However smooth it might have appeared, we were improvising almost the entirety of this moment. We just trusted the fact that we’d grown up with each other for two and a half decades more than the fact that we’d been hating each other for a little under two years now.
“Ever since the Fallen Saints formed, deaths have followed,” I said. “For what seemed like forever, such deaths were minimal, and we were able to keep the Fallen Saints at bay.”
“But the past year has undone much of that,” Lane said. “For whatever reason, the Fallen Saints increased their attacks.”
Not whatever reason. Ever since our father died.
“The death we mourn today is, for us, the final straw,” Lane continued. “We have lost soldiers and leaders, but when you lose a man like Father Marcellus, the rules change.”
I cleared my throat.
“We have let our squabbles and differences divide us into shades of Reapers,” I said. “At some point, those differences and quarrels will need to be resolved, and when that time comes, we will do so. But now, I say to you all, we must not focus on that.”
“We must focus on unification.”
It was a funeral, not a political rally, so people didn’t rise out of their seats to applaud. But when I looked into the eyes of both the officers and the rank-and-file members, of the ones whose personalities made them least likely to be leaders and most likely to be governed by their impulses, I saw determination, properly channeled anger, and a willingness to listen.
It was the best thing, perhaps the only good thing, that I had seen on an otherwise tragic day.
“Lane and I are discussing plans to end the Fallen Saints once and for all,” I said. “I…”
I paused briefly when I saw a woman enter the church—but she looked like she quickly realized that she had come to the wrong place. She gasped, mumbled something inaudible, and left.
In any other context, she was awfully pretty and young, almost like a Southern belle. But, for painfully obvious reasons, the thought of hitting on a woman, let alone actually doing so, was just awful.
“I have seen too many friends fall, and I know that Lane can speak to that as well,” I said. “And for that…”
“We are preparing the run to end all runs,” he said. “If we do this right, we eradicate the Fallen Saints, cut off any allies they have—of which I believe they only have forced partnerships—and bring peace to Springsville. If we do it poorly, then this town falls into their hands.”
And, left unsaid, we’d all be dead.
But even if that thought crossed the minds of the audience, no one seemed scared.
“Regardless of whatever differences we have, regardless of past squabbles, we must now come together for the final battle between the Reapers and the Fallen Saints.”
With that, both of us returned to our seats. Lane squeezed Angela’s hand. I closed my eyes, took several deep breaths, and silently prayed to my father to give us the strength to win this battle.
Because if we didn’t, it would literally be hell on Earth.
* * *
Lilly Sartor
For such a beautiful day in the sky, it seemed like a tragic one on the ground.
I knew what I had been asked to do. I knew that if I did it, I would be promised a reward. I knew that I didn’t feel comfortable doing it.
But I did it anyway.
I walked into the funeral, pretending to be a churchgoer that didn’t realize a funeral was being held.
And the instant I did it, I regretted it.
There were just some sacred events on which one should not purposefully intrude, and a funeral topped the list. I didn’t know what else that list included, but it certainly included that.
The second I stepped inside, the gasp and the quiet apology that followed were not fake. They were very much a real byproduct of how I felt I had violated something holy by doing something very unholy. As soon as the door to the church had shut behind me, I still had my hand over my mouth.
And the truck that I had arrived in still sat in the back of the parking lot, its engine on, looking like just another parked vehicle to the unsuspecting eye.
