Winter solstice. The longest night of the year. Outside, the wind whipped through the trees, whistling as it carried swirls of snowflakes up into the bitterly cold air.

Inside, Halley paced. He had been restless throughout the day, unable to sit still; a state at odds with his usually serene demeanour. Soft brown hair fell to his shoulders, unbrushed. His eyes were gentle and liquid brown, his brow furrowed in impatience. The bells upon his wrists jangled as he turned to trace his steps yet again.

The first streak of lightning silhouetted Halley against the window. He knew it was coming, but the crash of distant thunder that followed still made him flinch. Outside, a flock of birds took to the wing with a raucous cawing; rooks, feathers and beaks as black as pitch.

The storm rolled in quickly, obliterating the stars with clouds heavy and dark. The sleet came down hard upon the roof, an arrhythmic drumming. Somewhere, a dog barked, a high-pitched, frightened sound.

Halley could wait no longer. He returned to the window, unlatched it and threw it open wide. Immediately, the snow whirled in, surrounding him. It stung his face and neck with frigid pinpricks and caught in the tangles of his hair. The candles guttered and went out; the room plunged into darkness.

He leaned out as far out of the window as he could go, feeling the iron shackle bite into his ankle as he strained against it. His blood was hot and he could hear the beat of his heart in his ears. They were coming closer, ever closer. His knuckles went white as he gripped the sill.

He had waited for this day from the first moment he had been brought here. If he could last until the solstice, he was certain that his father would come for him.

Halley heard them before he saw them. Horses squealed and whickered, hooves clattering against nothing but air. The hounds' baying was loud and frenzied. And then came the horn; the horn of Herne the Hunter that spurred the riders on; the horn that caused animals to flee blindly in terror and brought chaos and carnage to any foolish enough to be outside on the mid-winter eve.

And then Wild Hunt burst through the clouds and thundered across the sky.

The riders leaned forwards in their saddles, spurring their mounts on through the air. Manes and tails streamed, caught on the wind. The riders' cloaks whipped sharply about them. Hoods obscured their faces, shadowing their features into invisibility.

Around the horses, streaming to either side of them, seeming to have no beginning and no end, came the hounds. They were long-limbed and rawboned, with pelts starkly white against the inky sky. Their eyes flamed and their ears stood up, pointed and red. They belled and yelped, the sounds of hunters who have scented their quarry.

And at the head of the riders and the hounds came the Hunter.

He sat astride a black stallion, huge and heavily muscled, tossing its head arrogantly and snorting the smoke of its breath into the frozen air. The snow flurries seemed to part as it pranced forwards, wheeled around, scattering the hounds as it turned.

The Hunter himself wore no cloak, no shirt. His chest was smooth and bare, painted with primitive symbols in ochre and purple. His hair was wild and did not stop at his shoulders; it trailed down his back, thick and furred. His eyes blazed green, brilliant in the midst of the storm, and he was horned with the great antlers of a stag.

There was nothing of compassion or gentleness in him. He was untameable, the cruelty and the vengeance of the wild embodied in a man, his face pitiless and cold.

Herne the Hunter brought his horn to his lips, sounding it yet again as he drew the Wild Hunt to him.

Halley cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted into the storm. "Father! Father, I'm here!" His eyelashes were laced with snowflakes, blurring his vision, and he shivered continuously as the wind tore through his light clothing, already soaked with snow. He cried out, desperately.

"Father! I want to join the hunt! Please, Father, come and free me so I can ride with you!"

Halley willed the horse to come down to him, straining with every muscle against the metal band around his ankle that chained him to the wall. It cut into him, and he could feel blood oozing warm and slick down the inside of his ankle.

"Father, please! I'm here! I need your help -- I'm chained, I can't get free!"

He caught Herne's eyes, for just a moment. There was no sorrow, or sympathy, or apology in his father's angled face. There was nothing. And then Herne turned his emerald eyes away; a clear dismissal as he spurred his steed into flight.

Herne the Hunter did not stop, did not turn back. His horse thundered onwards, leading the Wild Hunt across the sky. Lightning crashed and crackled down in his wake, splitting a tree clear to its roots. The baying of the hounds came fainter, the riders only a distant blur now, through the flurries of sleet and snow.

Halley stumbled backwards and collapsed to his knees, the chain links rattling as they gained some slack. His father had come. And his father had not freed him. Tomorrow would dawn, and he would still be a Key, still be in chains. He threw back his head and howled, the sound of the brokenhearted.

The tears spilt over, slipped down his cheeks, and then froze as the wind drizzled snow over his face. He dropped his head forward and then his remaining strength gave out and he fell sideways onto the floor.

The wind died down. The storm rolled away. And the snow drifted gently in to cover the small body of the Key in a blanket of downy white flakes.