Chapter 1: The Night I Met My Headless Crush

37 The rain was coming down in sheets, turning the streets of Ashwick into a blurry watercolor painting of neon lights and regret. I, Felix Carver, was trudging home after a double shift at the diner, my sneakers squelching with every step. My life wasn’t exactly a fairy tale unless you count the kind where the hero gets stuck washing dishes for eternity. 

At twenty-two, I was a college dropout, a part-time waiter, and a full-time dreamer with a knack for stumbling into trouble. Tonight, trouble found me first. It started with a sound a low, rhythmic clopping, like hooves on pavement. Odd, considering Ashwick hadn’t seen a horse since the town fair’s pony rides shut down in ’09. 

I glanced around, but the street was empty, save for the occasional car hissing through the rain. The clopping grew louder, closer, until it felt like it was right behind me. I turned, expecting a stray dog or maybe a skateboarder with a death wish. Instead, I saw her. She rode out of the mist like a nightmare with excellent posture. 

A black horse, sleek and massive, snorted clouds of steam into the chilly air. Its rider was cloaked in shadows, a long coat billowing behind her. No, not her face her head was missing. Where a neck should’ve been was just… nothing. A smooth stump, like she’d been sculpted that way. In her left hand, she held a glowing, grinning skull, its eye sockets flickering with an eerie green light. 

In her right, a whip made of what looked suspiciously like a human spine. I froze, my brain short-circuiting. “Okay, Felix,” I muttered to myself, “you’re hallucinating. Too much coffee. Or maybe the diner’s grease fumes finally broke you.”The skull’s jaw moved, and a voice smooth, feminine, and annoyingly amused rang out. “Oi, mortal! You’re staring.

 Rude, much?”I blinked. “Did… did your head just talk to me?”The rider swung one leg over the horse and dismounted with a grace that made my clumsy self jealous. She strode toward me, her boots clicking on the wet pavement. Up close, I could see her armor black, ornate, and definitely not from the local thrift store. The skull in her hand tilted, as if sizing me up. “Name’s Lirien,” the voice said. “Dullahan, harbinger of death, yada yada. And you are…?”“Uh, Felix. Felix Carver. Harbinger of… bad life choices, apparently.

”Lirien’s skull laughed, a sound like wind chimes mixed with a horror movie soundtrack. “Cute. Most people scream and run by now. You’re either brave or stupid.”“Definitely stupid,” I admitted, my heart doing a weird tap-dance in my chest. “So, uh, are you here to… reap my soul or something?”The skull’s grin widened. “Nah, you’re not on my list. Yet. I’m just passing through, but my horse threw a shoe, and I’m stuck in this dump of a town until I fix it.

 Got any blacksmiths around here?”I stared at her. “Blacksmiths? In Ashwick? We barely have a functioning laundromat.”She groaned, the sound echoing from the skull. “Great. Just what I need another night in the mortal world, dealing with idiots and rain.” She paused, then tilted the skull toward me. “You’re not completely useless, are you, Felix? ”Wow, thanks for the vote of confidence,” I said, crossing my arms.

 “Why do you even need my help? You’re, like, a headless death goddess or whatever. “Dullahan,” she corrected, sounding mildly annoyed. “And I’m not a goddess. I’m more like… middle management for the afterlife. Look, I can’t exactly walk into a hardware store holding my own head without causing a scene. You, on the other hand, look like you blend into the background. ”Rude but fair,” I muttered. Despite the insanity of the situation, I was intrigued.

 Maybe it was the exhaustion, or maybe it was the fact that Lirien’s voice was weirdly charming, like she could narrate an audiobook and I’d listen for hours. “Fine. I’ll help you find a way to fix your horse’s shoe. But only if you promise not to, y’know, kill me. “Deal,” she said, holding out the spine-whip hand. I hesitated, then shook it, trying not to think about how it felt like shaking hands with a skeleton. 

“Let’s move, Felix. Time’s wasting, and I’ve got souls to collect before dawn.”We ended up at my apartment, because apparently “finding a blacksmith” in a small town at midnight was a pipe dream. Lirien’s horse, which she called Nightshade, was tied to a lamppost outside, looking way too chill for a beast that probably ate nightmares for breakfast. Lirien herself sat on my couch, her skull resting on the coffee table like a morbid centerpiece. 

I’d offered her tea, because that’s what you do when a headless woman crashes your life, right? “So,” I said, handing her a mug she couldn’t possibly drink from, “how does this dullahan thing work? Like, do you ever misplace your head? ”She snorted, the sound coming from the skull.

 “Misplace? Please. This baby’s tethered to me by magic. I can’t lose it, but I can’t exactly put it back on either. It’s a whole thing.”I sat across from her, sipping my own tea. “And the whip? Is that, uh, made of actual spines? ”Yup. Collected from people who annoyed me.” She paused, then laughed at my horrified expression. “Kidding! It’s just enchanted bone.

 Looks cool, though, right? “Very… metal,” I said, trying to sound casual. “So, what’s the plan? We can’t exactly Google ‘emergency horse shoe repair’ at 1 a.m.”Lirien’s skull sighed. “I’ll figure it out. I just need a place to crash until morning. You got a spare room, or am I bunking with you? ”My face heated up. “Uh, no spare room, but you can take the couch. I’ll just… sleep on the floor or something. “Chivalrous,” she said, sounding amused. “Didn’t peg you for the knight-in-shining-armor type.

“I’m more the ‘guy who trips over his own feet’ type,” I admitted. “But I’m not letting a headless lady sleep on the street. My mom raised me better than that.”We spent the next hour talking, which was weirdly easy despite the whole “she’s a headless reaper” thing. Lirien told me about her job ferrying souls to the afterlife, dodging rival supernatural creatures, and dealing with bureaucracy in whatever passed for the underworld’s HR department.

 In return, I told her about my spectacularly average life: flunking out of college, working at the diner, and dreaming of writing a novel someday. She didn’t laugh, which was nice. Instead, she said, “You’ve got stories in you, Felix. That’s something.”By the time I dragged a spare blanket to the floor, my head was spinning not from fear, but from the fact that I was maybe, possibly, crushing on a dullahan.

 Was that even allowed? Did the universe have a rule against falling for someone who carried their head like a purse?The next morning, I woke to the smell of burnt toast and the sight of Lirien’s skull glaring at me from the coffee table. “Your toaster’s possessed,” she announced. “It tried to murder my breakfast. “You don’t even eat!” I said, scrambling up. “And how are you using my kitchen? “Magic,” she said, like it was obvious. 

“Also, Nightshade’s fine, but we need to hit the road. I’ve got a lead on a guy who might fix her shoe. You in?”I should’ve said no. I had a shift in three hours, and my boss already hated me. But Lirien’s voice had this pull, like a song you can’t stop humming. Plus, I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to the weirdest, coolest person I’d ever met.“Fine,” I said, grabbing my jacket. 

“But if we’re doing this, you owe me a story. Like, how does a dullahan end up with a horse named Nightshade?”She laughed, picking up her skull and tucking it under her arm. “Stick with me, Felix, and I’ll tell you a thousand stories. Just try not to lose your head over me.”As we stepped into the morning light, I had a feeling my life was about to get a lot more interesting and a lot more headless.