Chapter 5:

Part V: Severance

A LOVE TO LOSE YOUR HEAD OVER

The morning mist clung to her like a funeral shroud. She hadn’t spoken in hours. But I felt her decision in the way her fingers trembled—not with fear, but with goodbye.

We rode through moors thick with fog, through graveyards where the names had long since crumbled.
Behind us, the Headless Host drew nearer.
The hoofbeats of their dark horses were the ticking of a clock I could no longer stop.

Éirelyn rode in silence now.
No song on the wind.
No curse in her breath.

Her grip on my head had loosened, tender as a mother’s hold—too tender.

She was unraveling, yes. But she was also becoming.

Not a monster.
Not a woman.
Something in between.
Something new.

We passed through Blackmere, where the dead rose only to dance.
Through Hollowsfield, where lanterns flickered with the voices of those lost in love.
And in every place, I saw her hesitate.
Her blade grew slower.
Her eyes were softer.

She was choosing me over herself.
And the world would not allow it.

They came at dusk.

The Host surrounded us like a closing throat.
Six riders with headless shadows, each one older than memory.
Their steeds breathed ash. Their words cracked tombstones.

“You were warned,” said the eldest.
“You’ve loved, and love weakens.”

Éirelyn dismounted. She placed my head on a stone altar and kissed my forehead.

“I know I was never meant to love,” she said. “But that was not a mistake. It was pure, beautiful. My mistake was in forcing him to love me.”

Then she turned to them.
“If I give him up, will the curse leave him?”

Silence.
Then a single nod.

I wanted to scream. To beg.

I thought I understood her. I was sure of her choice.

Why was she doing this? She didn’t force me to love her, not at all.

But I had no lungs.

And so, she raised her lantern for the final time.
But not at them.

At me.

The flame bloomed gold, then white, then violet. It consumed her—not with fire, but light.
Soft, sorrowful light.
Like the kind you see at the end of tunnels or the edge of dreams.

As it took me, I heard her voice—not from her lips, but from mine.

“Love is a curse, yes. A foolish invention by the romantics. For you, it felt short...like a short story you read in five chapters. But it was everything to me. Loving you has changed me, made me afraid. And I feared losing you forever, but you can’t lose what you never had. So I’ll watch from afar, like my own quiet little movie.”

With a look, her body vanished into embers.

The Host turned and rode into the mist, leaving only silence in their wake.

And me.

My body returned.

My neck was whole.

My heart was beating.

I collapsed to my knees, my head now my own.

That was one year ago.

I no longer remember the road. Only her hands.

Still, something lingered.

The scent of winter roses.
The flicker of a violet flame.
And in the distance, a single horse’s hoofbeat.

I sometimes see her in the corner of my eye.
A shadow with no face.
A lantern held low.