Page 18 of A Serpent in the Garden

He was cruel to you?

He’s a demon. A bit of cruelty isn’t really abnormal.

I’m sorry, I said, after an arrhythmic pause. But It dismissed my sympathies with a brusque little noise, as if I’d said something so moronic It was embarrassed for me.

A conspicuous patch of red caught in my peripheral vision, and I turned to find a rose bush, a shock of scarlet against the dark face of the wood, inexplicably growing despite the utter lack of sun in this place. The petals weren’t fanned in full flower but barely budding, drenched with dew.

How can they grow to look so healthy? I asked. Or even grow at all? Most plants need sun, and it never shines here.

They’re not the roses that you know, It said, bored, as if it were buffing its talons against its chest. They’re called bloodroses.

For the color?

They only grow where faerie blood’s been spilled. The part of the wood where that coven almost ate you will be buried in bloodroses soon enough. Some say they tell your future.

I felt my brow crease, a chill roaring through my veins. How?

You prick your finger on a thorn. The rose changes. Something like that. I’ve never been interested in prophecy, myself.

I heard Serich’s labored breathing puffing from around the corner, but I took a step toward the bush.

It clucked sharply in my head. I wouldn’t. Everyone wants to know their fate until they actually hear it. Sometimes darkness is better than the light.

“What’s the matter?” Serich stopped just behind me. A loud thud told me he’d managed to haul back a boulder.

I nodded at the bush. “It says the roses can tell your future.” Would he scorn them, I wondered, since fate and prophecies had no place in the church?

Serich joined me at my side, devoid of scorn, just a thoughtful frown upon his face. The roses seemed common enough, despite where they grew. It was hard to believe they were capable of anything. “How can that be?”

“A prick of the finger. The rose changes.”

He sent me a sly sideways glance, looking more like a slick devil than a priest. “And you’re tempted?”

“Aren’t you, a little?”

“Maybe a bit,” he said, with a glimmer of a smile. “Though you’d think whatever answer it gives you is open to much interpretation if it can’t use words.”

He knelt to examine the roses, their fat velvety buds. Petals red as a freshly opened artery, silken edges the deep burgundy of wine. And then Serich looked up at me and smiled, pricking the edge of his thumb against a thorn.

I bit back my surprise at his boldness and sank to the earth beside him.

We waited for a few heartbeats, hardly daring to breathe, but it seemed as though nothing would happen. And then it began to change, rising taller and taller, lush furry petals ripening in full flower. The stem grew thick and strong and twisted, ridged with fiendishly spiny thorns. More buds sprang from the side of it, branching off into separate flowers which shared a common root. And then those roses grew roses, more and more and more, a network of stems and thorns and petals, and when the one Serich had pricked his finger against began to shrivel up and blacken, another bloom took its place.

His lips parted as he watched the next oldest roses cycle through the process and eventually wither, though new buds kept bursting into life. “What does it mean?”

Not so devout, then, It said with amused and crushing disdain. His seed will certainly take root.

“Maybe that you’ll have children?” I tried to say it as though it were a good thing.

Serich looked like he’d been blindsided by a punch. “I’m taking vows when Father Hull returns, Des. I can’t imagine I would break them so easily.”

“Why would it be such a bad thing if you did?” I asked gently. “Would that change what you believe? Of course not.”

He was still frowning at the bush as if it were telling him lies. “It’s meant to be a sign of our dedication.”

“I don’t see why you couldn’t still be dedicated if you had a family.”

He climbed to his feet, and the bloodrose seemed to decide that he had looked his fill. Collapsing, it crumbled into dust.