As I dried off, I discovered a voice mail on my cell phone from my brother Sam, which had come in only seconds past. It was short and pointed. “Nell. We’uns got trouble at the church grounds. I’d look kindly upon a visit from you. As soon as possible. Sooner, maybe.”
FOURTEEN
“Can you meet me at the entrance to the church?”
T. Laine knew what I meant by the words “the church,” though there were dozens of churches in Knoxville.
“Why?” she asked, talking and yawning at the same time. “You got black mold growing there too?”
“No. Well, I hope not,” I added quickly. “Remember that tree that grew roots into me?”
T. Laine grunted. I feared she was already halfway back asleep.
“Well, it’s going crazy. Growing thorns. Attacking children. It’s put on a couple thousand pounds of wood over the last few months.”
“Attacking... That sucks. But... what canIdo to stop that?” she grouched. “We’ve already got a case.” I didn’t blame her. We were overworked and tired, and here I was asking her to help with something personal.
“You can tell me if a witching will kill it.”
“Witches don’t kill.”
“According to PsyLED files, a death witch can kill with her magic.”
“Death witches don’t use magic; they use curses.”
“Whatever,” I said, trying out the word and the attitude that went with it. It must not have come out the way I wanted, because T. Laine laughed, though not unkindly.
“I wanted to sleep in till at least six a.m.,” she said.
“I wanted to sleep in till four.”
“Four? Well, hell. I guess if you can burn the midnight oil, I can at least help. ETA forty-five. But you owe me breakfast.”
“Eggs, bacon, biscuits, grits, and pancakes or waffles?”
“God, yes.”
“See you then,” I said, not feeling the least bit guilty that I would be foisting my family off on her with breakfast at the Nicholson place. Not in the least.
***
T. Laine’s car followed me in, the witch driving, Tandy in the passenger seat, sipping on coffee-shop coffee. I could see the logo through the window. I was glad to see the empath looking so hearty, and also happy to see that he and T. Laine were so friendly. Tandy needed someone stable in his life, someone other than a romantic interest. But I hadn’t expected him to be here. I was suddenly worried what effect the massed emotions of the church and my family would have on him.
It was after dawn, and the church was finished with devotionals, the members walking and driving away, each and every one making a wide detour around the tree in its cement-block prison. Mostly because the walls around the tree were far more cracked and broken than before. One whole section was rubble.
To the side of the crumbled wall, a gleam of yellow utility paint could be glimpsed beneath a mound of vines that hadn’t been there yesterday. The vines originated up in the tree, as if the tree had decided to grow finger vines and attack. Deep inside the vines, I could see a bulldozer’s external tracked extensions—grousers. It looked as if a heavy-duty bulldozer had taken on the walls and the tree and had lost.
In the early light, the tree was massive, curling limbs and twisting roots in shapes a live oak attained after centuries, not decades. Today it was mostly leafless. The trunk and branches, the cement walls, and the ground for ten feet around it were blackened by fire. Where the fire had missed a section of the tree, a scarlet blaze brightened the bark. The branches there were covered with thorns as long as my fingers. The few leaves remaining were deepest green with crimson veins and scarlet stems.
The tree had started mutating when it had access to my blood. At the time, I had wondered if the mutation was mutual and if I would be changed as much by the tree as it was by me. Now that fear had waned. Though I had scars, I was otherwise unchanged. The tree, however, was an alien mutant ninja oak. I didn’t know what to do with it.
I got out of my truck and heard T. Laine’s vehicle doorsclosing. My brother walked up, leaving the chapel, the pointed-arched windows casting diffused light onto the ground. Sam had been in line to take over the leadership of the church, a contentious decision, but I had been too busy, and too thoughtless, to ask what had happened with the elders’ decision.
Sam walked closer, dressed in green camo pants and green camo shirt, with a matching camo coat over it and a camo ball cap. His boots were brown. “We tried what you suggested,” he called over the short distance.
“What happened to the bulldozer?” I asked.
“We think the tree ate it.” Which was what I had thought. I smiled at my true sibling as he continued. “Driver got away clean.” He stuck his hand out to T. Laine and then to Tandy, saying, “We met before. Sam Nicholson. Nell’s full sib.” Sam surprised me that he didn’t address all his actions and comments to the man first. My brother went up a notch in my estimation. The special agents gave their names, and together we approached the tree, stark in the headlights I had left burning. We stopped about twenty feet out, beyond the drip line.
