I know Silas’ house like the back of my hand. Spent so much time here before it becamehishouse. Before he and his mother moved into the compound, the house belonged to a single father and his son. They vanished in the middle of the night and never came back. Sometimes, I wonder what happened to them.
Senya moved into the house five years ago, pregnant and unwed. Silas found in her what he couldn’t find in me, and she took him without a second thought. In his younger years, he was charming in the light, deviant in the dark. Through hushed whispers in the pews of the Cross, she heard the rumors. She swore up and down the gossip wasn’t true in public. When it was just the two of us, in privacy, she sworethe same. Deep down, she knew the truth. It’s why she married Silas. It was her fucked up way of saving me from a life of sin, as if being a cocksucker wasn’t who I was, as if Silas’ cock alone was the reason for my diagnosis. I think she even knows I was still sucking his cock under her own roof.
The house is dark, lit only by candles on the dining room table. The flames cast shadows upon the walls as Noah and I climb the creaking staircase to the second floor.
At the top of the landing, there’s an oval window overlooking the food hall. I take a quick glance outside and watch as a stream of men, women, and children walk to their doom. They’re all dressed to impress, falsely believing their god is waiting on the other side for them. Sheep marching to slaughter. The head of each household, the oldest male, carries a lit torch in one hand.
“Let’s go,” Noah whispers, placing a hand on my back.
I lead the way into Silas’ room. A single black candlestick burns on the nightstand, half-melted and leaking hot wax onto the aged wood. Handcuffs dangle from each of the four bedposts.
It’s the same room he used to sleep in when he was younger. All bedrooms in all the houses in the compound are all the same size. After all, a home is nothing more than four walls and a roof, and a bedroom is for sleeping andsleeping with your wife once a year. So, there was never a reason for Silas to switch rooms when his mother died.
A bedroom for Silas was so much more than a place to rest his head. It was a shrine, a place of worship, a place where the laws of the Sinless Children were more like suggestions. Guns are prohibited to all members except the enforcers, and even they are required to keep their guns in a safe in the basement of the Center.
I open the top drawer of the dresser, dig through a not-so-varied collection of tighty whiteys, and find two guns. I keep one for myself and pass the other to Noah. He pulls the magazine from the bottom, checks for ammo, and slaps it back into the gun.
He rummages through the closet and comes back out with his duffel bag slung over his shoulder. The same duffel bag I last saw at the church. One of the two men must have picked it up and brought it back to Silas. But what does a dead man need a bag full of money for?
“Your boyfriend appears to be a thief as well,” Noah says.
I pay him no attention as a choir begins to sing a familiar hymn.
Noah steps to the window and peels the sheer white curtain back. “Time for the big show.”
I meet him at the window. Silas’ room offers the best view of the compound. The entire congregation is gathered in the courtyard, standing in frontof tables decorated with linen cloths and magnolia centerpieces. Torches light a path leading up to the pulpit where Silas, Senya, and Silas Jr. sit. Each of them wears a silver crown, signifying their status at the top of the hierarchy.
Noah points. “Who’s that hot guy?
“That’s Silas,” I groan.
“He’s kind of fine in a I’m going to fuck you so hard you’ll meet the devil kind of way.”
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?”
A shit-eating grin passes over his lips. “I see why you were so obsessed with him”.
I regret telling him everything. Looking back, there were things I definitely should have left out of the Odyssey of Seven. Can’t go back and change that. Can’t go back and change anything at all. Learned my lesson the hard way.
“If you’re done ogling the psychopath, can we go?”
He reaches out and tugs me back to him. “You know I’m kidding, right? Just trying to find some light in this darkness.”
“The night isn’t over.” I glance out the window as the song comes to an abrupt end. Silas motions with his hands and everyone takes a seat at their respective tables in unison. “It’s only going to get darker from here. I’m going to make him pay for what he’s done, even if I have to kill him myself.”
“Nobody else has to die.”
I look up at my knight in shining armor,the guy who would kill for me. The guy who has killed for me. There’s a softness to him now, the rough edges peeled away to reveal a changed man.
Right now, I don’t need a soft man. I need the Noah who jumped out of his car and beat a trucker to a pulp. “I just think you should know that when I was in the Box, Silas kissed me.”
He squints. “Say less.”
I raise both hands in the air. An innocent party to the kissing. “Completely against my will.”
“Okay, new plan.” He points in Silas’ general direction. “We kill that motherfucker, grab your sister and your nephew, and get the hell out of here.”
There’s that spark of darkness I require. He can turn over his new leaf come sunrise.
