Glancing up through reddened vision, Arthur sees Vaughn at the trunk of the Bone Tree, leaning in to put his cheek against its rough bark. One of his bony hands grips the lowest skull, fingers curled around the bottom jaw like he’s holding on to a skeletal scream.
His back has broadened, tearing the tunic, and he’s taller, and bright white again. His hair is more like fur, sleek and black, and he glances over his shoulder at Arthur.
“Alive, still. Well.”
“I don’t—” It hurts Arthur to speak, but he forces words through his bruised throat. “Why do you... care... about my... mother?”
“I don’t understand how she could leave her child. I nearly destroyed myself for mine, and your mother just... left.”
“I’d never have left!” Arthur yells.
The devil, whatever he is, crouches, balanced easily on his wildcat legs, and watches Arthur. “Yes. You’re too like me. I’ve always believed that, too.”
Arthur shakes his head. “No, no, I’m not.”
“Too powerful for the place you’re rooted. Wanting more but unable to let go.”
“No.” Pushing to his knees, Arthur shakes his head again. “I’m not.”
A moth bats wings against his cheek, and a centipede the size of a snake slips across the back of Arthur’s hand, scurrying toward the tree.
Flowers continue to fall.
What did the devil say? Arthur squeezes his eyes tightly shut.I nearly destroyed myself for mine.“What child?” Arthur demands. He coughs, racked with the ache of it from his throat.
“It doesn’t matter to you, Arthur Couch. I’ll be right there, to snap your neck properly.”
Arthur begins to crawl away, carefully getting to his feet, though he sways and stumbles back. “So you, what? You wanted more and so you made a bargain with the Grace witches, to leave your forest?”
“Yes, exactly! A taste of freedom, able to leave these roots, but the roots had to change, they had to have a replacement god.”
“The devils you gave it hardly replaced you.”
“Not the devils, not the saints themselves, but the life and death of them. The cycle, you see? Life and death. That is what I am, what has always been the heart of my forest. I tore free by giving the heart a different channel.”
Arthur can see now what the devil is doing: He’s caressing the Bone Tree, slowly coaxing it to open, so that the heavy white bark draws back from a crevasse. “Are you going back in?”
“Planting a new seed, Arthur Couch.”
“With what?”
Then Vaughn smiles again. “Here it comes.”
Screams of laughter erupt behind Arthur, and he turns. Something is coming, dragging something else behind it.
Arthur stands, holding on to the altar for strength.
The devil—Baeddan.
Arthur steps closer, but Baeddan doesn’t see him. His tattered black coat catches and tears on a scraggly bush, but Baeddan continues on, tugging violently at his prize.
“Baeddan?” Arthur says.
The devil looks up and grins. “I’ve got the saint, and I’ve got the saint! He’ll be woven into the Bone Tree, Arthur Couch, for now and for ever, and I will be free! Oh, I am hungry.”
Panic slices through Arthur, and he runs toward Baeddan. “Rhun?” he gasps, skidding to a stop at the edge of the grove.
“Ha, ha, ha!” says Baeddan, then deteriorates into rasping, devilish laughter.
