I don’t hear the news. Not for weeks and weeks.

Still, I should’ve known. The truth was so obviously in front of me.

Instead it takes an outpost owner near the Canadian border to convince me beyond a shadow of a doubt.

“That blighted horseman’s gone. I swear it on the newly dead, he is,” the man says, leaning on the pine countertop as he adds up my things.

The sight of the man himself, alive and bustling about his store, is surprising enough, but then again, I’ve ran into others on my way back up the coast. I assumed their presence had to do with Pestilence spreading his plague solely southward.

Now I stare at the store owner, his news not computing.

The world thought Pestilence was gone when we were holed up inside that mansion, but once I left, I assumed that he’d resume his travels.

“You mean there haven’t been any new sightings of him?” I ask dumbly.

He shakes his head.

No new sightings of him. An unpleasant sensation twists my gut, but I can’t say what causes it.

Maybe there’s no longer anyone left alive to spot him. The territory from Washington to California is vast … vast and full of the dead.

“Have you not heard?” the owner asks when he notices my surprise.

“Last news I received was that Oregon, California, and parts of Mexico were infected,” I say. Even now a chill slides through me at the thought. I played a role in that.

The man lets out a wheezy laugh, pulling a slim case from beneath his counter. Opening it, he takes the raw ingredients from inside and begins to hand roll a cigarette. “Oh, you’ve missed so much.”

Intentionally.

I made a habit of avoiding small talk like this, the guilt its own sort of illness. But now that we’re on the subject of Pestilence, a sick sort of curiosity comes over me. I find I need to know how much of the world still lives—and how my horseman fared.

Hearing that Pestilence hasn’t resurfaced since I left him …

The loss feels physical, like a limb’s been lopped off.

The outpost owner finishes rolling his cigarette, licking the edge of the white paper to seal the seam closed. “Pleased to tell you that all the sick recovered.” He shakes his head. “Damn miracle it is.” The man strikes a match and holds the flame to the end of his smoke, inhaling a grateful drag. “I’m not a praying man myself, but even I sent one up when I heard the news. Thought He’d left us to die.”

Wait—what?

I stare at him in shock.

All the sick recovered.

Can’t seem to catch my breath.

“You mean … all of those sick—they … lived?” I say incredulously.

It cannot be. I was with the horseman. I saw his anger, witnessed his unbending will.

No way had he changed his mind.

“Yep,” the man says cheerily enough, blowing smoke out the side of his mouth. “Even us up north here recovered—news didn’t bother mentioning that.” He frowns, like that’s some great travesty when oh my God, all those millions lived.

“Fucking plague came back right as I was re-opening my store,” he continues. “Thought I’d caught my death.”

There’s a pain in my chest that’s equal parts joy and anguish. I don’t want to believe him because if I’ve misunderstood, the disappointment might crush me alive.

I brace my hands on the countertop as I sway a little.

My God.

Pestilence retracted his plague. I don’t know how, but he did.

He must’ve done it while I was confined to that damn room. I’d thought the worst of him then, and all the while he was curing the plague he’d brought down upon the masses.

The only thing besides his love that I ever wanted. He gave it to me.

Had I but turned on the fucking T.V. I would’ve seen this.

Pestilence stopped the plague, and still I left him.

I swallow back a choked cry.

Why didn’t he tell me? By God, that would’ve changed everything.

“And the Fever,” I ask, somehow finding my voice, “has it spread since then?”

Have to be sure I understand this correctly.

The outpost owner frowns, considering my words. “Not that I’ve heard, though who knows where the world’s at these days? It hasn’t been back around these parts, and that’s good enough for me.”

I thank the man for the news and walk away from the outpost in a daze.

My last encounter with Pestilence fills my mind.

I surrender, he’d said, casting his crown aside.

He had already reversed the plague by then.

I may have laid claim to the world but I’ve lost you, the only thing I ever really wanted.

Why didn’t he say anything? Did he think I was watching the news in that room, that I’d learned that he’d cured them all and still decided to walk away?

These thoughts are gutting me. Because I’m still in love with Pestilence, and now, after vindicating himself, he’s gone.