“Baneberry like that grows out by the Gravewood.”
“Bythe Gravewood,” agrees Shea. “Not in it.”
Silas doesn’t budge. “At the rate the Mercy Boys have been picking off your classmates, I’d think you’d be a bit smarter than that.”
She thinks of Lys. She can’t help it. It’s a knee-jerk reaction. His dark, inhuman eyes. That sharp, inhuman smile. The scrape of his voice against the shell of her ear:That’s a boring rumor. I don’t take anyone who doesn’t beg to be taken.
“There was a patch of it growing out by Fletcher’s,” she says quickly, shoving all thoughts of the Mercy Boy in the dark where they belong. “I passed it on my walk to school this morning.”
“It doesn’t matter if you dug it up right in your backyard. You know I can’t sell that here.”
“You can if you boil it,” says Shea. “My mom likes to make it into tea.”
Liked. Shelikedto make tea.
The correction is a knife. It lodges in her chest.
“It’s not half bad with honey,” she adds, though her voice comes out pinched. “And it’s good for a cough.”
“Cough medicineis good for a cough,” says Silas, but both of them know there’s no cough medicine left. Still wary, he takes the wilting cohosh from Shea’s outstretched hand. The mention of her mother has softened his suspicion, just a little.
Ivy Parker—formerly Everly, and the only surviving member of Little Hill’s founding family—is Little Hill’s fallen angel. Pretty, popular Ivy, who disappointed everyone when she married a poor boy from Highbush and moved to the outskirts of town. Pitiable, innocent Ivy, who had a baby four short months later. A sickly little thing, too still, too small, too silent.
Lovely, golden-haired Ivy, who went gray in the weeks after Calhoun Parker left home in the dead of night and didn’t return.
“Is she all right?” Silas asks. “Your mother? Haven’t seen her around.”
“She’s fine,” says Shea, andthisis a lie. Her very worst one. “She sends her best.”
Silas looks unconvinced. “Maybe I should have Marla stop over one of these days. She can bring her famous casserole. Check in on things.”
“No.” Her voice is too sharp to be mistaken for anything but panic. She tries again, softer this time. “Thank you, it’s just that she’s not up for visitors.”
“Right, of course.”
There’s no denying how thin the excuse has worn. It’s been seven years since Shea’s father disappeared. Eleven whole months since anyone has seen her mother outside the house. Shea can’t keep up the ruse forever.
Thankfully, Silas doesn’t pry any further. His head kicks up, angling toward the door. The bell has rung again, too far off for Shea to hear it. She feels, in the soles of her feet, the subtle creak of floorboards, the telltale shift of another customer arriving.
“You’d better get on home.” Silas reaches for his pushcart, his eyes on the sky. “Sun’s due to set within the hour. If Constable Foster catches you out of the house after curfew, that stolen candy in your pocket will be the least of your troubles.”
“It’s not stolen,” she argues. “I bartered for it. Don’t forget to add honey to the tea.”
“I’m throwing that poison right in the garbage,” Silas calls after her, but she knows he won’t. He’s far too frugal. The last shipment was late in the summer. No trucks have come through since then.
It’s those Mercy Boys, say the rumors.They’re smoking us out.
But Shea’s not so sure she believes it. The Mercy Boys weren’t around when her father got sick, and there wasn’t medicine then, either. It’s why he left—to take the burden of watching him wither and die off her mother’s shoulders. No debt. No doubt. No slow, painful demise.
Only the forest and its teeth, the lesser of two evils.
She’s so lost in thoughts of her father, she doesn’t notice Asher Thorley standing on the mat until she collides directly into him. Her backpack—still clutched protectively before her—jams between them. The stolen cans bite into her belly through the fabric. From the look on his face, he’s felt it, too. His brows lift in quiet amusement. His hand closes over the strap before she can wrench herself safely out of reach.
“Fourteen months away and nothing has changed. You’re still a little kleptomaniac.”
“Let go.”
He doesn’t. “What do you have in there, Parker?”
