Fire and Ash

Finally the gate opened.



People began coming out. They did not advance toward him, but instead fanned out along the fence line. And except for one figure in the middle, all the others wore red sashes. Saint John wondered what the sash represented. Was it a variation of a white flag?



The figure without the sash glanced at the people on either side of him, and even from that distance Saint John could see him take a breath to steady himself. His shoulders rose and fell.



Then a small group began walking toward him.



Within a few paces it became apparent that these were not town elders. Not sheriffs or the leaders of a town watch.



They were children.



Teenagers.



One boy walked in front. His hair was clipped very short, and he had a vaguely Japanese cast to his eyes. To his left and slightly behind were two other boys—one Chinese and the other white; to his right were three girls—a tall girl with white hair, a very short girl with wild red curls, and a girl with no hair at all.



“Sister Margaret,” breathed one of his aides.



Saint John studied the teenagers. He did not know the Chinese boy or the large white boy, nor did he know the white-haired girl. But the red-haired girl he recognized. His lip curled back in anger. She and the half-Japanese boy had been in the forest near Sanctuary. The boy was nothing to the saint, but the girl had had the cosmic effrontery to call herself Nyx—the name of the mother of Thanatos, all praise to his darkness. At first Saint John had believed her to be an actual physical manifestation of the mother of his god, and thought she might have been clothed in flesh in order to provide some kind of spiritual test for him. But in the end she was nothing more than a sinner whose flesh cried out for the purification of pain.



Saint John caressed the handle of his favorite knife, which was hidden beneath the folds of his shirt. His aides sensed his mood and shifted restlessly.



When the heretics were ten feet away, Saint John pointed to the teen with the Japanese eyes. “I know you, boy.”



The teen stopped, and the others stopped a few feet behind him. Except for the large white boy and Sister Margaret—the blasphemer who insisted on being called Riot—the others wore military-style bulletproof vests, with similar pads on their arms and legs. It made them look like black insects. Like cockroaches. However, they all had good knives strapped to their waists or thighs. The girls all wore gun belts. The Chinese boy had a compound bow and a quiver of arrows. The red-haired witch and the lead boy both wore katanas, positioned for fast draws. The Chinese boy carried something in his hand, an old-style megaphone, the kind that ran on batteries. Saint John was mildly impressed—working batteries were exceptionally rare.



“Show your manners,” said Saint John, pulling the cloth from his mouth. “Name yourselves.”



The boy cleared his throat. He gave a formal Asian-style bow, low and deferential.



“My name is Benjamin Imura,” he said. “Brother of Tom Imura, samurai of the Nine Towns.” He wiped away tears caused by the stinging chemical vapors.



The saint smiled and nodded. It was a very nice title and presentation.



“I am Saint John of the Knife, chief priest of the Night Church and sworn servant of the Lord Thanatos, all praise to his darkness.”



The boy bowed again in acknowledgment. The others took his cue and also bowed.



Saint John found that he liked this young man. He had manners, and that was rare in these troubled times.



“Do you know why I am here?” asked the saint.



“Yes, sir,” said Benny. He coughed and wiped more tears from his face.



“Have you come to offer terms for surrender?”



“Would it do any good?” asked the boy. “If we open our gate and let you come in, will you show us mercy?”



Saint John smiled. “The day will end more quickly.”



“Right . . . meaning we’ll be dead before noon and your guys can take a siesta.”



The smile faded.



“Look,” said Benny, “we both know how this works. You come out here and we talk. What’s it called? A parley? Okay, so we’re parleying. I know what your terms are. Join you or go into the darkness, right? You have seven more towns to pillage, so you probably want a bunch of us to—what’s the expression? Kneel to kiss the knife? Wow . . . creepy and unsanitary. How do I know where that knife’s been? Point is, some of us get to live if we agree to help you and your reapers slaughter everyone we know. I mean . . . that is the offer, right? That’s the plan?”



“You are dangerously close to—”



“To what? Seriously, man . . . what is it you want me to be afraid of? Torture? You’re already going to kill me. I don’t know if it really matters all that much if I spend the last few hours screaming. I’ll still be dead at the end of it. You want to threaten my friends and family? Go ahead . . . you’re just going to kill them, too.” Benny made a sour face of disapproval. “Maybe nobody’s told you, but offering different kinds of murder isn’t really a terrific sales pitch. Kill me now, kill me later, torture me . . . in the end all you really want is for us to be afraid of you. You dig the fear. You’re like a vampire, only you suck up the terror and pain. You want us to be afraid of you? Sure. You’re a serial killer psycho with an army. Pretty scary.”



“Are you finished?” asked Saint John.



“Why, what have you got?”



“You had a single chance for a peaceful death. The death of the knife. Handled with care and compassion, a blade is a mercy. Like a scalpel, it cuts away the infection of a life lived in sin. I came to offer you the quickest and cleanest of deaths. A single red mouth and you would feel nothing. The darkness would open its arms to enfold you and give you rest.”



“And I blew that with my smart mouth, I know, I get it,” said Benny. “It was kind of my intention.”



“Do you know what the penalty is for your impudence?”



“I have a pretty good guess. Does it involve lots of very fast dead guys with eating disorders?”



The white boy behind him snorted with laughter. The redhead and the Chinese boy were smiling. Saint John wasn’t fooled, though. He could see the fear that turned their eyes glassy and sent lines of cold sweat down their faces.



“The forests behind me are filled with my reapers and with uncounted legions of the dead who—”



“Why do you talk like that?” asked the Chinese boy, speaking for the first time. “Oh, hey, I’m Louis Chong. It’s just that I’m listening to this and I’m wondering why you sometimes talk like you’re in a fantasy novel. You have kind of a Lord of the Rings vibe going on, and it doesn’t really work. I mean, sure you have an actual army, and I guess the zoms are good stand-ins for orcs, but really, man, who uses words like ‘impudence’ and ‘uncounted’?”



“Yes,” said the white-haired girl, “it makes you sound stupid.”



The six teenagers all laughed.



Saint John’s Red Brothers growled in anger and drew their knives.



In the same heartbeat three guns and a bow were pointed at them.



“Don’t be stupid,” said Benny. “We all know that we’re mouthing off to you because we’re scared, and you’re letting us get away with it because you brought knives to a gunfight. Personally, I’d rather go back to the parley. Less flop sweat all around.”



Saint John made a small gesture with his left hand, and the reapers reluctantly sheathed their weapons.



“Oh,” said the redhead as she lowered her gun and slid it back into its holster, “speaking of knives.”



“Right,” said Benny in a bad imitation of having just remembered something. “I’m going to pull a knife and toss it to you. It’s not an attack, so let’s nobody get all weird about it.”



Saint John nodded, curious.



Benny reached around behind his back and slid a long knife from a leather sheath clipped to the back of his belt. He weighed it in his hand for a moment and then tossed it onto the ground in front of the saint.



Saint John recoiled from it as if it was a scorpion.



The Red Brothers gasped.



They all knew that knife.



Saint John picked it up and clutched it to his chest. Then he let out a terrible wail as he sank to his knees in pain and grief. Tears burned in his eyes as he recalled the day he gave this knife to a young man, first of the reapers.



“Peter . . .” The saint looked up pleadingly at the teenagers. “Where did you get this?”



“Where do you think I got it?” said Benny. “I took it from him after I sent him into the darkness.”



Saint John closed his eyes and bent forward as if the knife had been driven into his stomach.



“Feel that?” asked Riot coldly. “That’s what it feels like to lose someone you love.”



98



BENNY IMURA LOOKED AT THE madman kneeling in the dust.



His nose burned from the chemical vapors that rose from the ground, but he imagined that he could smell Saint John’s fear and pain.



Somewhere, deep in the darkness of his fractured heart, he found he liked it.



And with that realization came the screams of all his other parts. The kid that was lost in those shadows. The son who had quieted his parents. The brother to a fallen hero. The young man who had probably lost the love of his life. The traveler and friend, the climber of trees and the catcher of small, fierce fish. The collector of Zombie Cards and the apple-pie eater. Child and boy, teen and young man. All the many aspects of Benny Imura shouted a warning at him as he savored the pleasure of this evil man’s pain.



How scary are you willing to be in order to take the heart out of an enemy? Are you willing to be the monster in the dark? Are you willing to be the boogeyman of their nightmares?



The ranger had asked those questions.



He should have asked one more.



Are you willing to become a monster to defeat monsters?



But Benny already knew the answers to all those questions.



99



BENNY IMURA FELT HIS MOUTH turn into a sneer of absolute contempt.



“Get up,” he said.



It was not pitched as a request.



It was pitched as an order.



The Red Brothers bristled, their hands flexing on the handles of their knives and axes and swords. Benny shot them a look that told them clearly that their chance would come, but it wasn’t this moment. Those men saw something in Benny’s eyes that ignited flickers of fear in them. They helped Saint John to his feet.



“I will bathe in the blood of everyone you love,” said Saint John, but his voice was hoarse.



“Yeah, sure. Whatever,” said Benny. He held out his hand toward Chong, who handed him the bullhorn. Benny clicked the button and spoke into it. His voice boomed out, startling him with the towering volume of it. It echoed off the tree line and rolled down the field.



“Listen to me,” he said, speaking slowly and clearly. “My name is Benjamin Imura, and I speak for the people of Mountainside and the other towns. I know who you are and I know what you’ve had to do. Most of you were forced to join the reapers. Most of you don’t want to do the things you’re doing. Murdering innocent people. Killing little kids. I don’t believe that most of you ever wanted to do that, and it probably makes you sick to even think about it. I understand. I’ve done some pretty horrible things myself in order to survive.”



“They won’t listen to you,” said Saint John.



“Sure they will,” said Nix.



“I won’t let you . . .”



Lilah pointed her pistol at his face.



“Yes you will.”



“Kill me and my reapers will tear you to pieces.”



Lilah shrugged. “So?”



“You’ve been told a bunch of lies,” continued Benny. “You’ve been forced to accept those lies as the truth. But they are lies. Here is the truth. A scientist named Dr. Monica McReady has developed a cure for the Reaper Plague. It’s not perfect, but it works. My friend was infected with an arrow shot by one of your reapers. He got the plague and almost turned, but then Dr. McReady gave him medicine and he’s right here with me.”



Chong raised his bow and waggled it.



“The world hasn’t ended,” shouted Benny. “There is a new government in Asheville. People are reclaiming the world. The mutagen—the red powder you have—is going to wipe out the dead. It makes them faster, but it will also make them decay. In a week your flocks will fall apart. The plague is ending. We’ve survived it. Mankind has survived it. You and me, we’re going to be here when it’s over. That’s what we’ve all prayed for. That’s the grace of God, and it’s the work of good-hearted people. We’re being given a chance to make a new world.”



“You are wasting your breath,” said Saint John. Power was creeping back into his voice, and he still held Brother Peter’s knife.



“We need to end this war,” pleaded Benny. “You need to end this war. Lay down your weapons, tear those angel wings off your clothes, and walk away. On behalf of the Nine Towns I have been authorized to offer a complete and total amnesty. No questions, no punishments. Lay down your weapons and help us rebuild the world instead of helping a psychopath destroy it. Don’t be destroyed by his screwed-up view of the world. Open your eyes. Open your hearts. Be alive!”



None of the reapers moved. They stood in endless rows that faded back into the depths of the forest. No knives fell to the ground.



“I am offering you a chance. One chance. Walk away now . . . or burn in hell for what you’ve done.”



Benny lowered the megaphone.



Saint John smiled through his tears. “And you accuse me of being dramatic. ‘Burn in hell’?”