Please Let Him Live!
- We begin with Briony and Eldric drifting and seeping and bleeding and weeping into the swamp, to use Briony's exact terms. Alright, we know this sounds like a painful, gross, and potentially devastating experience, but Briony seems to quite enjoy it and Eldric doesn't complain.
- Eldric and Briony discuss her long absence from the swamp, and by discuss we mean Briony avoids saying anything real or of substance while Eldric asks nosy questions.
- Through another of Briony's memory narrations, we find out that her father stopped coming home altogether after she got sick (except to sleep)—so it makes sense that Briony is supremely irritated and angry with her father now.
- Briony briefly argues with Eldric about whether or not Stepmother killed herself. Really though, Eldric doesn't argue back much with a secretive and brooding Briony.
- While they walk through the swamp Eldric sings a song about needing a body, crying, and gin and Briony imagines playing "he loves me he loves me not" with a flower version of Eldric.
- Witch trivia time, Shmoopsters. Why can't witches survive in big cities? Because machines and metal make them sick. Bonus question: Can vampires survive in cities? Why yes, yes they can.
- Night falls and the Horrors start to try to scare them. Briony and the Reeve try to warn Mr. Drury not to run or act scared, but the silly man gets tricked by the Wykes' false lights and flees from Briony's grasp.
- As Mr. Drury runs wildly through the swamp, the rest of them run after and try to catch him.
- Briony begins to blame herself for Mr. Drury's impending death and reminds herself again how evil she is. She says some things about calling Mucky Face, which gets a little confusing, but it seems she's describing a wave that she has named.
- They find Mr. Drury and tell him not to move.
- Briony goes back to remembering Mucky Face and the time when her Stepmother told her that she, Briony the teenage witch, had caused her stepmother's injuries.
- Mr. Drury is "slurped and swallowed" (6.124) by the swamp. Nom nom, we guess.
- Briony beats herself up some more with reminders of how evil she is, the promises she continues to break to Stepmother, and now, Mr. Drury's death.