Lord of Order by Brett Riley (the reading list book TXT) 📕

throat, still grinning. Her eyes sparkled with glee and madness. Now I trust you’ll fight to your dyin breath, she croaked, nodding at Sister Sarah. You got somethin precious to lose.

I always did, he said. All my people are precious to me.

She cackled again and scooted away. Some more than others.

I want to put her down like the rabid animal she is. But if I do, Sarah will never let me cross this threshold again. And I’d be handin New Orleans to Royster.

Sister Sarah began to come forward, but Stransky held up her hand. Hang on, Sister. Me and Gabe got a little more jawin to do. Better if you don’t hear. That way, if anybody ever asks, you ain’t gotta lie.

Behave yourselves, Sister Sarah said. Both of you.

She backed out of the room, glaring at them, a mother leaving her petulant children alone in a room full of glassware.

Troy leaned against the pew. The votives flickered and wavered. I wish I could ask Sarah to light one for me. Any shelter in a hurricane, right? But I’ve burdened her too much already.

Stransky edged close to him. Now that we know where we stand, I got a condition.

You ain’t in no position to bargain.

Neither are you. Right now, we got a common enemy. It don’t matter if we don’t like each other much. Until that enemy’s gone, I need your solemn promise before God, here in this house of worship, that you won’t betray me and mine. That you won’t sell us out to those outlander fucks. Can you do that?

Troy examined his hands. They had done so much violence, first in his days as a deputy and then during his tour as lord of order. He had killed and tortured. He had shot men, women, children barely big enough to hold a gun. Just now he had nearly strangled a woman with one hand and shot her with the other. And he had done it all because he believed it was right, commensurate with the Crusade’s teachings and the will of the one true God. Now he could no longer reconcile the Crusade’s orders with his own heart. Perhaps in disobeying his church, he was damning himself. Or maybe he had been damned for years, following Rook and his ilk straight to hell. Troy did not know how you could try so hard to do right and still lose your soul, but that contradiction now seemed truer than any of the easy certainties he had always known. Against such a backdrop, why not promise Stransky whatever she needed to hear? What more harm could he do? Besides, no one knew what tomorrow would bring. Perhaps he would get to keep his word.

He looked her in the eye. You got my word before God that I won’t turn on you or yours, at least not till the city’s safe.

Stransky smiled again. I reckon that’ll do. We can sort each other out later, if it comes to that. And hell, Gabe. We might even be real friends by then. She stood without another word and walked to the door. When she opened it, Sister Sarah was on the other side, her hands clasped, as patient and immobile as a statue. He’s all yours, Sister. I think this went pretty good, don’t you?

Stransky disappeared into the sanctuary’s recesses, slapping Sister Sarah on the buttocks as she passed. Sister Sarah shrieked. She scowled as she entered and closed the door behind her. As she strode to Troy, her habit swished against her legs as a horse’s tail shoos away flies. Taking a seat beside him, she winced and rubbed the back of her neck. The dark bags under her eyes seemed more pronounced. Stransky’s doin? Or Royster’s? Or mine? Troy took her hand. It was almost as rough and calloused as his, a fragile link in a world fraught with peril and pain. Too fragile. He was stained with Troubler blood. She believed she had married Christ Himself. Who could compete with such a suitor? Sorrow clenched Troy in its fist. Even when we stand at the edge of eternity, watchin the days march past any known measurement of time or distance, I could never walk with her. All I can do is try to save her life here and now.

She squeezed his hand. You look tireder than I feel. When was the last time you slept through the night?

I ain’t got time these days. Is Stransky drivin you batty?

She’s a challenge. It’s like she’s addicted to heresy. If she weren’t such a religious fanatic, I’d call her an atheist.

Troy frowned. She just shined me on about her faith, but I ain’t never met a Troubler with any religion, much less fanaticism.

Sarah looked at him as if he might be stupid or a little deranged. You ought to know better than that. Some Troublers believe in nothin but food and guns, but most of em are Protestants. Around here, anyway.

The Crusade supplanted all the Protestant sects after the Purge.

No. They only drove the loyal believers underground. The Troublers practice a kind of hybrid religion. Immersion baptism, individual prayer by a congregant like the old Baptists used, the pew-jumpin ecstasy of the Assembly and the Pentecostal, the Amen corners and call-and-response you’d see in black churches.

What’s a black church?

In the ancients’ time, folks with white skin, like you, went to different churches than dark-skinned folks like Ford. Or me.

Troy blinked. Why?

Different traditions, different dogmas, sometimes plain old hatred.

I never knew that.

There’s a lot the Crusader Bible and the histories leave out. Even the forbidden ones.

How do you know all this, and why didn’t you ever tell me?

I know because I’ve talked with the Troublers and read their books. Plus, us Catholics got our own histories, not all of em written down. As for why I didn’t tell you? Because you would have used it against em. Same reason I don’t tell them what you say when we talk. I won’t help y’all kill each