Granny Smith stirred the bright green cider and watched a ghoul slip behind her bar. She was a green apple who ran this tavern, and she had one dream: a cider strong enough to drop even the dead. No ghoul had ever stumbled from her stools. Tonight one lunged for the locked cabinet she let no one touch. The ghoul's gray fingers found the cabinet latch. Granny's knife hit the wood an inch from its wrist. "Touch that," she said, "and I pour you into the gutter." The ghoul froze. Inside that cabinet lived her mother recipe. It held the one ingredient that made her cider bite the dead: a glowing branch pulled from the haunted forest, its veins lit orange and green. Without it her work stopped cold. Every batch failed before it finished. Two guests watched from the far end. Evelyn Greenwood, the green ghost who drank only water, set her glass down. She had haunted Granny's bar for weeks now. Granny still wondered why water. Beside her sat Willow Ashenmist, the tree phantom, roots curling from her shoulders. "Let it break the lock," Willow said, flat. "Then you have nothing to guard." Granny did not look away from the ghoul. "That branch is my whole recipe." The ghoul yanked. The latch snapped. The cabinet swung open, and the glowing branch tumbled toward the floor. Granny dove. Her fingers brushed the bark. The ghoul grabbed the other end. For one breath they both held it, and the branch flared hot between them. "Water," Evelyn said. "Put it in water." Granny did not ask why. She swung the branch, ghoul and all, and plunged the lit end into the full basin behind the bar. The water hissed. Green light spread through the basin like spilled paint. The ghoul let go and shrieked. Then it went still. Its gray jaw hung slack. It swayed, bumped a stool, and slid to the floor. The ghoul was drunk. Granny stared. She had tried wine, smoke, and rot. Nothing touched the dead. But the branch, drowned in plain water, had done it in seconds. "That's why," Granny whispered. She looked at Evelyn. "You knew water would pull it out." Evelyn shrugged. "I only drink water. I notice things about it." Willow leaned toward the glowing basin. "That branch is mine," she said quietly. "It came from my roots." Granny's grip tightened on the basin rim. The secret was out. Both phantoms had seen the one thing that made her cider work. And now the tree spirit claimed the source. The drunk ghoul snored on her floor. Granny finally had her answer, and two witnesses who each wanted something from it. "Nobody touches this branch," Granny said. "Not you. Not her. Not the dead." Willow's glowing eyes did not blink. "Then you will need my permission to grow more."