28. || devil's backbone.

Finley tore off her flannel and wrapped it around River's abdomen, tying it tight against both wounds. Blood soaked through the fabric, staining her hands a deep shade of red as she continued to hold pressure while searching for anything to help stop the bleeding. Along the edge of the woods, the lone coyote stalked the shadows like a silver ghost, weaving between the slender pines.

Rancid decay surrounded them, both pungent and sweetly sickening. The one boy's head had been hollowed out by the bullet, brain splattered against the little thornberry; the othern's still laid near the hemlock, severed from its body. And Jedidiah's split right up the middle with the axe stuck in it like a stubborn maple log. All three bodies laid dead still. It was no surprise they were attracting predators, but it wasn't the four legged ones Finley was concerned about. The coyote circled wide, careful not to breach the hemlock's clearing as she watched Finley's every move.

"I can't tell if you're pacing 'cause you're worried about River," Finley said to her, voice trembling with panic as River's blood seeped between her fingers. "Or if you're just hungry." The coyote seemed to be listening as she slowed and hopped on a rotted moss-covered log up the crick to observe.

Moss.

Even with only the waning moon's light, she could tell from the fullness of its starry green blanket it was a type of sphagnum. She'd used the same to pack the bullet hole in her foot a year ago. Glancing around, she searched for any within reach, but the closest clung to the wet bark beneath the coyote's paws. As fast as she dared, she released her pressure on River and cautiously stepped towards the wild animal.

"If it's all right with you," she spoke to her softly like River might, kneeling down next to the fallen tree, "I'd like to borrow some of that moss."

The coyote's ears and nose twitched, her head dipped, eyes skittish, but she didn't run.

Slowly reaching out, Finley slid her fingers beneath the layer of moss and carefully skinned it away from the rotten log, revealing hollow arteries of insect tunnels and larvae beneath its green carpet. As she went to peel off another layer, the coyote curled her lip. Her teeth gnashed above, but her dark eyes stared beyond. Twisting her neck, Finley looked over her shoulder. Nothing moved against the hemlock or near the bank where River laid. But someone or something—or both was definitely watching. As she turned back around, the coyote was gone.

She tore the rest of the moss free from the log and then hurried back to River's side. Squeezing out what moisture she could, she packed layers of the leafy sponge into each wound. Had she time to boil it, it would've been more effective as an antiseptic, Gram had taught her that much, but she would worry about infection later once she got River stable and safe at home in the cabin. Their eyes remained shut, their breaths shallow and labored, but their fingers tapped to find hers.

<You're wasting your time, Finley.> Buckmouse appeared across the crickbed. Behind him, a herd of thirty-some deer moved in strange, orbital patterns, circling the springhouse. <We have everything we need now. Use the knife to mark River and end the curse for good.>

"Everything?" Beside her, the blade of the knife still laid covered in River's blood. She picked it up to study the handle. Carved into the bone, another rune matched the design of the antler and deerjaw. It was the third talisman. River had it in their possession this whole time. "What happens to River?"

<They will return to the Otherworld with the souls of the dead.>

"And you?" Finley asked. "What happens to you?"

The white stag snorted and shook his crown of antlers as he wobbled on his hindlegs.

"He'd be free tae click them bloody hooves beyond this mountain, love."

Finley shot to her feet, spinning around with the knife, face to face with Vera. Blonde coiffured hair framed her slender face with a lone curl spiraled down her porcelain neck. Her icy blue eyes dropped to the point of the blade, but she didn't flinch or back away. Instead, she smiled.

"Ya got so much of your mum in ya." Vera's cold fingers slid behind Finley's ear to brush the hair from her face. She cupped her chin to look her over, digging her sharp, pointed nails into her skin. "Them eyes—"

Finley jerked away and raised the knife to Vera's pale throat. The edge of the blade cut straight through the blonde curl that dangled from her head. "We share blood, that's it." She wasn't sure if Vera meant her actual mother or Thalia, but it didn't matter. "Forgive me for not feeling sentimental."

"Aye, blood." Her eyes slipped away to steal a glance at the garnet ring. "A wee bit of yours goes a long way, yeah?"

Finley lowered the blade. "Will it save River?"

Vera's eyes shifted again to glimpse over Finley's shoulder where Buckmouse still stood. "River's better off dead in these woods. Ya know that as well as I."

"So you tried to kill them and keep them trapped here like you?" Finley's fingers tightened around the bone handle. "They deserve to live a life beyond this curse." Between them, the hemlock's roots that chained Vera slithered up her long black skirt and wrapped around her cinched waist. "Unfortunately, I can't say the same for you."

Vera flicked her wrist and roots shot up out of the ground around Finley, constricting her arms to her ribs. "Got your mumma's backbone as well, I see. That mouth, 'specially so." She laughed as the roots wrapped tighter. Dark blood began to drip from her nose. "But me lamb, dinnae forget I kilt ya once and I'd gladly dae it again."

Those icy hands Finley had felt in the springhouse the first night had been hers. A hereditary vision of the past that had been seared into her memory, coalesced from the blood of her dead grandmothers. The same cursed blood that filled her womb now. It was no longer just about her or even River anymore. The curse had to end here.

Finley spun the blade with her fingers to point up and as the roots tried to compress against her, they cut themselves clean in two. White worms spilled and sprawled from either end of the roots, thousand leggers crawled up and down her legs, but she yanked and sliced through the rest that restrained her. Vera, breathing heavy, smeared away the brown blood from her nose, but she didn't try to send more.

"I'm not marking River, but I'm not gonna let them die either." Finley dropped the knife and knelt back down at their side. The moss was working, the bleeding had slowed. On a root next to them laid the blonde curl that had fallen from Vera's head. Slowly, Finley slid the garnet ring off her finger. "I just need a couple more months. And then you can do what you want with me."

<Finley.>

She ignored the pleas from Buckmouse and held the ring up. Vera's eyes widened, but she almost seemed hesitant to take it. Her tongue ran over her bottom lip to lick away the dark blood that continued to stream down her nose. "When's the wee bairn due, love?"

She'd already done the math long before she even set foot on this mountain. It was what had convinced her to try to escape the Demon one last time. While Vera's eyes were fixed to the garnet, Finley reached behind for the knife. Her hand slipped through the golden curl and she let it coil around her finger. "Late spring, it seems."

Snatching the garnet, Vera shook her head. "Ya dinnae have that kinda time. Look 'round, my lamb. This thing, this demon that's after ya will nae quit til it's destroyed the whole forest owre lookin' for ya. It smells your soul in the ancient heartwood, your blood in the black earth." Vera stretched out her long fingers to admire the red glow of the ring on its rightful hand. "But perhaps we can offer it somethin' more enticing, somethin' else to bind to..."

"Can you reverse it back to the one who conjured it?"

Vera's eyes sharpened as her lips twisted up to a grin. "Lookin' for revenge, are we?"

Finley wasn't sure what name to give it, but she was tired of running. "What do you need?"

"Just somethin' that belongs to them," she answered. "And your blood."

"I don't have anything," Finley murmured as the edge of the blade teased her skin. "You're bound, anyway. I doubt you could help."

Vexed anger flared in Vera's eyes. "I've tamed the darkest haunts this mountain has spilled whilst chained tae it. Just ask your deer friend, Buckmouse. Or should I say Ignatius, his mastermind."

"Ignatius?" As Finley echoed his name, the maple branches above rustled.

"Used me for his own benefit," Vera continued. "Convinced me tae destroy the mine, the dam, and the church. Done the same tae ya, I reckon. Danglin' your soul out ahead the curse."

<She had no hope. No soul to redeem.> The lynx's silver eyes glowed against the black, tainted maple leaves. <But for you, it's still possible, Finley.>

The betrayal soured her stomach, but she tried not to let it show. "This demon that's after me isn't just some deceitful, extra-large housecat or a bony, undead, Not-Deer. But I don't blame you for staying rooted to the hemlock, Vera. As much as they're chains, they protect you, right?"

Vera yanked Finley to her feet and snatched the knife from her hand. Gripping her wrist, she slid the blade along the line of Finley's palm. Cold air stung the gash as it split open. Blood surfaced and dripped down her arm, running over Vera's thumb as she dug her pointed fingernail into it; ignorant to her own golden curl wrapped around Finley's finger, now soaked in cursed blood.

She released Finley's wrist and brought her bloodied thumb to her lips, licking the length of her nail. "Tastes like a girl, my lamb. Best end it now so she won't suffer as we have." Cutting her own palm, she mixed the bright red with the sludge that dripped from hers onto the garnet ring and threw down the knife.

The earth began to tremble as Vera walked back towards the hemlock to place her palm against the rotted trunk. In the trees above, Ignatius moved farther out on a limb. Finley could feel his eyes on her as she discreetly drew out the mountain's sigil—and its mirrored image—over the bed of yellow pine needles, letting their crescents overlap into full circles.

Two ends of the same old curse.

As Vera turned back around, she walked along a narrowed root and then stopped at its edge. The toe of her boot crunched against dried maple leaves as she tested the now broken boundary. But no scorch of hellfire blazed up her leg. She was free.

Flattening her foot to the ground, she took a full step away from the hemlock. Then another.

But she had barely stepped away before the ground shook violently with a quake deep within the mountain like the night before. Brine and sulphur filled the air, spewing from the cracks in the earth.

"It's come tae fetch ya." Vera turned her attention back to Finley. "I can make it quick, my lamb. Ya know when she gets aholt of ya again, she won't be as kind."

Finley dropped the blood soaked curl into the circles between the triangles. "Then hopefully you can throw off her demon for a bit."

Thick, filth covered roots unlike any belonging to the trees of this mountain broke through the crust of the forest floor along the lines of the sigil. A gaping pit opened before her where those roots, those tentacles led back to the rotted, upturned trunk they were attached to; a reflection of the blighted hemlock. The look of shock twisted Vera's fine features into ugly knots as they came for her fast, roping her wrists, dragging her to its center where a form emerged covered in that sludge, that dark mud-that-wasn't-mud.

"Beloved," it spoke.

Vera stopped fighting. Her arms dropped to her sides, wrists freed from the oozing shackles. Mud slopped to the ground, falling away from this thing, revealing a dark haired woman, her pale skin clean and free of filth as her hand reached towards Vera. And she took it. Vera's eyes glazed over, clouded gray like those zombies that she'd sent after River. And Finley didn't need to see the front of this thing to know what it was. She knew it had carved out a heart-shaped face like her own, and like her mother's and Gram's and hers before down the line til it manipulated and molded itself into Thalia.

But Thalia, it wasn't and Finley almost felt bad as it coaxed Vera towards its muddied maw. Absorbed by an embrace, she disappeared for the last time. Just an ephemeral haunt, true to the legend of the Hemlock Witch.

But the roots continued to search. The sludge spread out over the forest floor. Tentacles of brown mucous sought out the dead boys, gorging themselves on their bodies. One wrapped around the hemlock and claimed Vera's charred black bones. Another slithered towards Finley and lapped at her legs with a hot, wet, tongue, but found the split in Jedidiah's skull more appealing. All began to recede into the pit, aside from one determined to take River with it.

With her boot to Jedidiah's head, Finley wriggled the long-handled axe free from his muddy skull and swung through the slick root that snaked around River. The sludge split and splattered, but unlike the hungry worms of the hemlock that crawled away, this root reformed and multiplied. Again, Finley chopped and swung, but still more roots swarmed them. Puncturing River's wounds, they pushed out the clotted moss and began to drag River towards its center. Finley sunk her hands into the sludge, tearing clumps away, but its filth burned her skin.

Unsure what else to do, she wrapped her arms around River as the mud began to encase them both.

"Listen to that pile of bones over there and mark me. End this all for good." River winced. "Even long-legged, back-assward, immortal hillbillies gotta return to the earth someday, Boots."

"Not like this, Riv." Ignatius may have fooled Finley in retrieving the talismans for the demon Not-Deer, but he had also given that pile of bloody bones a name. Finley strained to look across the crick where the white stag stood. "Buckmouse!"

Reaching into her pocket, she removed the jawbone and fought against the sludge to stand up. Looming over her, Buckmouse appeared at her command and she slid the bone back into his skull. The white stag let out a spirited shriek, spewing crawlers to the ground. His herd of deer leapt over the brook and began licking at the dark mud that clung and burnt and tugged at River and Finley.

Free from its hold, Finley looped River's arm over her shoulder and forced them to stand. Blood ran thick down their stomach and she knew they were running out of time. The sludge continued to pump out roots, seeking them out again, but the herd began to circle tight around Finley and River and Buckmouse. The deer formed layers of circles, spiraling in the opposite direction of the one before.

<Get to the springhouse. The bone ward will hold.>

Pushing through the herd, Finley dragged River down over the bank and through the spoiled crick, up to the springhouse as the roots began to strip the fur and flesh away from the deer. The sludge was hot on their tail, but Finley kicked the sack of lime over the doorway, sending a cloud of dust its way. The springhouse was fortified once again.

In the basin of the reservoir, only a small amount of water remained, all thawed since this morning. It was their last hope. Stumbling over the stone ruins of the retaining wall, Finley guided River into its deepest corner. Ice cold water washed around her ankles, soaking her thighs as she laid them down.

"Hey Boots," River whispered with a grimace. "I thought up a good one while I was out."

"Shh," Finley lifted their soiled shirt to assess the wounds. "No jokes right now."

"How did the tree get lost in the woods?"

"River." But she couldn't hold back her grim smile even as their bright red blood continued to saturate the freezing water around them. "I dunno, how?"

"It took the wrong root." As Finley groaned, they laughed softly. "What? Too soon?"

Shaking her head, she leaned against them. For the first time, their skin felt cold and she wondered if this was it. Would she even be able to tell if they died in her arms? Stuck here eternally. Like her, if she chose not to break the curse. Maybe there were worser fates.

But then those little ripples tickled her belly and she began to pray.

And not to that Christian God because he wouldn't forgive the blood on either their hands and she'd given up on Him years ago anyways. Instead, she looked up to the trees that branched out overhead because they knew River better than anyone and maybe they were still listening.

Snowflakes began to fall around them, melting against her hand. As she turned her palm up, she saw the scarred tip of the mountain's mark peeking out from her sleeve and she knew they had heard her. Discreetly, she buttoned the cuff.

Beyond the window, there was no sign of the mud-that-wasn't-mud.

"Boots... Finley," River corrected themself. The warmth in their voice as they said her name made her forget how cold she was. Lit by the moon, their dark eyes met hers. "I know we said we shouldn't, but I dunno if I'll get another chance to—"

Cupping their cheek, Finley pressed her lips to theirs. The fear of losing River propelled her, but desire consumed her now. It burned hot on her tongue as River kissed her harder. Reluctantly, she pulled away to glance down at their stomach. Swollen and raw, the wound had a ways to go before it healed, but it had closed.

River followed her eyes, then looked back up with a smile. "Let's go home."