The scene crystallized like an optical illusion, the sea of red dots that became a sunken homestead if someone stared long enough. Leo’s body no longer resembled a human form; the trees’ roots had wrapped and squeezed him until he popped. Fragments of bone and flesh and gut lay in a king-rat of roots. As Linda breathed in deep, the smell of blood filled her nose. She bent over and gagged, her hands on her thighs.
The scene repulsed and confused her. Something about it wasn’t correct. She puzzled at the information, trying to make sense of what she was seeing: death, dismemberment, the annihilation of a whole man’s soul by the roots of a tree. The roots of a tree had done this, and Linda’s wildest fears, the ones she had pushed away because of their unlikelihood, flooded her. Linda wasn’t scared of ordinary things. She wasn’t afraid of snakes, or heights, or the dark, or clowns. She didn’t succumb to jump scares, and she kept a level head regarding other people’s terrible driving on the road around her. This manor, and the woods surrounding it, terrified her to the bone.
“There’s no blood,” Charity muttered, almost a whisper.
No blood. That was it, the unsettling thing beyond the impossibility of it all. The death was gruesome, and it suggested truths about the world and the manor that broke Linda’s conceptions of reality, but the uncanniest fact? There was no blood, despite the man’s body having been ripped wide open. And she had smelled that copper perfume.
She frowned. She stepped forward, scanning the trees. She heard a faint beat. She stepped closer to the trees. She could see they had a red tint. She stepped over the edge of the root pile, and the beating grew stronger. She stumbled and fell face-first into the leaves, landing with her hands in front of her face. They pressed into something soggy and cold, a pink goo that coated her palm. It was part of his intestine. As a reflex, she wiped her hand against the closest rough thing: the bark of the nearest tree. She felt it beat beneath her touch, and she heard a sound then like the rushing of blood in her head, but all around her. It was the trees, and the bark felt soft and muscular like the back of Charity’s thigh as Linda knelt between her legs and grabbed hold of the meaty flesh. She pulled back, and through a hole in the trunk, she found Jazz’s calf, her music-note tattoo wrapped around the purple skin.
• • •
As Charity described the scene to Sabrina, Linda saw it once more. Guts. Blood in the trees. Muscle. Bone. A slip of intestine against her palm. She felt woozy again. Death was a thing no one escaped.
“It’s the trees,” Linda whispered. “You were right.”
“What?” Sabrina said.
“It’s the trees,” Charity repeated.
“Marion’s disappeared.” Deja swept into the parlor where the final women sat soaking in the horror of the day. “None of us should be alone. It’s not safe, and we can’t let any violent acts go unseen from here on out.”
“More?” Linda frowned. “You know we just found three bodies in the woods, right?” Every time she blinked, the images floated like sunspots.
“Whose bodies?” Deja pressed a hand to the wall. “Tristan’s? Brandon’s?”
“Becca. Leo. Jazz.” Linda shivered. Charity reached for her. “Can you tell us what happened to them?” She didn’t mean to let the accusatory tone in her voice through, but she couldn’t help it.
Deja smirked. “I don’t know, Linda. Do I look omnipotent? I can’t call my psychic, you know. “
“But you know some things. There’s some weird shit going on,” Charity said. “Brandon, Tristan, Marion. What happened to Becca, Deja? She was speared by a limb.”
“And the others—” Linda shuddered again as she described them. “You know what did it, don’t you?”
“Goddamn this fucking house. How the hell could this have happened?” Deja’s face drained of its vibrancy. “Speared on a limb? The only thing I can guess is she was climbing the tree, and she slipped, and the limb—”
“And what about all the weird rooms full of body parts, and the wood floor in the bathroom growing?” Linda said.
“And the womb wall,” Sabrina said.
Linda and Sabrina shared a confused glance, but there wasn’t time to get into that now.
“There’s nothing in these old rooms but wood. Now quit being naive and paranoid and help me find Marion.”
“Paranoid?” Charity stood to face Deja. “Half the people who came here are dead. You’re untrustworthy as shit, Deja, and we’re onto you. You act like you’re in charge still. Like you still own our time, our emotions. That shit ended the moment Tristan kicked the bucket. No Groom, no brides-in-waiting. We’re equals now, motherfucker.”
Deja’s eyes flashed as she moved away from the door, resolve forcing her mouth into a thin line.
“And what about Marion? She’s sick! And now she’s also missing? If we go back into those woods, are we going to find her dead, too?” Sabrina stood. Linda joined her. They all crossed their arms across their chests like a monster movie girl gang. Pride surged in Linda, a tremor in her chest.
“The truth?” Deja raised her eyebrows. “She’s infected with the spirit of the woods.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Sabrina said, but Deja pressed a finger to her lip.
“I grew up in this house. I’m sure you’ve heard that by now, as loose as your lips are. Trust me when I say you won’t ever understand this place. Not like I do.” Deja’s voice shook for a second before she swallowed, continuing as evenly as ever. “I didn’t mean for it to happen this way, but we don’t have time to chat. We need to find Marion.”
“Let’s say she is infected.” Sabrina’s tone was a lazy river weary of flowing. “How do you suggest we cure her?”
“There’s no cure,” Deja said. “Only death.”
The room pulsed in sync with the palpitation of Linda’s heartbeat.
“Death?” Linda’s throat constricted. Years ago, she had wished her father dead, and he had died. She had dreamed of wrapping her hands around his throat, and he had breathed his last breath. Now, Deja was speaking death to Marion, and Linda recognized the desperate gleam in her.
Linda understood the importance of her next lines, unscripted in that famous reality TV way. If she said the wrong thing, they would reshoot again and again until she got it right—or she’d find herself punished.
“Let’s find Marion,” she lied. She’d gotten so good at lying. “Tell us what to do. We’ll do it.”
Chapter Forty
Linda
Deja took the bait. She assigned each woman a wing of the manor to search. “If you find her, don’t engage,” she said. “Come find me.”
“Why not?” Sabrina asked, causing Deja to narrow her sharp gaze.
“Because she’s strong, ladies. It’s as simple as that.” She handed over Linda’s earpiece, her brows knitted. “Linda, use this to tell me where she is. You, especially: Do. Not. Engage.”
Linda swallowed as she pressed the piece into her ear. She was glad that Sabrina didn’t ask why her specifically, but Linda understood: because she, too, was dangerous. As Deja scurried off, Linda ripped the earpiece out, turned it off, and shoved it into her pocket. She was done being dangerous for Deja.
