“Truer words were never spoken.” Shiori offered a gentle smile over her shoulder to the child. The apocalypse demon was always a welcome sight. “How have you been, little duckling?”
Haru crawled toward Hakudoshi, babbling as he went, as if telling the boy about all his day.
Shiori sat beneath the apple tree. A tree that once offered so much, now barren. Snow upon its branches, not a leaf in sight. Winter had come and claimed all of its fruit. Haru crawled slowly along the ground through the snow making a little trail in his wake.