“I haven’t seen any flowers.”
“Interesting,” he sang, a lilt to his tone. “Interesting indeed. Why am I here, Charles? Seems an odd gathering.”
It was odd, I thought it was just me.
Thomas and I, along with Mr. Kels, Mr. Alascer, and Azrael were all here. Pastor Masters was gone on a trip for a couple of weeks, which was terrible for me. Thomas made them follow the rules sometimes, but it was his father that laid down the law when they started getting too aggressive.
I had monthly appointments with the doctor just to make sure everyone was following the rules just enough, but with Pastor Masters being gone, that went out the window.
Since he left, Mr. Young had been requesting a few more private sessions with me, which was completely against the rules. He liked to touch me in bad places. Places that would make me impure if he went too far, and he almost did, and I had paid the price for it because I didn’t speak up. Which was why my back was a little straighter today. It was too raw to touch my clothes, and I had a couple extra doctor appointments in the next two weeks to make sure the lashings wouldn’t become infected.
It hurt, but it was something I was used to.
“Well,” Mr. Alascer began, “Garrett has decided that you’re worth promoting to Pillar, so congratulations. Welcome to the Church of Daylight.”
My heart did that strange thing again. I was wrong,nowhe was officially a Pillar. Maybe the daffodil was the one he had already picked out, now that he was officially a Pillar, she was officially his Favorite.
“And he wants to immediately start testing you to be a Leader. Apparently, he sees…potential,” he went on, albeit bitterly.
Azrael hadn’t been in church much since June, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t test him. He must have been meeting with Pastor Masters privately, working his way up in the ranks without actually attending all the services.
What conversations had he been having with them outside of here though? I wanted to know. I wanted to know what they saw in him to move him up the ranks so quickly. Six months was a record, especially if the son of the Pastor disliked him.
It only intrigued me more. Azrael was an enigma in this church. He didn’t belong. His eyes, the way he spoke, the way he taunted and hummed. He was a black spot in a church bathed in sunlight. A snake in the lion’s den. How was I the only one noticing that he didn’t fit in here?
I suppose, on some level, Thomas had noticed, but not enough to see past his rage.
“I’ve passed so many tests already,” he purred, that strange lilt still hanging on. It was so familiar, that lilt. Soveryfamiliar.
Becoming a Leader meant knowing everything. Not as much as Pastor Masters knew, but more than the Pillars. I didn’t even know everything the Leaders knew. I didn’t know where Absolution was in that state of Washington or what happened there. I didn’t know what happened when a member was excommunicated, or even where the branches of every churchwere located. We had some in this city, branches of our church, and I had no idea where they were.
I listened to everything, and I still didn’t know enough.
“To become a Leader, it requires more,” Mr. Alascer said tightly. “More than just simple little tests. More than questions and answers. If you’re not up for it,” he paused, “fine. You will remain a Pillar forever.”
I heard something like the swift swish of air.
No, not air…
Something was spinning in the air and then it stopped. “It seems to me that the risks of this outweigh the benefits,” Azrael noted, bored.
That’s because they’ve never done this before. The risks did outweigh the benefits, but that didn’t matter because if he failed, if he made the Leaders doubt, he would disappear just like other Pillars had.
But this…why was Pastor Masters doing this? He was always so careful. Azrael must have been the richest of them all. It couldn’t have just been the transportation job.
“Garrett seems to believe it’s worth that risk,” Mr. Kels said bitterly.
But they didn’t. None of the Leaders liked this. I could feel it in the air, hear it in their voices. They must have thought—believed—that Pastor Masters was making a mistake. That the risks were far too great to push him through the ranks this hard and this fast.
Azrael was quiet for several seconds before he responded, and I heard the smile so fully, I could almost see his razor-sharp teeth. “Very well. I accept.”
Suddenly, I knew what it was, that lilt. I knew exactly what it was.
That was the sound the sea made right before the tsunami hit. A sound telling the world that it was already too late. You can’trun. You can’t hide. You can’t escape what’s about to happen. The tsunami was coming, and it was going to destroy everything and anything that stood in its way.
It was just a matter of time.
~ ~ ~
