“[Agony of a Girl],” Ruby whispered.

Her utterance summoned a chill that traveled through every soul and mind as if Ruby herself had sung it in their ears. Wind picked up throughout the area, gathered around each curse, each person.Swishy’s straw stood on end. The Sling-ravens lost a few stray feathers. Trey just hugged himself, shivering. And Myst…she was stoic. Stoic and wobbly.

But the effect was most dramatic when it came to Ruby, she who invoked agony. The intents buzzed within her belly into a swirling orb. The hive of curses bounced off one another, manifesting greater power. Meanwhile, Ruby’s inner child doubled over, clutching her stomach. She fell off to her knees, then collapsed completely, rolling along in Ruby’s ribcage.

Ruby, herself, kept the same sickle-shaped smile. The pain was shared, it had to be, but Ruby simply swayed on her broom as her own black aura pulsed and pulsed.

The witch was dignified, mythical, and kept an emotionless face as she trembled from the coming explosion.

“It’s a personal cataclysm, Myst. Don’t you worry. I’ll give you all the attention you seek. Look forward to your life—filled with me.”

She closed her eyes, focusing on the technique, brewing her colossal aura.

It was then that Swishy noticed a major secret to the spell, a slit-shaped portal in Ruby’s dress. The dimensional pocket in which she kept The High Chasm’s heart was open. The heart’s pulse leaked out, faint at first, but with each second exposed to the outside Swishy began more in tune with its hammering. Help. It required help. But it couldn’t speak or communicate anymore.

The hostage heart could only struggle along, baiting the curses with its intoxicating promise.

And the curses came, flowing toward Ruby. The skies cleared. The physical surfaces became brighter as the shadows stripped themselves away to seek heart. Most of all, the curses comprising Myst’s [Possessed Guardian], giant arachnid that she was, had defected en masse toward Ruby’s pocket.

“I was right,” Ruby called out. “I always am.”

Fickleness. That’s what she meant. Curses were fickle, oh so fickle.

Curses drew from Myst’s body, leaving her like a liquid slime. They crawled up along the buildings and trees toward Ruby, who gleefully cannibalized her. Like a split egg in the womb, Ruby became the twin that claimed the greater share of the nutrients.

Myst, then, began to go concave, the shadows within compressing into a swirling tornado. She reached for her aching stomach as the curses left the [Possessed Guardian] she’d taken control of in favor of the heart that Ruby gave away.

The wind returned, enclosing Ruby in grey ribbons. And that barrier now darkened from the inky curses that sought her pocketed treasure.

The erratic pulse of The High Chasm’s heart thundered in Swishy’s soul.

“I'll get you back,” Swishy called.

Please, the heart said.

The boy didn’t need to give instructions—the Sling-ravens tossed Swishy up at Ruby.

He held his rake in a one-handed grip over his shoulder, its gold stretching into a javelin. Swishy was dynamic, a star, a snapshot of an athlete and warrior all in one.

[SUNBRIGHT LANCE]!

Swishy jammed his rake into the barrier wind, trying to pry the curses apart with light. But they easily protected themselves between the raw gale, finding asylum in Ruby’s body. Swishy still circled her, pressing inward, but there was no progress made. Ruby’s winds were as solid as reinforced windows.

The scarecrow’s heart sank as curses easily glided within the folds of wind, releasing taunting jeers before slipping inside.

Swishy understood the underlying symbiosis: the curses convinced themselves that they couldn’t live without Ruby while Ruby feasted off their devotion. They were backbones to each other but a bane to the world.

It was now Ruby who’d taken in those shadows. She was no giant, of course. Only a lady, or so she claimed.

The girl inside, that sullen presence Swishy occasionally glimpsed, now was fully present. He experienced her as a frail blue soul in Ruby’s belly. Now, he didn’t even have to try to see her.

Swishy gazed at her, hoping to make meaningful contact. Staring wasn’t the way he’d learned to make friends but he didn’t know what else to do. He simply waited for feedback from his attention.

That girl made a throat-cutting gesture.

Swishy felt it as a spirit, the vicious slash of her frustration. He held a hand to his neck—no injury—but he was scared. He looked again at Ruby’s passenger.

The girl averted her gaze, staring emptily at the world Ruby was now set to ruin.

All of Ruby’s bird ghosts, her portals, her radiating aura, recollected into her. The blackness covered her in total, turning her figure into an obsidian silhouette.

Ruby stood on her broom, drifting from side to side, up and down. Her lullaby rhythm was relaxing to watch—then nerve-wracking as the shadows collected.

The weather cleared, the evening tinge bleaching the world into a semi-dawn.

Ruby bent over herself, holding her stomach. Her mouth was silent but her drama was loud. Each writhing gesture stirred the shadows over her body, the curses bubbling and steaming like tar.

Then Ruby threw her arms outward, posing like a star, and the shadows were flung outward. The spreading darkness mirrored Swishy’s possessed guardian’s waves.

The boy knew how this would go: everything the aura touched became infected.

The organic material—the flowers, the stalks, the trees—leaned away from the waves.

But it was the other darkness, the Myst territory of webs, that began to vaporize. Curses began to leave her control, screaming like they did when Swishy first met the peeves.

Emptiness!

Regret!

Fuck all that, I’m FAMISHED.

Ruby’s wicked grin revealed itself through the darkness she’d shed. She was revealed once more, her flesh, her fashion—with flecks of remnant curses slugging around her skirt.

“I’m pleased for you all to relate.”

She’d infected every curse with her HUNGER.

The webs that Myst had painstakingly created, the body that she claimed from the [Possessed Guardian]—everything once more was commandeered. Or rather, the curses left her, fickle as they were. Rather than staying in the shape of Myst, or to the charge and loyalty of Swishy, they’d switched teams again.

The curses weren’t spiders or webbing or elegant vapors—they’d thinned out, going from black to gray, becoming wind.

“Crazy,” Trey said.

“It really is.”

A wind tunnel blew around, carrying debris, curses, and whole animals. The snitches, the clusters of shadows, devolved into wailing and whining messes. It was the smaller entities that took the gale force in stride. Swishy admired the spirits of ladybugs and ants, their calmness, as they were long used to the lack of control that came with being a tiny unit of life.

Fate came and the insects knew that after a time their destinies would settle.

And that was the thing about Ruby and her agony—everything became small in its path. The sky islands around her also paused in their orbit. Same with the rising HEAVEN elements from the surface. The Straw Village was crystallized in time. None of the air or clouds or humidity moved except for Ruby’s cyclone.

Everyone waited for only one thing: for Ruby to decide what she’d destroy and what she’d spare.

The curses, the snitches, the scarecrows rooted to the surfaces all bent their heads down in prayer.

Who they prayed to? Swishy hoped not Ruby. He knew that when the straw-bound prayed to him, he felt it. But Ruby was just a woman. That was her limit: the flesh. Flesh, so easily marred and cut, so starved and panic-driven, was devastatingly impenetrable.

The witch knew her followers’ wants—but she only tended hers.

And yet the shadows moved at her will, melting down the structure of Myst’s webs. And the integrity of the arachnid’s body as well. Ruby did what she did best: appeal to the fickleness of curses.

“You sense it, can’t you?” Ruby called to the land. “The altar in me. The altar of this heaven. Wait no further, for paradise is here!”

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And the shadows streamed from Myst, from the crevices of The High Chasm, from every creeping node of [Midnight] to collect in Ruby’s aura. That was the agony that Swishy detected. The collective one. Nothing hurt spirits like that which they didn’t have. As the curses rose in that familiar reverse rain, Swishy saw nothing but hunger in each atom of it.

Myst was melting away.

She held out her arachnid legs, her human arms, but those edges became fuzzy, then goopy. She was like steaming lava, her solidity drifting toward Ruby.

The webs, the body, and the heart.

Everything rose through the spiraled path of Ruby’s black cyclone.

(…)

Myst dragged herself uphill, a crushed insect. Her stature remained large but half of her spider legs had sloughed away. And her upper body was thinned, far too thin. Her luxurious veil was a thing of the past, her black lace sheen long gone. Myst was a torn sail now, flapping her shabby edges with every movement.

“My, my,” she said. “This isn’t good. This truly isn’t good.”

Myst laughed it off but that only made Swishy more desperate.

“I got this!” Trey called, rushing to her aid through a [Zlide].

But Swishy didn’t hear him.

“Open, open, open!” Swishy screamed as he jammed his rake over and over again. With each clash against the wind, sparks of HURT and ABANDONMENT sprayed off. Ruby’s [Agony of a Girl] was achieving definition, selecting specific ingredients for her manufactured abyss.

“I’m always open,” Ruby said. Her somber tone caught Swishy off guard. “I’m full of attachments, of curses and kin. Openness is all that I am, all that I’ve ever been. But…”

Swishy stabbed and stabbed. He slashed at the barrier. He battered it with the rake’s blunt base. But the resistance was strong. Ruby’s eggshell-shaped fortress was rigid, immutable. WEAKNESS began to fly off as a mist. DOOM, too. There were notes of HOPELESSNESS and WASTING that were shot out in violent sprays.

The cursed splashes presented a pattern, elements that Swishy’s emotional intelligence understood.

All these feelings were a symptom of Ruby’s HUNGER. Each strike only splashed away a woeful intent and the occasional image of Ruby’s inner girl, sobbing, crying, hating.

The ambient murkiness cleared even further.

It was a beautiful day.

The sky islands were full of nature and light.

The High Chasm, for as panicked as its snitch and scarecrow citizens were, was well cared for. The views of the distant cityscape were postcard-perfect. Anyone would visit. Swishy, too, would’ve liked to dive into the city’s wonders.

There was so much of the world to play in, so much he now saw with a clear view.

And that meant there was less of Myst. She and the [Possessed Guardian] melted further. He wondered how Trey would help her. Or if Myst had disappeared completely. Because now the webs had begun to snap away, too, the final reassuring darknesses leaving Swishy.

The boy stared up at Myst’s heart hanging from the final web, a full array suspended between two wishwillows.

Black webs. A golden base. And a beating heart in all the colors of autumn, in a natural pallor that Myst, shadow mistress that she prided herself on being, had managed to preserve. Swishy was proud of Myst. And scared for her. Because the web was snapping in parts, gaining holes, becoming closer to falling into the greedy world.

The heart twisted upward as if tied to the end of a parade ribbon. It danced away to the rhythm of Ruby’s looping and animated flight. The cadence of evil was playful indeed.

A wry smile stretched across Myst’s vanishing face. Her likeness momentarily faded, thin as clouds, thin as blown-away air, before reforming into a small orb. Every shadow left her. But she still had herself, marble that she was. Her core was sturdy, a dense ball that dropped from the sky.

[Zlide]—Swishy was suddenly sucked into Trey’s portal. Instant, decisive routing, their fastest traveling yet. The exit came in a blink of an eye, through which Trey reached out and caught the condensed and coin-sized Myst.

“Make a little shield.”

Swishy made one from the tip of his finger. It had a pumpkin-shaped crest and everything.

“No, like a dome.”

“Oh.”

Swishy laughed through his embarrassment, then served up the order.

In the dome, a presence flared.

Cold, so cold. A frosty and angry spirit.

“Hi Myst,” Trey said.

“Yes, hello,” her tone was flat.

“Just rest.”

“I believe I shall…” Myst rolled around Trey’s palm, pressing footholds into the wrinkles. Then she lay still. But she was shivering.

The boy knew the shock to her system, to the little of her that was left.

But she was okay. Swishy knew from her smile, from the straightness of her posture. Myst, though ethereal, learned the value of a spine. She remained composed. Frozen to the touch. But she kept it together.

“You’re so cool,” Swishy said, almost breathlessly.

“Thank you, little straw.”

“What’s your secret?” Trey said.

“I think you foolish mortals just have a thing for the heartless.”

It hit close to home, especially for Swishy. But he’d been heartless before. And so, too, had Myst. Maybe that was what made them cool, to have heart, to lose it, and to still keep going.

Swishy used his [Weave] to craft the straw dome and open windows for Myst to look through. Myst, herself, just vaporized into a black flame, reduced to a candle of self. But she was comfortable now. Small and cozy within her makeshift hearth.

The trio’s souls warmed against each other, COMFORT triangulating amongst them.

The world was a dark and scary place.

It roared and raged and set every curse into an uproar.

But the crew found shelter in their huddle. No wind touched them. And for those moments, no terror either.

(…)

The cyclone dispersed.

Everyone looked up. The High Chasm was untouched, or so it seemed.

But Ruby wasn’t done yet, not a chance.

There was another heart in her hands, another harvest well executed.

“What now?” Swishy breathed.

“The obvious,” Trey groaned.

Swishy head-tilted, seeking denial. The blackwheat that curled in him broke all notions of a coping mechanism, though.

“You know.”

“I do…”

“The flesh wants…” Marble Myst said with tired air. “And the Cearth grants wishes.”

Myst’s heart was gone. Out of Myst’s body and into Ruby’s hands. Swishy stared up in the direction of The High Chasm peak and saw Ruby go far, far, away. The witch chose to fly this time instead of warp, holding her victory in her hands. Another heart pumping in Ruby’s fist. Strings of webbing stuck to her knuckles and palm.

The next words from Ruby weren’t I-wish, I-need, or I-want.

“Give me,” Ruby said, clutching Myst’s stolen heart. “Give. Give. Give.”

Every darkness gleamed, Cearth preparing to deliver Ruby’s due. She flew away and the shimmering atmosphere trailed after her, stars addicted to her presence.

The rake glowed beyond gold—it was nearly red. Znitchy’s anger wouldn’t be denied. Eyes on the prize, eyes ever always on retribution and justice.

“You got Myst?” Swishy asked Trey.

Trey looked down at Myst in his palm. And she looked right back at him. And then he closed his hands over her and the straw hut, warming them with [Zzt]. “Of course,” Trey snickered.

There was a transformation happening there on a smaller scale, a changing room event as her marble of self took form once again.

The straw shield absorbed into Myst.

Then, one leg at a time, she turned into a spider again.

[Heart String]—Trey had wrapped Myst in a glowing thread, fashioning it into a shawl.

“How fashion forward,” Myst said.

“I’m a tastemaker.”

“Lovely. Now I must rest.”

“Me too, actually…”

Swishy looked at Trey with gratitude. But also with sadness. Trey was tired. His posture was slumped and his soul…the Clayborne was like a cavern inside, moisture dripping from the walls. No oasis, no store of soul to maintain him. Even that last [Heart String] squeezed him bone dry.

“Are you really here pitying me?” Trey said.

“A little, yeah.”

“Don’t.”

“I have to. You’re just a human. And I think I know what that means now.”

“I am just a man, you’re right about that.”

“So I’m doing the rest alone.”

“I’ll pray for you.”

“And I’ll do you a favor too.”

“Okay, what?” Trey smirked.

“I’ll clear these skies.”

Blackness dominated. It could’ve been its own kind of beautiful. But the hunger, the famished souls. Suffering was no kind of color for the world.

“Make it happen then, my guy.”

“I got it!”

Swishy took off, leaving a black and gold trail over Trey and Myst.

During Swishy’s ascent, he braced against the massive wind of Ruby’s curses and heard the next part of Ruby’s plot. Curses, curses, curses—all they did was gossip.

The altar, the altar, she’s remaking it!

And one of us gets to be the emissary!

One of us, one of us!

Dark shadows flickered over his body as Swishy flew after Ruby, the land’s curses drawing toward her home. Swishy knew a wish was happening, that a reconstruction of the altar was likely true and accurate news.

The boy strained against the wind to return to The Last Straw.

Swishy glided up a hilly, tree-less stretch, full of every color of wheat imaginable. A couple of modest squares contained sunflowers and black daisies—tended by snitchtalons, no less, pecking in the picket fence stakes while another carried a watering can over the blooms.

The winds were kind zephyrs, not a hint of darkness carried within. The translucent curling strokes of gust tickled Swishy’s spirit.

The [Midnight] curses got in where they could fit in, fertilizing nature. Shadows became food, seeking to flower and evolve. Any use they found for themselves gave them worth. As they settled into the land, their pleasing sighs and moans were a secondary sound that traveled beneath the breeze.

The Last Straw, though, was as beautiful as he’d left it, the landscape’s glow responding to Ruby’s presence.

Everything that’d gorgeously spawned upon The High Chasm, the remade Straw City, the treehouses and nests, remained intact. There was no collateral damage, only growth. Reds, oranges, honey. Wishwillows that were migrated to the garden area. Much of the shadows that pooled toward Ruby were side-tracked, stopping short to curl around blades of grass and stalks of wheat, growing those instead.

Swishy reached the top. He soared across The Last Straw garden grounds, through the alternating rows of wishwillow gold and everytree black to get to Ruby. The ambient curses eyed him like a rare gem. And the tree roots curled and uncurled, awaiting a moment to bind the scarecrow. There were snitches. There were wrathravens. And there were other scarecrows, dark and groaning ones who wished to become Swishy.

And then there was Ruby. He’d know her broom-riding silhouette anywhere. Floating altar stones loomed over her, solving the puzzle of its reconstruction. The stones stacked one at a time, rebuilding the altar from the ground up.

“Me, me, me…” Ruby chanted amid the arranging stones.

The woman pointed at where the stones should place themselves, directing traffic, reverse-engineering the altar.

With her other hand, she held Myst’s web-covered heart. She blew the strings aside, clearing its surface. Bright aura ebbed against her face. Swishy was jealous. He thought the aura looked warm, bakery-fresh. And it seemed that Ruby took in those cozy feelings as she finally hopped off her broom and set her feet on solid ground.

Swishy became speed itself as he soared toward the madness. Blind to the physical world but keen to the soulscape, he devoted his full focus to Ruby’s spirit. Though he couldn’t hear her, the witch’s spirit was a language he well understood. For better or worse.

“The new Myst shall be me,” she exhaled several tons of spiritual relief.

“You can’t replace her!” Swishy screamed.

But he was far away. Casually, a shadowy row of everytrees root-walked in his path, blocking him. Around and around, Swishy weaved. Yet his every glimpse of Ruby and the altar were impeded by yet another tree.

Then, after several seconds, the dark trees moved out of the way, relaxing once more.

And those seconds were all Ruby needed.

Swishy gaped in terror as Myst’s heart gradually vanished from Ruby’s hands, Cearth claiming its due and rendering the rewards.

The girl inside raised her posture, too, curiously holding her stomach, surprised at the pain relief.

HUNGER, for once, had shrunk. The word still tried to stretch out, to occupy space through Ruby’s insides, but the stated wish seemed to bind the word and keep it in check.

Shadows stretched from the now-repaired altar, oozing from its cracks. The curses slithered over Ruby’s feet, then her ankles. Next were her calves. Then her knees. Her thighs. The hem of her dress.

Up, up, up the curses went.

After several long moments, the curses coiled around Ruby’s neck, then spread to her lips and eyes and hair.

Every ounce of flesh—and everything within, too—was claimed by Cearth.

The heart evaporated in full, its vapors snaking around Ruby’s fingers.

Swishy landed within several steps of Ruby. She stood before him, a wraith in woman’s skin. The finished altar was behind her, a scarecrow-shaped monument of black stone. Cursed sparks crackled around its fractures and fissures, an ancient power leaking from its confines.

The wish was complete: the rise of a new emissary, the total displacement of Myst.

Ruby claimed it all—shadows, power, everything.