Darkwood Legacy

THE CONFESSION TREEThe tree remembered every sin. Then they cut it down.For three centuries, the Confession Tree stood in the Appalachian mountains-an ancient execution oak where the guilty were hanged and their sins absorbed into the wood itself. 256 souls. 256 confessions carved into the grain.Grace Pritchard knows this because her twin brother was the last.She watched him hang for a murder they both committed. She's spent forty-six years carrying his confession and hers-the childhood abuse she never reported, the killing she helped hide.In 2019, the tree was felled. Its wood sold to a craftsman who carved it into forty-three beautiful objects: rocking chairs, kitchen tables, walking sticks, jewelry boxes.He had no idea what he was distributing.A mother rocks her infant and feels the urge to silence it forever. A family gathers for dinner and the table whispers strategies for bloodshed. A walking stick spreads violence through every hand that grips it.The objects don't haunt. They infect. Each piece carries fragments of the sins absorbed over centuries, and they're waking in the hands of the innocent.Grace is the only one who can collect them. She has Harrow blood-the sin-eater lineage that bound the tree in the first place. But every object she touches brands her. Dark wood-grain patterns spread across her skin like roots seeking purchase.The tree isn't dead. It's distributed across the country, poisoning lives one carved object at a time.And Grace is becoming the vessel it always needed-a living tree to hold what wood alone can no longer contain.The first sin was hers. The last one will consume her.Book One of The Darkwood Legacy: Folk horror meets object curse. For readers who crave The Ritual's ancient wrong made flesh and Hereditary's inescapable family sin.The wood remembers. And it's not finished. R.D. Parrish is an American author whose work blends atmospheric horror, Southern Gothic melancholy, and deeply human storytelling. A Marine Corps veteran and longtime resident of the American South, Parrish draws inspiration from the quiet places-flooded fields, forgotten towns, and the heavy, humid stillness where memory clings to the earth.His debut novel, Hollow Ground, is an intimate rural-horror tale set in the fictional Mississippi Delta community of Gethsemane Parish, where relentless rain awakens an ancient, listening intelligence beneath the soil. Parrish is known for crafting horror that is slow-burning, emotional, and rooted in character-stories where fear emerges not from monsters, but from misunderstanding, grief, and the fragile ways humans try to connect. Parrish writes with a focus on atmosphere, psychological depth, and the strange beauty of the natural world. When he isn't writing, he enjoys time with his family, exploring small-town history, and working on the next haunting story set in the world just beneath our feet.He lives in the United States with his wife, De.

HIDDEN ROOTS Book 2 of the Darkwood Legacy SeriesThe hunt continues. The contamination spreads. And Grace Pritchard is running out of time.Six months after burying the first cursed objects from the Confession Tree, Grace has learned three things: Malcolm's protective methods only slow the inevitable. The contamination spreading through her body will never stop. And she can't do this alone.Enter Marcus Webb Jr.-son of the man her brother murdered at the tree more than twenty years ago. He should hate her. Instead, he becomes her unlikely partner, helping Grace track ten more cursed objects across North Carolina. A cradle that drives new mothers to madness. A spinning wheel that won't let go. A rocking horse in the hands of a monster.With each collection, the wood grain climbs higher. Grace's hands crack like old timber. Her eyes reflect light in ways that make people look away. Malcolm's equipment and rituals buy her time, but everyone can see the truth: Grace is transforming into something that isn't quite human anymore.The Grounding Ritual nearly kills her. Forty-eight hours of agony, peeling away strips of wooden flesh, screaming until her voice breaks. It works-barely. But Malcolm warns her the next time might not.Because deep beneath the surface, something is stirring.The Confession Tree was cut down. Its wood carved into forty-three objects. But some roots run deeper than anyone knew. And Grace is about to discover that her hunt is far from over.Book 2 of The Darkwood Legacy - Where body horror meets Appalachian folklore, and redemption has a price measured in pieces of yourself.For readers who loved THE TWISTED ONES by T. Kingfisher and BETWEEN TWO FIRES by Christopher Buehlman. R.D. Parrish is an American author whose work blends atmospheric horror, Southern Gothic melancholy, and deeply human storytelling. A Marine Corps veteran and longtime resident of the American South, Parrish draws inspiration from the quiet places-flooded fields, forgotten towns, and the heavy, humid stillness where memory clings to the earth.His debut novel, Hollow Ground, is an intimate rural-horror tale set in the fictional Mississippi Delta community of Gethsemane Parish, where relentless rain awakens an ancient, listening intelligence beneath the soil. Parrish is known for crafting horror that is slow-burning, emotional, and rooted in character-stories where fear emerges not from monsters, but from misunderstanding, grief, and the fragile ways humans try to connect. Parrish writes with a focus on atmosphere, psychological depth, and the strange beauty of the natural world. When he isn't writing, he enjoys time with his family, exploring small-town history, and working on the next haunting story set in the world just beneath our feet.He lives in the United States with his wife, De.