Page 45 of The Exorcism of Faeries

“Then let’s figure out what in hell is really going on, hm?”

Atta dipped her beak and they rounded one last corner. Gold Stitch opened the door to what felt like another time. Two giant stone braziers blazed with fire at the foot of a short set of stone steps.Everythingwas stone. Save for the skulls and bones that made up the cave walls.

“Jesus,” she whispered in awe, descending the steps to have a better look.

The huge door closed with a heavy thud and Atta jumped, turning to see Gold Stitch flanked by two enormous stone-carved reapers on either side of the door, featureless, protective, with their hoods up and arms outstretched, waiting for the dead.

“Sorry.” He said, jogging down the steps to meet her. “That door doesn’t close quietly, I’m afraid.”

“This is where Agamemnon Society meets?”

“It used to be, in the beginning.” He pointed to the curved walls of bones. “Society members’ coffins are buried empty. We are set aflame on an altar here and our bones are taken from the fire before they become ash.” He gestured to the cavelike walls Atta was just realising were inlaid with–

“Humanbones,” she breathed, spinning a small circle, taking in the ossuary, like a miniature replica of the Catacombs of Paris.

“Yes. We make up the walls here.”

Without waiting for her to respond, he led the way forward, down another tunnel, shorter by far than the last. It opened up into an identical chamber, only everything was made of marble instead of crude stone. When the door shut, Atta turned to see if the reapers were there, too. In that updated inner sanctum, the reapers were marble masterpieces.

Atta wondered how they managed to get so much pristine marble underground but didn’t have time to contemplate it because her guide was already entering through another door.

She ran to catch up, ripping off her mask as soon as she made it inside the clinical space. She expected Gold Stitch to reprimand her, but he didn’t. He, too, was taken aback, standing stock-still in front of a body on a metal autopsy table. The body of Lauren Kennedy. Wrapped in crawling ivy.

Atta dropped her mask to the cold floor and walked forward, her mouth agape and breath fogging in front of her, ever so slightly. Lauren’s head was too far up. Unattached from her spine.

Atta bent to look closer, marvelling at the stems growing within the flesh like veins, the petiole and buds protruding from her skin. “They’re completely embedded,” she said as Gold Stitch came to stand next to her.

“They look like they originated from inside her body,” he mused.

He was right. Atta rushed to a wall of small drawers, opening and closing them quickly looking for?—

“Here.” He handed her a pair of surgical gloves and slipped a pair on himself.

Together, they peeled back the flesh at the incision site with forceps, immensely grateful Lauren hadn’t yet been sewn back up.

“Someone will be back soon,” he said, grabbing a pair of surgical scissors. “She’s not been closed properly and there is no way they’ll leave her alone here for long. Not like this.”

Atta reached for a set of tweezers, pushing and prodding the vines in the chest cavity, looking for the root, the beginning of Lauren’s demise.

She and Gold Stitch sucked in a breath in unison when they found a mushroom sprouting.

“Her heart,” Atta whispered, then looked at Gold Stitch. “How?”

She ripped off her glove.

“What are you doing?” Gold Stitch’s voice was urgent.

But she didn’t answer. Instead, she gently touched the mushroom cap.

This time, shealmostexpected the migraine. Was almost ready for it.

Ivy, thick and wild, crawled up marble pillars. It looked like ancient Greece but draped in a golden haze—like an old Jean Harlow movie. At the end of the row of pillars sat a throne of twisted branches, dotted in unidentifiable flora. Colours her eyes had never seen. There was a glimmer, like gossamer wings. Then there were fangs in her face, dripping with blood. Atta gasped as the creature lunged for her, hissing. Everything went black, then she was back. Looking at Lauren’s body, Gold Stitch’s hands around her waist, holding her upright.

“Atta?” He sounded almost frightened like he’d said her name many times already.

“Migraine,” she managed to get out and he let her go, a hand still at the small of her back to steady her as they both looked down at the black spore dust on her fingertips.

In the distance, a giant door thudded shut. Atta just had time for her eyes to go wide before Gold Stitch had her by the wrist.

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