“What did you do to yourself?” Harvey asked.
“I dislocated my shoulder,” Jac grumbled. “I’ve had worse.” He realized he said that phrase a lot.
“Give me five volts, and I’ll fix it.”
Jac narrowed his eyes. “Like I’d let you help me.”
“It’s not a favor if you pay me.” Harvey also spoke those words like he said them a lot. “Or sit around and moan to yourself and play martyr, if that’s what you’d like. As if I’d try to trick you in a church.”
Jac glanced at Harvey’s Creed, the one that shared a chain with an antique gold key. Reluctantly, he paid Harvey his five volts and let him fix his shoulder. This time, he was ready for the pain, and he didn’t make a sound.
“You’re made of sturdy stuff,” Harvey told him, clearly impressed.
Jac cleaned up the broken bits of glass and wax and deposited them in an empty bowl of holy water. He slipped into a pew beside Harvey.
“It’s funny I ended up in a church,” Harvey murmured. “It’s been a while.”
Jac also hadn’t visited a church for several months. “It hasn’t exactly been an easy year.”
“No, but that’s when you make the time for it, as my parents used to say. They’re real Faithful people. They’d probably tell me I don’t deserve to step foot in here, not even for asylum.”
His words reminded Jac of the priest he’d met at the hospital, the night he’d overdosed and Levi had saved his life. The priest who told him a sinner’s prayers wouldn’t go answered. Looking around the quiet church full of trembling North Siders, Jac was feeling more repentant than usual.
He should’ve just apologized to Sophia about the boxing. He still wished she’d be honest with him, but the last thing he wanted to be was a burden. Not with the way he felt about her.
“Do you believe in demons?” Jac asked Harvey quietly.
“Strictly speaking—by the Faith, I mean—demons exist, whether you believe in them or not. They’re just called something else.” Harvey peered up at the painting behind them, featuring a red-eyed malison with a dozen shadows meant to be shades. Shades were curses malisons placed on the souls of sinners, according to more esoteric stories.
Maybe Jac was too gullible, or maybe it was the sounds of the storm rumbling through the quiet reverence of the church, but he could almost believe in that moment that Charles Torren was as unholy as any story Jac had ever heard.
“Can you unlove someone?” Harvey asked Jac suddenly, pulling Jac’s thoughts from his own problems.
Jac cleared his throat awkwardly. He didn’t know Harvey well enough to give advice. “I don’t think so, not really,” he answered. “But you can love someone differently.”
Harvey sighed. “That won’t be enough.”
A menacing crack of thunder boomed overhead. Both boys jolted as though it’d been meant for them.
ENNE
By the time they reached the museum, Enne’s clothes were soaked through from the storm, her wet shoe leather had blistered her heels, and her gun was out of bullets. Still, she pointed it ahead of her, taking comfort in its steady weight in her hand. The lockdown had begun nearly forty minutes ago, and the rain continued to pour. Water rushed in streams below the street curbs, and the wind at times whipped hard enough to send Enne skidding sideways.
Levi ran to the wrought iron gates of the museum’s grounds. He shook them, and chains rattled. “Who’s on watch?” he called.
“It’s Stella,” someone answered through the darkness. “Who’s that?”
“It’s Levi.” Lightning flashed between tree branches and church spires.
A figure stepped out from behind the trees. “Pup.You’re back. We didn’t know—” Stella stopped as she approached, taking them both in. “Whathappenedto you?”
“We’ve been running in circles dodging whiteboots. Half the streets in Olde Town are blockaded, and the other half are flooded.”
Stella unlocked the gate and opened it for them. They slipped inside, and Enne felt a rush of relief to have something separating her and the rest of the North Side.
“We’re missing a few others,” Stella told him. “Hwan and Liddy.”
Levi’s face darkened. “Is Tock here?”
