Maryse, Sadie, and Chef lure Ku Kluxes with a silver-laced bomb during a Klan parade in Macon, Georgia.

A Ku Klux corners Maryse in a warehouse, and she summons a magical leaf-shaped sword to kill it.

The trio returns to Nana Jean's farm and delivers Ku Klux carcasses to scientist Molly Hogan for examination.

Molly Hogan warns the resistance that the Ku Kluxes are evolving into a new, more dangerous form.

Maryse has a dream vision of a monstrous figure named Butcher Clyde, who sings while chopping flesh.

The fox-like aunties warn Maryse in a vision that Butcher Clyde is especially dangerous to her.

Maryse seeks out Butcher Clyde at his butcher shop and learns he is a harbinger of the Grand Cyclops.

Butcher Clyde and the Ku Kluxes attack and burn down Frenchy's juke joint, trapping people inside.

Sadie is mortally wounded by Ku Kluxes while protecting Maryse and dies in Maryse's arms.

Butcher Clyde captures Maryse and attempts to force her to swallow flesh belonging to the Grand Cyclops.

Maryse falls into the aunties' realm and confronts them with Butcher Clyde's claim that they have been lying to her.

The Night Doctors force Maryse to confront the trauma of her family's murder, and her repaired sword reappears.

The resistance fighters agree to travel to Stone Mountain to stop Butcher Clyde's Birth of a Nation screening.

At Stone Mountain, Butcher Clyde offers Maryse revenge for all Black suffering, but she attacks the Grand Cyclops instead.

The Night Doctors capture the Grand Cyclops, Maryse destroys Butcher Clyde, and the aunties reveal a new evil rises in Rhode Island.

Maryse Boudreaux and her fellow resistance fighters trap Ku Kluxes in Macon before learning that the monsters are evolving into something far worse. Dream visions introduce Maryse to the monstrous Butcher Clyde, who is working to bring an entity called the Grand Cyclops into the world. When Butcher Clyde launches a devastating attack on Frenchy's juke joint, Sadie is killed and Maryse is captured, her sword shattered by her own uncontrolled rage. Forced to confront her deepest trauma in the realm of the Night Doctors, Maryse emerges with her sword restored and leads the resistance to a final showdown at Stone Mountain. There, Butcher Clyde makes one last offer that Maryse refuses before she and her allies destroy both him and the Grand Cyclops. The victory is incomplete, however, as the aunties reveal that another dark power is already rising in Rhode Island.

The core battle against the Ku Kluxes and their masters.

Nana Jean shares visions of an approaching disaster and a white man with blood-red hair with the resistance.

The community at Nana Jean's farm holds a celebration and Ring Shout ceremony after the Macon mission.

Maryse spends an evening with her lover Frenchy at his juke joint before falling into her visions.

Maryse has a dream vision of her younger self hiding silently in a hatch as Ku Kluxes murder her family.

The aunties tell Maryse the story of Truth and Lies, hinting at deception connected to the leaf-shaped sword.

Maryse returns to Nana Jean's farm to warn the resistance that Butcher Clyde plans an imminent attack.

Chef tricks Butcher Clyde into a standoff by falsely claiming she has a bomb packed with silver.

Maryse discovers that her lover Frenchy is among the hostages the Ku Kluxes have taken to Stone Mountain.

Maryse urges the resistance fighters to pursue Butcher Clyde to Stone Mountain, but they initially refuse.

Auntie Jadine reveals a prophecy that a world where Maryse joins Butcher Clyde ends in Earth's total desolation.

Maryse enters the Night Doctors' realm and meets Dr. Antoine Bisset, who agrees to guide her there.

The Night Doctors expel Maryse from their realm when the overwhelming pain stored in her sword floods them.

Maryse brings slim hope of a Night Doctor alliance back to the farm and convinces the fighters to act.

Nana Jean and the Shouters channel Ring Shout magic as a weapon during the final battle at Stone Mountain.

Maryse and Frenchy are reunited after the battle while government officials secretly clean up the site.

While Maryse's core struggle drives the story, a web of supporting events builds the world and raises the stakes of the resistance. Nana Jean's prophetic visions and the community's Ring Shout ceremony establish the cultural and spiritual foundation for the fight ahead. The attack on Frenchy's juke joint makes the conflict personal, with Frenchy captured and taken to Stone Mountain as Maryse fights her way free with Chef's help. With the resistance reluctant to act, Maryse descends into the Night Doctors' realm and returns with a fragile hope that finally unites her allies behind a plan. At Stone Mountain, Nana Jean and the Shouters channel Ring Shout magic to turn the tide of battle against the Ku Kluxes. The novella closes with Maryse and Frenchy reunited as quiet forces move to erase all evidence of the battle from the world.

The supporting moments that shape the resistance.

Maryse carries her late brother Martin's book of Black folklore into battle against the Ku Kluxes in Macon.

A small girl in Maryse's first dream vision warns that enemies exploit the places where a person hurts most.

The aunties reveal in a dream vision that the leaf-shaped sword was forged from the rage of enslaved people and betraying African chiefs.

Butcher Clyde taunts Maryse about the deaths of her family members when she refuses to join his side.

As Sadie dies, she expresses her wish to fly away to Africa like the people in the Igbo Landing story.

Butcher Clyde reveals he deliberately left Maryse alive after killing her family in order to cultivate her rage.

Maryse's leaf-shaped sword shatters when her overwhelming rage escapes her control during Butcher Clyde's assault.

The aunties confess they gave Maryse the sword to neutralize her dangerous potential, not because she is their chosen champion.

Maryse proposes to the Night Doctors that she bring them Ku Kluxes filled with hate as payment for their help.

The Night Doctors cut Maryse open and, guided by the small girl, extract the memory of her family's murder.

Maryse relives discovering her family's hanging bodies in the barn and finally confronts the full weight of that trauma.

Martin's ghost urges Maryse to think like the trickster figures of Black folklore rather than accept Butcher Clyde's offer.

The ghosts of people murdered by the Klan, including Sadie and Martin, arrive as reinforcements in the final battle.

Martin's ghost reveals he has been secretly adding folk stories to Maryse's book throughout her fight.

A Klanswoman claims she did not know her companions were monsters; Maryse and Chef sharply dismiss her ignorance.

Beneath Ring Shout's action lies a series of pivotal revelations that transform Maryse from a trauma-driven avenger into a true champion. Dream visions warn her early that her pain is her greatest vulnerability, and the aunties' account of the sword's dark origins hints at forces manipulating her from the start. The raid on Frenchy's brings the cruelest revelation: Butcher Clyde murdered Maryse's family on purpose, engineering her rage as a weapon against her, and her sword shatters under the weight of that knowledge. The aunties' subsequent confession that they gave her the sword to contain her, not to honor her, strips away the last of Maryse's certainties about who she is. A harrowing session with the Night Doctors forces Maryse to finally enter the barn where her family died and confront the truth that has haunted her for years. These confrontations free Maryse to fight from love rather than hatred, and the arrival of her brother's ghost — carrying a book full of hidden stories — gives her the final wisdom she needs to win.