ENVY

"Be careful what you crave in the shadows, for the Three Sisters grant every wish with a jagged edge. In this kingdom of ghosts and gold, the price of envy is a debt that can never be paid-only repeated."

Beneath a sky of bruised and "venomous purple," where the river's "relentless plink" tolls the knell of a pauper's soul, dwells Jacob-a man consumed by a "black fury" and a "simmering rage." From the threshold of a "shack that seems to lurch and sway," he gazes upon the Mallory estate, those "insolent constellations of wealth" that glitter like cold stars to mock his misery.

Driven by a "cold seed" of resentment, he rows his "leaky boat" into the "gullet of some great beast" -the forbidden upper river. There, amidst the "skeletal sentinels" of the swamp, he invokes the Three Sisters, the "hunger in the dark." They offer the "gold of a hundred sunken ships," yet they speak in riddles of a "seed" and a "harvest."

The gold is granted, ancient and "deadly cold," but the harvest is a "spectacle of wealth and sorrow." For as Jacob ascends to his "kingdom of ghosts," his daughter's lungs fill with the "silty river water" of the damned, and his wife becomes a "beautiful, empty shell" with a "mechanical" smile.

Now, trapped in an "eternal hell," Jacob discovers that the rope upon the banister is no mere tool, but a "permanent part of the house." "All sins come with a price," and in this "magnificent prison," the debt is paid in a cycle that never ends.