Bullshit. Tell it to the mirror.
When I stay quiet, he blurts, “It’s a god. The story about my great-great-grandfather is true. He did save the baron’s daughter, but not from a collapse. They dug too deep. When the god crawled out, it went through the miners like a Sunday brunch buffet. He saved her and trapped it. As soon as they realized what having it around did, they started feeding it. Been in the family ever since. The tradition was to let some poor bastard loose in the woods and let it hunt. It became a spectacle.” He shakes his head. “I’m proud to say I’ve modernized. We’re not barbarians. You get more flies with honey than vinegar, as the saying goes. The only time it used to see the sun was during the hunt. Now, it gets two full days of freedom to stretch its legs and chase critters to its heart’s content. We establish boundaries, of course. Some of which you saw.”
He looks to the crate, then grins down at me. “It almost got ya, didn’t it? Can you imagine? The sacrificial lamb gets eatenbeforethe sacrifice?”
There’s something happening in my chest. It’s not my heart thumping. It’s not my stomach sinking. It’s a ghost pepper pushing its way up my throat. My gums and the muscles in my jaw are on fire. The only cure is tobite.
“Where’s Emma? My dog?”
“You just had to keep on walking.” Ellis continues like I didn’t say a word. He picks up a lock of my hair and rubs it between his fingers. “I hope you don’t think this was all me. Arden hates you so much. Between you and me she doesn’thandle failure well. She tried so hard to recruit you. I think it really damaged her. The failure.”
Having it confirmed that, yes, it was her on the video of Ripley hurts in a way I didn’t expect. For so long, I tried to be the best employee and most pleasant coworker possible. I wore kitten heels and tucked in my shirts and spent a thousand dollars on Arden and Jena’s worthless self-betterment cult. None of it—none of it—could cover up who I am at my core. Arden smelled it on me the moment we met.
Turns out that no amount of perfume can cover up the stench of the working class.
This is all so ridiculous. I want to laugh. Of course a personal-development cult has trapped me in the woods so they can sacrifice me to their weird god that crawled out of a hole. Of course they have.
It’d make too much sense for some transphobe to sabotage my truck. Way too pedestrian to wander into a drug trafficker’s territory and get shot for it. No, what ultimately does me inwouldbe the silliest thing imaginable.
And here it is: the silly thing has come to eat me up. Not only me, it’s gonna swallow my best friend and my dog whole too.
“Knew it was a cult.”
“It’s a cult thatworks.” Ellis’s mouth is doing something that’s less a smile and more a manic grimace. “Humans at the height of actualization are naturally driven to create a better, more ethical world. Do you have any idea how much land I’ve saved for conservation all over the state?How much our members have given to charity? Every new Ascentian is a soldier in the Empathy Revolution. Every revolution needs a leader.”
The capitals on Empathy Revolution are loud and clear. In a few months it’ll be on T-shirts and tote bags and hashtagged to death. Not only will the revolution be televised, but it’ll be trademarked too, if Ellis has anything to say about it.
“I have to ask. You had no idea about me, did you? That’s on purpose, of course. If people saw what was controlling the hand of God, there’d be no faith, don’t you agree?”
Every word drips with zeal and smugness. Again, he pauses for me to react. I close my eyes since I can’t cover my ears. “Sure. Whatever.”
Silence. Reluctantly, I open my eyes. At least his grin is gone.
“You’re not the least bit curious what you’re dying for?”
“You sacrifice people in exchange for prosperity. That’s just capitalism, and that’s been killing me my whole life. Itdidkill my mom.” The tears are immediate. I blink rapidly to clear the prickle at the corner of my eyes. “Grow up.”
He shakes his head. “My ancestors, my father, did it for wealth. For a spectacle. We aren’t—I justtoldyou how it’s different.”
Even his rants about mountains and ancient glaciers carving through the earth don’t rival the wide-eyed zeal that’s taken over his face. “You don’t know anything about power. Aboutritual.I’m changing the world. I’m saving it. All it costs is one person that no one will even remember.”
Bone-deep tiredness pushes a sigh out of my mouth.
“I get it, okay? You are averyspecial boy.”
A full minute passes with nothing but the sound of cicadas filling the air. He looks up at the darkened sky, then squints down at me. “Arden was right. You deserve this.”
Without another word, he retreats into the house.
He’s got Haircut and Youth Pastor with him when he comes back. They hold a struggling and still-handcuffed Emma. Blood is smeared across her cheek and her hairline. Her shirt is drenched with sweat. She’s 130 pounds soaking wet, but she’s still managing to make both men strain with how hard she’s throwing herself around.
Haircut and Youth Pastor walk her forward and force her to her knees. I crane my neck, but it’s difficult to see with the lanterns between us and the ropes holding me down. Our eyes meet. I know what I’m expecting: anger, fear, disappointment. Instead, she wears a blank mask. She meets my gaze, then looks away.
“Well, alright.” Ellis smiles. “Might as well get to it.”
Arden:Do you mind if I—
Ellis:No. I’d prefer the takeaways to be more accurate.
