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Mercy grabs my wrists. “I’ve got you!”

“Don’t let go!”

“I won’t!”

The Harvest bends toward the barn.

The broken roof groans beneath it as branches scrape across splintered beams, forcing the thing to fold itself nearly in half just to look inside.

To look at me.

Then its chest begins to open.

Roots peel apart with a wet, fibrous tearing sound, exposing a darkness inside its body that seems to go much deeper than anything that size should allow.

Something moves in there.

Hands.

One pushes through.

Then another.

And another.

A dozen human arms slowly unfold from its chest, joints bending at angles that make my teeth ache. Some are young and smooth. Others are gray with decay. One is little more than bone held together by roots.

Each palm carries something.

An apple, its red skin so ripe it has split down the middle.

A knife wet with blood.

A silver goblet overflowing with something too dark to be wine.

A black ribbon wrapped around dead fingers.

A red ribbon clenched in a child-sized fist.

A human heart, still beating.

And finally, a handful of corn kernels resting in a rotting palm.

The rites.

Every fucking one of them.

The arms extend toward me.

An offering.

No.

A menu.

Choose how you belong to me.

The mouths covering its body begin to move.