24

Jyll ran through the night, scaring anyone who heard her screams. She ran through the fields past farm houses yelling the word “ugly.” The animals in their pens shied away from her passing. Children cried in their beds. Parents did their best to comfort their frightened children. Grown men hid their heads under their pillows and prayed to their various goods that the banshee would not come for them.

Jyll ran between the main hall and the stables. The soldiers hid with the horses hoping they would disguise the men’s scents so the crazy demon woman could not find them. The women of the kitchen staff pushed the long heavy working tables in front of the doors to the kitchen and each woman armed her self with a cooking knife in one hand and a large meat fork in the other. The huddled together for support and a shivered each time the haunted spirit screamed.

Sucat was the only person who slept through the passing of the demented being. As she went screaming and yelling around Sucat’s holdings terrifying the people and keeping everyone awake, she sawed off hunks of her own hair and sent the strands flying in the wind. She made several circuits of the area passing through each spot more than once.

When she did not encounter any people she remember where this horrendous night had begun. She was in a farmer’s field when she remember Sucat and what he had done to her once beautiful face. Now her outside was as ugly as her insides. She could not bear that he had made her so that all would know. He needed to pay for what he had done. She forgot that she had begun to punish him by freeing his prisoners. They were long out of her broken mind. All she could focus on was hurting him personally and that required that she do him physical harm. She looked around her trying to get her bearings.

When she saw which way the hall lay she headed in that direction. Now she began calling Sucat’s name. She began quietly, drawing his name out in a long siren’s call.

“Suuuuuu-cat.” She called his name in a sing song that was more frightening than her screams had been before. She sang his name, changing the inflection, first loud then soft, accenting the beginning of his name one moment and the ending the next. She called his name like she was calling a lover. She called his name like she was searching for a child. She called his name like she was calling for her dinner. All that heard her cringed in fear.

She entered the hall calling his name. It echoed in the empty room making her song even more eerie.

Jyll went up the stairs, going slowly, sneaking but no one was there to stop her. She did not give a thought to why the place was deserted. She did not care. She just liked to creep. She went up the stairs climbing part of the way on her hands and knees. At one point she thought of herself as a stalking cat looking for a mouse and she purred Sucat’s name.

She reached the second story but did not go through the bathing chamber. She did not want to go in there. There were looking glasses in that room and she did not want to look at her ugly face. If she saw her ugly face she would know how ugly she was inside. She could no longer live with how ugly she was but first she had to kill the man who had shown her and the world just how ugly she was. Ugly, ugly, ugly. The word rolled around in her mind and she had to make it go away so she started singing Sucat’s name again.

She went down the hall past the door to the bathing chamber and enter Sucat’s bedchamber from the outside door. He still lay on the floor where she had left him earlier and he snored. His snoring made her angry and she hit him on the back with his belt that she found laying on the bed. The buckle struck him and he stirred in his sleep half waking. She hit him again, harder, and this time he woke with a start and a yelp of pain.

He pushed himself up, shaking his head to clear the drink from it. He stumbled over to the wash basin and splashed his face with water. He felt horrible. He could not remember ever drinking so much. He still felt very drunk. He had already forgotten that Jyll was in the room with him, until she hit him again with the buckle of the belt. He yelled out a curse and turned towards her.

“What the hell is wrong with you, woman?”

When he saw her face, he blanched and swayed. He did not recall cutting her until he saw her again. They stood looking at one another for several minutes, neither moving.

Jyll began singing Sucat’s name again. Every third time she would add the word “ugly.” He let her go on for a while but it was getting on his nerves and he yelled ay her to stop but she just smiled and kept on singing his name. He reached behind him and picked up the first thing his hand touched. He wrapped his fingers around a small flower vase, brought it around and threw it at Jyll. She ducked, came back up and swung the belt at Sucat again. He reached behind him and grabbed an ink pot. He threw that at Jyll, the ink flying out as ink the pot went through the air. She ducked again and the ink pot shattered on the wall behind her. This time she lifted up the knife in her hand. He had not seen it before and now he became scared as the whipped the leather belt she held in one hand and swung the knife she held in the other hand. Sucat called out for help but no one came.

Jyll laughed at him. She could smell his fear. She had him cornered between the bed and a table. She continued to sing his name. The belt just missed him several times. She played with him laughing as he ducked out of the way of the swinging belt and the flashing knife.

He tried calling for help a couple more times.

“They are all hiding,” said Jyll. “They are afraid of me. Are you afraid of me? You look afraid of me. You should be afraid. I am going to kill you for what you did to me.”

She moved closer to him and the belt’s buckle nicked his shoulder.

“After you cut my face I ran out into the courtyard and set Hyd and Ranee free.”

Sucat turned red in the face with anger.

“I only just remembered that. Does that upset you? I am glad.” Jyll looked away from Sucat.

“I cut off all of her hair before I cut the ropes holding her prisoner. Then I cut the rope holding Hyd tied to the pole. You guards ran away from me. They are afraid of me too. Everyone is afraid of the ugly, ugly hag.”

Jyll began to cry.

“No one loves me because I am ugly. Everyone is afraid of me because I am ugly.” She dropped the belt as she sobbed out her pain. The knife was hanging loose in her hand.

Sucat rushed her, ramming his shoulder into her stomach and knocking her to the floor. The knife flew from her fingers and slide across the floor. Sucat and Jyll wrestled with each other. She rolled him over and sat on his chest. She punched him in the face and scrambled to reach the knife.

Sucat grabbed her ankle and pulled her to him. He climbed on her back and pushed her face into the floor as he went over her to get the knife. His fingers touched the hilt. He thought he had it when Jyll bit him in the leg. He kicked at her, hitting her shoulder with his heel. He pushed off the contacted and propelled himself forward, reached the knife, wrapped his fist around it, got up on his hands and knees and turned around.

Jyll got up on her feet. Her face was bleeding from the cuts on her cheeks and from her nose which looked like it might be broken but she showed no signs of stopping. Sucat was sure she was insane now, all rational thoughts gone. He got to his feet and faced her, both of them breathing heavily.

She started calling his name again. She danced a little jig as she sang. She twirled around and around and then she lunged at him, trying to get the knife from him. She pulled back and came at him again. She moved away from him again. He held the knife out in front of him. He weaved and swayed. He was still drunk and his head hurt. Jyll ran at him and impaled herself on the knife. She hugged Sucat and would not let him go. He tried to push her away but her fingers clawed at his shirt. She smashed her face into his trying to kiss him but he turned his face away from her. Her eyes were opened wide like a frightened animal.

Sucat felt her warm blood soaking into his clothes. It seemed like all of her blood was draining out of her as she clung to him. As her blood flowed from the knife in her gut, her fingers began to loosen one by one. Finally she closed her eyes, let go of him and slid down his body to the floor at his feet. She had slid off of the knife. He still held it in his hand. He dropped it on top of her lifeless body.

He went into his bathing chamber. He threw up all of the excess alcohol in his belly and lots of sour noxious bile came up. It burned his throat and mouth. He stripped off his blood soaked clothes and cleaned some of it off of his skin. He threw up again, this time only gagging as he had nothing left to heave up. He took a pitcher of water and poured it over his head hoping it would make him feel better and clear his thoughts. He took a towel out of the wardrobe and wrapped himself in it.

He went back into his bedchamber. He needed sleep. He did not look at Jyll’s body. The dead did not bother him but he was afraid seeing her blood would make him want to retch again.

He climbed into bed, covered himself up and closed his eyes. It was then that he remembered what Jyll had said about Hyd and Ranee. Was it really possible that she had set them free? He did not believe it but he would need to check. Just not now.

His head was pounding so hard he thought it would split in two. It would be soon enough to check once he had some sleep and he felt better. He could smell Jyll’s blood in the room. While it did make him feel more ill, it also gave him comfort. He buried under his blankets to block the smell and keep warm. He had begun to shiver from the pain in his head, the smell of the blood, the burning in his belly and exhaustion.

All he knew right now was that he had taken care of another one of his problems. Jyll was dead never to trouble him again.