

"Well, in Cossot’s at least," Sybyll said with a slight smile on her crimson lips as she took Poppy’s reins from Roseen’s outstretched hand. "I still think ye may be better suited to one o’ me siblings, Roseen," she said. "I intend ta’ ask on yer behalf soon enough."

"Thank you, my Lady," Roseen said, offering a brief curtsy before she rushed to Cossot’s side. "As long as I can stay together with Cossot, it doesn’t much matter to me. A gift of eternity with Cossot is already more than I could have hoped for," she said, taking Cossot’s recently calloused hand in her own and holding it tight.

"Ye may say that now," Sybyll said, placing one foot in the stirrup and pulling herself up into the saddle. "But twenty or fifty or a hundred years from now, ye may come ta’ feel differently. Treasure these last months o’ daylight, lasses, an’ all the things that might still be. Once ye’ve become a vampire, tha’ road ahead is as narrow as tha’ edge of a blade an’ ye’ll balance on it tha’ rest o’ yer days."

"We understand," Cossot said, holding tightly to Roseen’s hand with one hand while the other hand formed a determined fist. "We won’t disappoint you, Dame Sybyll. We’ll work hard to be worthy of your gifts, we promise."

"Ye say that now," Sybyll said with a smile. "Ye’ve yet to meet tha’ rest ’o tha’ family. Come, collect yer horses an’ ride at me side t’night. Ye’ve earned tha’ right."

"Jalal!" Sybyll called into the night, looking around the camp for her closest friend outside of the Vale of Mists. "Are ye’ ready?"

"We’ve been ready since before the sun set," Jalal replied, emerging from the column of mounted riders from the town and villages of Hanrahan. "We were just waiting for you to finish your beauty nap. Now that you’re here to lead us, the drummers are ready to play, and the dance can begin."

"Then sound tha’ drums, old friend," Sybyll said as her lips curled into a smile that revealed her long, sharp fangs. "I hear there are still a few old salts in Lothian who fought in the War of Inches," she said sweetly. "Do you think they still remember us?"

"Perhaps," Jalal said as he signalled to the drummers. "And if they’ve forgotten, I think I know just the tune to help remind them..."