The Stone in the Forest

Oscar was eleven when he was sent to live with his Uncle Pelligro on the outskirts of a village called Fane. It was a year fraught with upheavals, and moving into the ramshackle house on the forest’s edge seemed the least of them. It was not to remain so.

“Pay up,” Anson threatened, double chins jiggling. One meaty hand pressed Oscar back against the rusty chain-link fence. Behind Anson’s bulk, Cedric and Lucas sniggered. 

Oscar had been a happy child, but that was in the before-time. Before his parents were killed. In the now-time, things were very different. 

A fist crashed into Oscar’s stomach, and he grunted in pain, doubling over.

“Get up, you fucking slowcoach,” Anson snarled, pulling Oscar upright. “I said, pay up!” 

Oscar shook his head, dark curls bouncing. “I d-don’t have anything!” he gasped. “Y-y-you’ve already t-taken my lunch.” He felt a spark of shame at the whingeing edge to his voice.

Anson screwed his piggy eyes into a glare and his hand knotted in Oscar’s shirt. “Then you hafta find some other way to pay the tax.”

“Pay the tax! Pay the tax!” Cedric and Lucas chanted.

“What’s going on here?” a voice broke in — a teacher’s voice. Mr. Bastian stood there, hands on his hips, expression curiously intent beneath a thick thatch of unruly red hair. Anson pantomimed wiping something off Oscar’s shirt.

“Just helping our mate here clean up,” Anson said. His usually pale pink cheeks and pug nose were flushed an angry red.

“Is that the truth, Oscar?” Mr. Bastian asked, one thick brow raised.

Oscar hesitated. “I-I, yes, Mr. B-Bastian,” he conceded, head drooping so he didn’t have to look the teacher in the eye. That twinge of shame now burst into full flame.

“Well, I think you’ve cleaned it off, so why don’t the three of you clear out?” Mr. Bastian suggested. 

Oscar’s heart leapt. There was no way for Anson and his cronies to continue lurking without obvious disobedience, and that would mean punishment. Maybe even a paddling. 

“See you tomorrow, mate,” Anson sneered, and then he, Lucas, and Cedric were running away, on to their next target.

Behind Oscar, Mr. Bastian let out a deep sigh. “Why do you let them torment you?”

Oscar shrugged. “I-it’s not so b-bad. I-I-I dealt with worse than them b-back home.”

Mr. Bastian’s brows rose at that. “Did you indeed?”

Oscar nodded and forced a smile, although he hated himself for the lie. Of course, there had been the inevitable taunts and jibes back home, but no one had made his life a living hell.

“Still, it doesn’t sit right. I’m of a mind to bring it up with the headmaster. Mean-spirited foolishness is the last thing we need at a time like this.”

Oscar let Mr. Bastian ramble on about how hard it was to get supplies for the school and how long the war had dragged on. Oscar liked Mr. Bastian’s voice, but he was also one of the few people at O’Belisk & Strang’s School for Boys who treated Oscar like a human being. Not that the other teachers were cruel; brutality was the province of the students. No, they saw Oscar as a curiosity: a shiny stone or three-armed crab, or, worse, a creature to be pitied.

“Would you like that?” Mr. Bastian asked, eyes bright, expectant.

Belatedly, Oscar realized he’d been asked a question. “Y-yes, I suppose so, sir,” he replied, not entirely sure what he was agreeing to.

“Wonderful! It’s settled then. You’ll come to my office the second Wednesday of every month, and we’ll work on that stutter together.” Mr. Bastian tousled Oscar’s hair, gave him a friendly smile, and was off.

Without the teacher nearby, Oscar suddenly felt exposed. Vulnerable. He glanced around, somehow certain that Anson and his friends would materialize out of the afternoon gloom, but he was alone in the school yard. He took advantage of the situation and ran. 

***

The screen door slammed behind him, and Oscar winced. Uncle Pelligro had strict rules about doors and their slamming. He paused and listened, but heard little more than the creak of the ancient house settling around him. Osca breathed a little easier. Perhaps his uncle had ventured to town; else, he was outside tending his garden. 

When another two minutes had passed without any sign of his uncle, Oscar decided he was safe, at least for the moment. He quietly climbed the narrow stairs to the room he’d been given and set his school books on the bed beneath the solitary narrow window. He sank down next to the bag and contemplated his fate. The truth was that he had been lucky today. If Mr. Bastian had not come along when he did, things would have turned out very differently. He rubbed at a large, yellowing bruise on his arm, legacy of the last time Anson had tried to extort payment from him. Other bruises covered his legs and even his back. His torturers cared little about where their blows landed, only that they did and had the intended result.

“I hate you!” Oscar muttered, skinny fingers digging into his palms hard enough that his ragged nails drew blood. He rocked back and forth for a moment, letting his rage and helplessness boil over and evaporate into the unfinished planks of the walls and floors. 

The tromp of booted feet on the stairs brought him back to the present. 

“Boy,” Uncle Pelligro greeted him, standing in the doorway, starched white shirt under his suspenders as stiff as his bristling black beard. “Come,” he commanded and turned, clomping back down the stairs without waiting. 

Oscar followed, down the stairs, then down the hall, across the kitchen with its hulking cast-iron stove, then out the back door. He was careful to catch the door and ease it closed, then hurried to catch up as Uncle Pelligro stomped through the blue shadows of evening. Oscar soon realized their destination: the garden. Surrounded by an aging wattle fence, the garden might have once been grand, but was now a riot of weeds and frost-scarred, scraggly vegetables. 

“Caught the bastardo destroying my cabbages,” Uncle Pelligro growled, walking around the garden to the rickety shed that stood on the very edge of the forest. There, Oscar beheld a horror: a small wooden box inset with iron bars, atop which an iron handle and lever were cunningly set to hold a movable door. Frantic movement within caught his eye. The trap bounced and wobbled as the rabbit battered at the bars and door to escape. 

Then Uncle Pelligro was there, a rusty pipe wrench in hand.

“W-w-what are you doing?” Oscar demanded, although he already half-suspected the answer.

“Only one thing to do with pesados, boy,” his uncle replied, handing him the wrench. The handle was cold and rough in Oscar’s hands, and it felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. “I’ll open the trap and grab the bastard.” Uncle Pelligro pointed to a flat stone half-obscured in yellowing grass nearby. “When I put it on the stone, you kill it.”

“W-what?”

“Hit it in the head with the wrench.”

“I c-c-an’t,” Oscar wailed, clutching the wrench to his chest.

“You’ll do as I say, boy!” Uncle Pelligro roared. Then, more softly, “Life’s hard. Best that you’re toughened up before you’re forced to meet the worst head on.”

Uncle Pelligro picked up the trap and carried it toward the stone. Oscar trailed behind, the wrench’s weight dragging at him like an anchor. 

“Get ready,” his uncle muttered, then, holding the trap vertically, he slid the metal gate open and reached in with one thick-fingered hand. He pulled it out a moment later, clutching a brown and white ball of fur that thrashed and kicked and tried to bite for all it was worth. Uncle Pelligro pressed the rabbit’s body firmly to the stone, leaving the head free.

“Now, hit it!”

“No!”

“Kill it, boy!”

Oscar stepped forward, a sob catching in his throat. He raised the wrench over his head, and the rabbit stilled. Its wide, brown eye stared straight into Oscar’s own. He felt something, then, a jolt of connection, like static electricity in the summer, but in his stomach, tugging behind his navel. The rabbit’s eye loomed large; Oscar saw himself reflected, a monster, red-faced, weapon raised for the killing blow. That’s how Anson would look, he thought.

“No, I w-w-won’t!” Oscar cried, tears streaming now. 

“Then give it here!” Uncle Pelligro ripped the wrench from Oscar’s hands. He pinned the thrashing rabbit against the stone, then raised the wrench high. An all-too-human scream ripped from the rabbit’s throat, mercifully cut short by the crack of the wrench striking. Blood flowered, curiously bright in the shadows of the forest, spilling over the stone and spattering the grass.

Oscar fled into the forest, tears streaming down his face and grief in his heart.

“Oscar! No, come back!” his uncle cried, but it was no use. Oscar had vanished into the trees. “You foolish niño,” Uncle Pelligro said quietly.

***

Oscar fled into the forest, and the sound of his uncle’s voice dwindled behind him. He ran heedlessly, branches tearing at his clothes and face, half-tripping over roots and fallen branches. Visions swam before his eyes.

Hit it. His uncle’s words echoed in his head, and he saw the rabbit’s wide, staring eye again. Kill it, boy! 

The eye melted and flowed, and then became Anson’s fat, red-mottled face. See you tomorrow, mate! 

Then Mrs. Pascomb’s disheveled hair and tear-streaked face appeared. Oscar, lad, I’m sorry! Your parents— they were killed in last night’s bombing. You must go and live with your Uncle Pelligro.

Something caught the toe of his shoe, and he went sprawling. Pain lanced through his skull as he crashed down. The world darkened around him, stilling, and he measured time in shuddering breaths and the pounding in his skull. When gray sight returned, sobs wracked his body, and tears hot as shrapnel streamed down his face. All the rage and loss and hate and fear churned inside him, bubbling and roiling like something alive. He felt that he was going to be sick, that if he didn’t let it all out somehow, he would explode with the pressure. It worked its way up from his stomach, through his ribs, up his throat, and then tore out into the world, a wild, wordless cry of anguish. It went on and on for what felt like an age, and when it was done, Oscar collapsed, utterly spent.

As he came back to himself, he found himself in a forest clearing. The boles of ancient trees ringed the spot, but here near the center, the tasseled heads of grasses and delicate drifts of late-season daisies nodded in the evening breeze. 

He felt something sticky on his face. His fingers came back smeared with red, and he wiped them on the ground to clean them. He got to all fours. Something ground beneath his knee, and the pain made him glance down. It was an acorn caught between his flesh and a stone. Distractedly, he swiped at it, and the acorn bounced away into the shadows. The stone did not move. He looked closer and realized it was not a small stone at all, but part of something larger. He scraped away centuries of leaf mould and dancing fern fronds, dirt-caked fingers disclosing sinuous lines and curving designs that bewildered the eye. It was—

“A st-st-standing stone?” he muttered to himself. He’d seen some on the journey to Uncle Pelligro’s, gray stones arranged in circles or clotted together like ashen flowers. None of those had borne carvings like this, though.

Forgetting what had driven him to the forest and that night was rapidly falling, he stared at the shape before him. It was an enormous stone man. Well, that wasn’t quite right. It was a stone, and long ago someone had carved a figure into it. Oscar would not have called it a man; the proportions were wrong, and trying to make sense of it sent a cold shiver down his spine. 

—who comes—

There was someone here! The whisper rode the chill night breeze, but Oscar did not hear it with his ears. It buzzed within his skull.

—who summons me by salt and blood—

“Who’s t-t-there?” Oscar called out. 

—who are you—

“My n-n-name’s Oscar.” He felt foolish telling his name to the night or the trees or the wind, but there was definitely something there. 

—oz car—

“N-no,” he said. He fought to control his traitor tongue, screwing up his face, concentrating as hard as he could. “Oscar, with an S. My n-name is Oscar.”

—oz car—

Oscar sighed. “Close enough. D-d-do you have a n-name?”

—i had many names—

—but now i am nameless, forgotten—

—alone—

“Who are you?”

There was no answer. 

“It’s all right, you can tell me. I-I-I won’t t-tell anyone.”

There was the quiet sense that he was being weighed, that his bones and brain and eyes and soul were being judged against some invisible measure. He shuddered. Would he be found wanting?

—i remember the before times—

“B-before what?”

—all this—

—i remember their faces, those children of the moon who sang the stones into being—

“Are you a g-ghost?”

—no—

“Are you a g-g-god?”

There was a scritching, scratching, scrabbling sound. Something moved at the end of the stone, quick, darting amongst the grasses and winter flowers. 

—yes, once, perhaps again—

“C-c-can I see you?”

The motion came again, lightning-fast, setting seedheads dancing and flower petals falling to the ground. A long, thin appendage tipped with black nails stretched up onto the stone, followed by another. A long, wasted body followed. The god’s head sat low, thrusting forward from the top of its bony chest, strands of thin, dark hair dangling around its emaciated face, framing eyes that flickered golden with inner fire. Its mouth pushed forward, thin lips wriggling back from crooked teeth. It sat on its haunches atop the fallen stone, watching.

Oscar stared back, heart hammering. Whatever he’d been expecting, it wasn’t this. 

—it has been long and long since mortals called upon me—

“W-w-what kind of god are you?”

—many things; the cry of the wolf at the winter solstice, hot red blood spilling, sparrow-small souls winging toward their next life—

“Are y-you a good god?”

The god cocked its head further. 

—good—

Oscar wasn’t sure if it was affirming that it was good or tasting the word and rolling it across its tongue. Probably best not to think too long about that, he decided. 

“W-why are you out here all alone? D-don’t you have a church or something?”

The god looked down at the stone and ran one long finger across its surface, black nail digging a trough through moss and dirt. 

—temples—

The word hissed in Oscar’s mind like steam from his uncle’s teapot. 

—binding, biting, caging!—

—no temples, no—

“But where are your people? Your worshippers?”

A strange look passed over the god’s face then. It took Oscar a moment to realize what it was: sadness.

—long gone to dust and ruin—

“It must have been a very long time ago,” Oscar agreed, looking at the fallen stone again. 

The god nodded, then fixed Oscar with its flickering, golden gaze. 

—you summoned me—

—woke me from slumber—

—why—

“I d-d-didn’t mean to,” Oscar apologized. He hung his head in shame. “I ran away from my uncle.”

—he hurts you—

“No, it’s j-j-just that…” and then the whole story came rushing out of him and a vast flood. He told the forgotten god about the loss of his parents, being sent to live with his uncle, and the daily torment at the hands of Anson and his cronies.

“I j-j-just c-couldn’t take it anymore. I ran and ran, and then I fell on your stone, and I must have hit my head, and…”

—salt and blood—

“Was that what summoned you?”

The god nodded as best it could. 

Oscar glanced around, realizing for the first time just how dark the woods had become. It must be after dinner time. Uncle Pelligro would be looking for him. 

“I r-really have to go now. I’m g-g-going to be in so much trouble.”

—help—

“You want to help me?”

The god nodded and rose on its skeletal legs. In a flash, it stood over Oscar, bringing with it a scent like sage and honeysuckle, but a bitter tinge floated just beneath. 

—you have summoned me—

—made sacrifice—

—let me aid you—

“A-a-ll right.”

The god put a black-clawed hand on Oscar’s head, and the world shifted.

***

“That boy will be the death of me,” Uncle Pelligro muttered, stomping in his thick-soled boots down the hallway, whiskey bottle caught by the neck between two thick fingers. 

Oscar and the god hung upside down, suspended from the bannister on the landing outside the boy’s room. The blood rushing to his head made him feel funny, and Oscar suppressed a giggle.

—watch—

The god pulled at its side, tearing off a gobbet of flesh. Oscar watched wide-eyed. Beneath the flesh, blackness writhed, pocked by cold blue lights. The wound closed itself, the thin flesh stitching itself back together, leaving a puckered scar. The god rolled the flesh into a ball, then held it to its thin lips. Oscar wasn’t sure, but he thought the god breathed on it. Then it dropped the ball below. It landed on the hallway floor with a soft smack. 

“What’s that?” Oscar whispered.

—watch—

Oscar did as the god asked. Soon, he saw movement within the ball. It bulged and shuddered, rocking back and forth, back and forth. Was it going to explode? Bubble up and fizz? Oscar held his breath in excitement. Then two protuberances grew from the top, reaching upward like insect antennae. Oscar gasped as they widened and thickened, growing brown fur. The ball began to elongate, rutching across the floor. More protuberances sprouted and grew, and in mere seconds, the bit of godflesh had become a white and brown rabbit.

“It’s j-just like the one Uncle k-killed.”

The god tapped Oscar’s temple. 

“You s-saw it in my m-m-memories!” Oscar whispered.

The god nodded, then pointed at the rabbit below. The tromp of Uncle Pelligro’s boots was louder now, the man returning down the hallway. He came out of the sitting room wearing his heavy coat and carrying a flashlight and a shotgun, but stopped dead when he saw the rabbit.

“What’s this?” he muttered.

Oscar choked back another giggle. 

“What are you doing here, conejo?” Uncle Pelligro knelt on the floor and set down the gun and flashlight. “Come here, and I’ll take you back outside.” He reached slowly for the rabbit.

The rabbit hopped toward the extended hands. Uncle Pelligro’s eyebrows shot up. He had definitely been expecting to chase it around the house. He lunged, hands ready, but the rabbit leaped right at his face, screaming its human-sounding scream.

“¡Santo Dios!” Uncle Pelligro shouted, batting at the thing. He connected with his right hand, sending the rabbit into the wall, but instead of being stunned, the rabbit leaped off the wall toward his face, front incisors gnashing the air as it flew. 

Uncle Pelligro backpedaled desperately, narrowly missing the rabbit’s teeth. However, its leap was strong enough to carry it past the man’s face, and it reached out as it flew by, rear claws raking bloody furrows down his face.

Fear and disbelief blossomed in Oscar’s heart. “What’s h-happening?”

The god’s lips writhed back from its teeth in a ghastly grin.

—he killed the rabbit—

“Y-yes, but I don’t want to k-k-kill him!”

—death pays for death—

“N-no! M-make it stop! M-make it stop, n-now!”

The god hissed, whether in anger or disappointment, Oscar was not sure. It gestured with its long fingers, and the rabbit fell where it stood, smoking and bubbling, until nothing remained but a scorch on the floorboards.

“¡Sangre de Cristo!” Uncle Pelligro gasped.

Oscar sobbed. The god had been going to kill Uncle Pelligro!

“Sobrino? Is that you, boy?” Uncle Pelligro asked softly, peering into the shadows above him. But Oscar and the god were no longer there.

***

Steam billowed from the showers, and the music of water on tile was everywhere. Oscar had rarely been in the locker room before, and he stared around with interest. Once-white tile stretched from floor to ceiling. Naked iron pipes ran around the upper third of the wall, with individual showerheads sprouting like corroded metal flowers at regular intervals.

“Why t-t-urn on the water?” Oscar asked.

—you will see—

Oscar wasn’t sure whether he should trust the god after the debacle with his uncle, but the man still lived, so that was something. And Oscar was desperately curious about what they were doing at the school. Already, the steam was filling the room. 

The god hissed and pulled more chunks of flesh from its body. The wounds closed more slowly, leaving rough, red weals behind. It clutched the gobbets to its chest, panting.

“Are you all right?” Oscar asked. “Are you sick?”

The god ignored him for a moment and rolled the flesh into little balls, then carefully laid them on the floor under the hot water. Oscar counted seven balls of tissue. 

“What are we doing here?” Oscar asked, changing the subject.

—wait, watch—

Oscar did as the god bid him, his stomach in knots. Then there was movement among the pieces of flesh, and he forgot this worry in fascination at the change. Once more, they bubbled and bulged and shook, but instead of rabbits, these grew into small, hunched rat-like figures, but these were no rats. They stood on two bandy legs, their twisted, potato-shaped bodies covered with a ruff of fur that grew longer on the back. Their naked heads poked forward, bulbous white eyes atop short snouts filled with jagged teeth. Two scabby arms dangled down from sunken shoulders, and each hand bore razor-sharp nails. 

Almost as soon as they had formed, two things happened. First, the steam became so thick that Oscar could no longer see the creatures; he could barely make out the shape of the old god by his side. Second, he realized that they were not alone.

“Who’s in the showers?” Mr. Bastian’s voice called out. “You shouldn’t be here, the school’s closed!”

Oscar’s heart leaped into his throat. If Mr. Bastian caught them, there would be hell to pay. He was kind to Oscar when it came to Anson, but he brooked no rule-breaking. Oscar would be suspended, maybe even expelled.

“Come out this instant!” Mr. Bastian shouted, but of course, no one appeared. Oscar heard his shoes clacking on the tile as he strode purposefully toward the shower. “Whoever is in here, you’re in a world of trouble.”

Oscar made out a darker shadow where he thought the shower doorway was, and then he heard the click-click-click of the creatures’ nails on the floor as they scuttled through the steam.

“What are they d-d-doing?” he whispered fiercely to the god.

—help—

“Who’s there?” Mr. Bastian cried out, a note of fear in his voice. The click-click came faster. The steam billowed and lifted, and Oscar saw the little monsters racing on all fours for Mr. Bastian, mouths open and a feral light in their bulbous eyes. Click-click-click!

“Mr. B-B-Bastian is my friend! Don’t hurt him!”

It was too late. The creatures converged on the teacher with high-pitched growls and screeches, teeth gnashing. “Is that a rat?” Mr. Bastian’s voice was disbelieving. “Where did they all come from?” Something heavy fell to the floor, and then Mr. Bastian was screaming. Oscar rushed forward blindly, groping about in the steam. Red streaks flowed past his feet toward the drain.

“Mr. B-B-Bastian!” he shouted. Thumps and smacks echoed strangely through the steam, and the teacher continued to scream, underscored by the growls of the horrible creatures.

—he did nothing to help you—

“He’s my f-f-friend!” he cried. 

—he could have stopped the fat one—

—could have punished them all—

—he did nothing—

“This is w-wrong! Please!”

The god growled and hissed at Oscar, then disappeared into the steam.

Oscar heard the crunch of bone, and then the corpse of a creature slid by on the shower floor, flattened but still twitching. Mr. Bastian was still fighting them! Oscar dove back into the steam. A small form darted past his feet, and he lashed out. He felt the toe of his shoe connect with flesh, and heard the thing screech as it flew through the air to smash against the shower wall. It slid down and did not move again. An idea struck him then, and he ran for the shower head, quickly turning the water off. Oscar ran to the next, and then the next. As he ran, the steam began to clear, although he wished with all his might that it had not. 

Mr. Bastian knelt on the floor, blood streaming through tattered pant legs. Around him lay the other five creatures, smashed to fleshy pulp and unrecognizable. Strangely, the only blood on the floor came from the teacher. 

Slowly, Oscar approached the man, one hand outstretched. “Mr. Bastian?” His fingers grazed the teacher’s shoulder. 

Mr. Bastian whirled around, still on his knees. The man’s eyes were wild, glasses askew. He relaxed a little when he saw that it was Oscar. “Where did they all come from?” he gasped.

Oscar shook his head. How could he explain? He didn’t understand, and he’d seen the god create them.

“Did they bite you, Oscar? Are you all right?” 

Oscar nodded, touched that the teacher was worried for him.

“W-what are you doing in the showers?” Mr. Bastian asked. There was a new light in his eyes: suspicion. “Did you turn on the showers? Did—did you let these rats loose in here?”

“W-what? N-n-no! Mr. Bastian, it wasn’t me!”

“What are you doing here, then? You know it’s against the rules to be on school grounds after hours.”

“I-I-I w-was—”

Mr. Bastian groaned and swayed woozily, sparing Oscar the need to respond. He crumpled toward the floor, catching himself with one hand. 

“Let m-me help you,” Oscar said, holding out both hands. Somehow, he managed to help get Mr. Bastian to his feet, out of the shower, and up the hall. They reached the nurse’s office, and the teacher collapsed into a chair. 

“Quickly,” he gasped. “Get the Mercurochrome and bandages.”

Oscar ran to the cabinet and yanked open the doors. There were dozens of glass bottles and piles of bandages. He grabbed a bottle and tried to read the label in the dimness. Not what he needed. He set it aside and grabbed another. Still nothing. Where was it? The fourth bottle proved to be it. He grabbed it and several bandage rolls before returning to the teacher.

“Don’t look,” Mr. Bastian warned.

“N-n-no, let me help,” Oscar insisted. He gently pulled up one of Mr. Bastian’s pant legs. The flesh was scored with dozens of gashes, half-clotted. Oscar dabbed Mercurochrome onto the corner of a bandage and began dabbing at the teacher’s wounds. Mr. Bastian hissed as the medicine burned, but did not protest. When he finished, Oscar and Mr. Bastian wrapped the leg in bandages. 

“Do y-you know anything about the people who used to l-live here?” Oscar asked as they worked.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, b-b-before there was a village or anything. People lived here, right?”

“I’m sure they did. Before the Romans came, this place was supposedly a crossroads for trade.”

“What were they like?”

“I’m sure I don’t know,” Mr. Bastian replied, tying the last bandage in place. 

Oscar pulled up the other pant leg and applied the medicine. “D-d-do you know anything about their g-g-gods?”

Mr. Bastian held out his hand, and Oscar placed a roll of bandages in it. 

“They worshiped strange gods, I can tell you that,” Mr. Bastian replied, bending to apply the bandages to his leg. Oscar helped him wrap that one, too. “Legend has it that long before the Romans were even a tribe in Italy, the people here were driven off by strange invaders,” the teacher replied. “They left their homes and their tools and their gods behind, and disappeared. Some say the earth opened and they descended into it. Others say they fled into the sea and dwell among the sea monsters. It’s a load of myth and superstition, if you ask me, but they did leave behind their—”

“Standing stones,” Oscar finished for him, pulling his pant leg down. He helped Mr. Bastian to stand once more. The teacher winced but seemed able to walk.

“Oscar,” Mr. Bastian said, putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I won’t demand an answer about why you were here after hours, and we don’t need to involve the headmaster, either. But I do ask one thing of you; if you are in trouble, and I sense that you might be, please know that you can trust me and that I want to help.”

Oscar nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

“Right, then. It’s long past bedtime for us both. Run on home and tell your uncle I had you helping me tidy up.”

Oscar flashed him a grateful smile, and they went their separate ways.

***

It was a long, lonely walk back to Uncle Pelligro’s house. Oscar watched for the old god, but saw and heard nothing. Had it abandoned him? Part of him hoped so. The god frightened him deeply. What the god could do, what it felt no compunction doing, frightened him even more. But that also excited something deep within the boy. 

“Sobrino?” Uncle Pelligro called as the front door creaked open. “Oscar?” 

So much for sneaking up to his bedroom and pretending like nothing happened. “Sí, it’s me,” he called.

Uncle Pelligro tromped in. Oscar braced himself for whatever might come. “You did wrong to run into the forest, niño,” his uncle began. 

“I-I know. I’m s-s-sorry, Uncle. I just… The rabbit, I couldn’t d-d-do it,” Oscar cut him off. If he apologized, maybe Uncle would not punish him.

“No, you couldn’t. That fault is mine, not yours.”

Oscar raised his eyes to his uncle’s face, not quite willing to trust his ears. 

“You are the last of mí familia, Oscar,” Uncle Pelligro continued. “You and I, we are all that’s left after… Well, you know.” He took a deep breath and blew it out, steeling himself. Oscar smelled the whiskey then. “Don’t feel bad about the conejo. We’ll make a man of you yet.” Uncle Pelligro swayed a little on his feet. He raised a hand and pointed his index finger in Oscar’s face. “We’ll do that, sí. But you have to promise me something, sobrino. Promise me.”

“What is it, Uncle?”

Uncle Pelligro bent his face close to Oscar’s, dark eyes intent, and licked his lips. “Promise me, you’ll stay out of the forest. There’s nothing good there. Nada. Es muy malo, ¿estoy claro?”

“Yes, Uncle,” Oscar said, lowering his gaze so he didn’t have to meet his Uncle’s gaze. He’ll know, Oscar thought. And what would happen then? He had a vague image of Uncle Pelligro chasing around in the dark, searching for the old god. Worse, maybe he would find it, and what then? Oscar would be totally alone. Better to keep his eyes down and the truth locked behind his teeth.

Uncle Pelligro gave him a wobbly once-over. “That’s… that’s bueno, Oscar. Go up to bed. School in the morning; dormir bien.”

Oscar climbed the stairs without looking back, but he felt his uncle’s stare follow him all the way up. Not his fault, he’d said. So, why did Oscar still feel like he’d let Uncle Pelligro down? Why was his uncle so dead set against the forest? Did he know something about the standing stones, about the old god? Should Oscar have confided in him? Then another thought crept into his brain: did Uncle Pelligro suspect that Oscar had something to do with the rabbit in his hallway?

He lay down on his narrow bed and stared out at the crescent moon through his narrow window, but sleep was a long time coming.

***

“S-s-stop it!” Anson said, then laughed.

“D-d-don’t hurt m-m-m-me!” Cedric added.

 It was a holiday, and there was no school. It had only been sheer bad luck that Oscar had been going down the lane at the same time the three others were coming up. They saw each other at almost the same instant, and no one was sure what to do. That moment of hesitation transformed into a cross-country race. O’Belisk & Strang’s School for Boys crowned the hilltop behind them. Ahead loomed the ancient forest, growing larger by the moment. Uncle Pelligro’s house sat at the edge of the forest to the west, visible but impossible to reach in time. 

“Stop m-m-making fun of me!” Oscar cried.

“Stop m-m-making fun of me!” Lucas mimicked. 

 Oscar turned and ran toward the trees, and the three bullies followed. A rock whizzed by his ear, close enough to feel the wind of its passing. Another landed nearby and bounced ahead. 

“Stop running, you bloody coward!” Anson yelled. Bright spots of hectic color stood out on his cheeks, and his breath came in great gasps.

Oscar ran faster, feet flying across stones and past hummocks of yellow grass. If he could just reach the treeline, there was at least a chance that he could lose them. Being caught would mean a beating and likely a nasty one. And then he was at the treeline, pushing through the undergrowth at the edge and nimbly leaping over serpentine roots. 

The sounds of pursuit behind him stopped, and he realized the other boys were frightened to enter the forest. 

“My da said never to go in the forest,” Cedric protested.

“Your da’s a drunk who couldn’t find his own prick with both hands,” Anson spat back. 

Oscar heard branches breaking and realized Anson was pushing forward anyway.

“Don’t!” Lucas shouted. “There’s monsters in there!”

Anson snorted and kept bulling his way through the undergrowth.

“You, too, Cedric?” Lucas asked, disbelieving. “Well, don’t come crying to me when some troll rips your legs off, then.” 

There was more thrashing in the undergrowth as Cedric pushed through to join Anson, but there was no sign of Lucas. 

“Let the little baby bugger off,” Anson growled. “More fun for us when we catch the slowcoach.”

“Are you sure about this?” Cedric asked.

“‘Course I am, we’re not scared!”

Oscar had hoped that all three boys would give up the chase, but that was not to be. As quietly as he could, he crept away from the sounds of the two bullies thrashing their way into the forest. Soon enough, the sounds stopped, replaced by footfalls in dry leaves as they made it through the fringe and into the forest proper. Oscar paused to peer around the bole of a great oak. There they were, Anson in the lead and Cedric bringing up a reluctant rear. They were moving perpendicular to his position, so he wasted little time in hurrying the other direction. Just when he thought he was in the clear, his foot sank into a great hole in the ground, the legacy of a tree long fallen. He tumbled to the ground in a great rustling of leaves and breaking of twigs.

Cursing his luck, he lay on the ground holding his breath and listening.

“What was that?” Cedric asked in the distance.

“Gotta be the slowcoach!” Ansom replied, and then they were running his way.

Oscar scrambled to his feet and fled, not bothering to try to be quiet. If he could get far enough away, maybe he could climb a tree or bury himself in the leaves or… he burst from the trees into the middle of a clearing. It took him a moment to realize why it looked familiar: in the center, a great standing stone lay on the ground. 

It was the god’s glade. 

“N-no!” Oscar made to retreat the way he had come, but the sound of crashing in the undergrowth told him Anson and Cedric approached. Oscar glanced around, but there was nowhere to hide, except—

He dashed for the center of the glade, slid across the god’s fallen stone, and flattened himself against the ground along its far edge. 

“Come out, stupid!” Anson called, stepping out into the glade. Cedric followed a step behind, voice lost as fear ate through his earlier bravado. 

“Come out! It’s only gonna be the worse for you if you make me come find you!”

Cedric tugged at Anson’s sleeve. “Maybe we should go…” He looked wildly around the glade, gaze landing at last on the fallen stone in its center. “I don’t like this place.”

“I don’t like this place,” Anson mimicked viciously. “Then sod off back home, you coward.” He tromped forward into the glade.

Oscar desperately tried to quiet his pounding heart. Surely, Anson and Cedric could hear it beating like a bass drum. Realizing his danger, he searched for something nearby to defend himself with. He groped about, but there was nothing. Then his hand closed around a wind-fallen branch. He clutched it tight, its heft and solidity a ward against encroaching fear.

Four sets of footsteps approached. Apparently, Anson had shamed Cedric into staying. Oscar held his breath. They were just feet away. Anson’s heavy feet clumped along, breaking twigs and smashing sedges into the ground. Cedric’s lighter tread still betrayed his proximity, coming closer, closer, closer.

And then they were at the standing stone. Oscar heard someone’s shoe scrape across its rough texture, then the grunt as they stepped atop it. Now was his only chance; it had to be this second. Oscar threw himself to his feet, bursting from the ferns, branch reaching backward as he readied himself for what might be the only blow he could land. 

Oscar’s branch slammed into the side of Cedric’s knee with a sickening crunch. Cedric screamed, dropping to the stone and clutching his leg. Ansom, his bulk too great to slow, careened across the stone as his companion fell. 

And then there were four beings in the glade. The forgotten god clambered onto the stone, skeletal limbs akimbo, worm-like lips peeled back from its teeth in a rictus grin. 

Anson screamed in fear and floundered about, falling off the stone. The god’s head jerked back and forth between the two boys, one round and crabbing across the forest floor on his back, impotent to flee, and the other, crippled by Oscar’s blow, hands scrabbling at a forsaken image carved into a fallen stone. 

Its gaze found Cedric, and the boy stood no chance. 

“N-n-no!” Oscar screamed. “L-l-leave him alone!”

The god stooped astride Cedric, bent down towards his shrieking mouth, and extended a single black-taloned finger that punched through the boy’s throat, scraping against the fallen stone and transforming shrieks to gurgles. The god shuddered, grinned, and gathered shadow around itself. Oscar thought it looked stronger.

In the meantime, Anson had righted himself, like some pale, sweaty-faced beetle, ready to trundle back into the forest. Gasping, he clawed his way upright, but it was too late. The god leaped from Cedric’s desecrated body to block his escape. It raised its hand, three black-tipped fingers splayed, and Anson wept.

“You c-cannot t-t-take him,” Oscar said, stepping between the god and its prey, broken branch in hand.

—he would have slain you—

—he would do so still, happily—

The god tilted its head, flickering golden eyes narrowed and fixed on Oscar’s. It extended a hand, one black-taloned finger pointing at the boy.

—you brought them here— 

—brought them to me—

—why else but as sacrifices—

Had he? Oscar wondered. Why else had he run headlong into the forest? It was so very tempting. He could let the god do as it willed, and he would be free of Anson forever. No one would ever know.

—give him to me—

—let me feast—

The god took a step toward Oscar, clawed hand still outstretched, but open, golden eyes luminous in the forest gloom.

—i will make you great—

—i will make you strong—

Something occurred to Oscar then. He remembered the god’s reaction in Uncle Pelligro’s house, and then again in the showers at school when he had ordered it to stop. I summoned it, he realized. It could do nothing until I accepted its offer of help. Can it act without me? Perhaps, but its bargaining said there were limits. He glanced at Cedric’s body splayed on the stone and remembered how the darkness had coagulated around the god’s form like a hell-wrought halo. But for how much longer?

“N-no,” Oscar said, drawing himself up to his full height. Even so, he came but to the god’s chest.

The god hissed, baring its teeth at him.

—then i will bury you, too—

It made to leap at him, but Oscar was prepared. He drove the jagged, broken end of the branch into his palm, and pain blazed up like flame. Oscar clenched his fist and held it out before him. The god backpedaled, some emotion that Oscar could not name crawling across its wasted features.

—do not—

Blood dripped from Oscar’s hand to the surface of the stone he stood upon.

—i will make you a king—

Unlocked by the pain and strengthened by his grief for his lost parents and the lonely boy who’d collapsed in this very grove, Oscar’s tears flowed, dripping off his nose to fall and mingle with the blood on the stone.

—no one could hurt you again—

Blackness gathered around the god, its eyes blazed like two small suns, and a deep rumbling that seemed to shake the world came from somewhere. 

Oscar stood tall. “Fuck you,” the boy said, and he did not stutter. “I revoke my summoning.”

The god’s rictus mouth stretched impossibly wide, its eyes melting into golden puddles before running down its face. Its bones snapped as its limbs folded in on themselves. And for the first time, Oscar heard it make an audible sound. A great wind shook the trees all about, carrying the god’s cry into the sky. Its body sank down, puddling on the stone, before slowly absorbing into it.

And then everything was still. Two crows cawed and took flight from the edge of the clearing, winging their way after the god’s scream. Anson still lay on the ground, quietly sobbing. Cedric’s body sprawled where the god had left it.

“Stay here,” Oscar told Anson. “I’ll go for help. My uncle’s house isn’t far.”

THE END