His hold on me tightens, and the three of us stay like that.
Tomorrow, we will be enemies, but tonight, he’s my solace.
Chapter 35
Orange, Texas
July, Year 27 of the Horsemen
It is the worst day of my life.
I’ve had so many bad ones, I didn’t realize they could be eclipsed by this one.
Ben doesn’t eat, doesn’t drink, and any time he cries, it’s a weak, thready sound; I can hear the grave in his voice. And maybe it’s my imagination, but I swear he’s calling out to that bastard horseman, begging him to take his life away from me.
When I woke this morning to a nurse doing the rounds, the horseman was gone and Ben was back in his crib.
Now I glance down at Ben, who’s once again in my arms.
I stroke his small cheek. “I love you,” I whisper. I’ve shed all my tears. My heart is still breaking, but it’s left me hollow. “Always, always, always,” I promise. “I’m sorry I couldn’t do better. You deserved so much more.”
I keep stroking his cheek, feeling lost, my lonely future unspooling before me. I’ve always wondered how long I’d get to live if nothing could kill me. Now the thought of it is punishing. There’s no one else out there like me, no one besides the horsemen.
My fingers pause as a thought comes to me, a desperate, hopeful thought.
The horsemen.
Death isn’t the only one with power. The others once had it—maybe they still do.
Famine must. Maybe they can help my son.
I choke on that toxic, hopeful feeling in my chest, and a part of me wants to push it away. But the idea I have … it has claws, and it sinks them into me.
Before I can think better of it, I place my son in the crib and call for a nurse.
Need to get this IV out.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t happen right away. The nurses don’t want to remove it yet even though it’s painfully clear my son is beyond the help of antibiotics and fluids.
It’s while I’m arguing with the nurse that I realize an astounding detail I missed until now: everyone is alive. The hospital staff, the patients, the people meandering about outside the hospital’s windows. Death gave more than just my son an extra day.
The thought steals my breath. Along with it comes the memory of Death’s arms around me, holding me as I cried. A lump forms in my throat at his strange bits of kindness.
I refocus on the nurse. “My son is dying,” I say, and I resent the hell out of her for making me say those words. “I want to take him home and let him leave this world surrounded by the things he loves.”
I have no intention of letting him leave this world.
The nurse presses her lips together, but reluctantly, she nods. “I’ll have to okay it with the doctor first,” she warns.
She brings a doctor back. They sign off on some forms. Remove Ben’s IV line. Murmur a few stilted platitudes.
I clench my jaw against it all.
After what feels like an eternity, I exit the front doors of the hospital, blinking against the glare of the morning sun. My bike is where I left it yesterday, and it’s a shock to see it there. It feels like I left it eons ago.
I buckle Ben into his seat, cringing at how limp his body is and how little light is left in his eyes.
I stroke his cheek. “I’m going to save you, Ben,” I swear to him with a conviction I shouldn’t feel.
Hopping onto the bike, I peddle for home, stopping only long enough to grab a map I bought a week ago and the note Pestilence left for me. I spend a moment locating the road the horseman spoke of, then I trace the route needed to get there.
I fold the papers up, tuck them in my pocket, and Ben and I are out the door once more. I peddle like a mad woman, desperate to get to the address. The jostling causes Ben to stir a little, and I even hear him let out a weak cry.
Something dangerous like optimism surges through my veins. I’m going to save him. I am.
As soon as I turn onto Road 3247, I begin looking for the house Pestilence had mentioned—I can’t remember if he said it was blue or gray, only that it had a red door with a star on it.
I panic several times, sure I missed it, but eventually, I find the home. It’s blue, not gray, the paint peeling from the wood siding, the windows boarded up. The red front door is faded and the lone star fitted to it has rusted over.
I ride right up to it, then fumble getting Ben out of his seat, my nerves nearly getting the better of me. Facing the door, I pound my fist against the weathered wood.
I can hear murmuring inside, but when no one immediately answers, I pound against the wood again.