"When you were born, Martin, it was almost as if the people of Barrows Bay forgot my dear goddaughter had ever existed. The Mother had borne a son. Never mind the fact that she was seventy years old if she was a day. Never mind that many of the town elders had been delivered by her themselves. Or the conspicuous lack of a father. Ruby Savage had a child—and it was a time to rejoice."

Sadly, Ruby's mental wellness had quickly begun to deteriorate, most noticeably at town gatherings—the funerals, the weddings, the Harvest Festival, the big Christmas gala at the town hall—and the people of Barrows Bay passed it off as "the blue feeling," which would later come to be called postpartum depression.

She had missed out on several births in the following years, choosing instead to stay home and take care of Martin. When she was taken away to Saints of Mercy Sanitarium, the entire town mourned. In her absence, Mavis Lynch filled the role. Though no one had ever dared call her "Mother," she had already been in charge of all births since Martin was born.

"Mavis was none too pleased when Ruby came traipsing back to town some years later, apparently all cured. Ms. Lynch had fashioned her own little fiefdom here on the island, and the town had grown into something Ruby Savage never would have condoned. It became a tourist trap. Mavis's Women's Weekends put Barrows Bay on the map. Ruby thought them gauche. Decadent. I must say I agree with her. But by then it was too late and much too popular to stop."

"So Mavis and my moth—" He still found it difficult not to think of her as his mother. He was still getting used to it, to being an orphan. "—and Ruby, they've been locked in a power struggle ever since."

"One could say that, yes. One could also say they despise each other. There's a term I've heard in working with school choirs on the mainland. I believe Ruby Savage and Mavis Lynch are what children these days call 'frenemies.'"

Sheila laughed.

The reverend excused himself to get blankets from the back closet and Martin attempted to absorb all that he'd told them. It was a lot to take in. His birth mother's unwitting rape at the hands of her father. Her death during his birth. His grandfather's breakdown. Ruby raising him as her own despite her deteriorating her mental health.

Barclay's "trail of blood" ran much deeper and further back than he ever could have imagined. He couldn't help but wonder if the killer had been right all along.

That his birth had been unholy.

That these deaths would only ever stop with his own.

Reverend Atkins returned a few minutes and several muttered curses later holding a stack of folded bedclothes. He laid them on the cot with a pained grunt.

"One of you will have to sleep on the floor, or among the pews. Though I suspect with what you know about Ruby Savage and her companions, it might be wise for you to stay together."