Page 200 of War

I know he’s said it’s impossible for him to die, but is it really any less possible than raising the dead or healing the wounded or speaking dead languages? Impossible no longer means the same thing it once has.

The horseman’s thumb brushes my lower lip. “And who says I will?”

“Tell me you won’t,” I say a bit desperately.

“My brother didn’t.”

I go still. “So Pestilence is still alive?”

War nods. “Do you want to know what happened to him?” he asks. “What really happened?”

“How he was stopped, you mean?” I say.

War’s fingers move to my scar, tracing the symbol. “It wasn’t violence that got him in the end. It was love.”

I don’t breathe.

“My brother fell in love with a human woman, and he gave up his divine mission to be with her.

Which isexactlywhat my horseman seems to be doing.

I try to keep my voice steady. “What happened to him?”What will happen to you?

“He and his wife live—they have children too,” War says.

I feel myself begin to breathe steadily again.

“So they’re alive?” I ask. “And happy?”

“As far as I know,” War says.

Relief washes through me. War won’t die, just as Pestilence didn’t. He can leave the fighting behind, and we can have a good life together. A mundane and happy and hopefully long life.

I study War’s expression again. “So you’re not worried about leaving your task behind?”

War hesitates. “I wouldn’t say that.”

Like snapping his fingers, my fear returns.

He must see it because he says, “Miriam, do you believe that I can be redeemed?”

“What do you mean? Are you asking if you can right your wrongs?”

The warlord gives a sharp nod.

He’s done so many abominable things. From the very day he arrived, he’s brought death with him. But what he’s done is a different question from the one he’s asking.

“I think you’realreadyredeeming yourself,” I say. “So, yes, War, I do think that can happen.”

The horseman gives me a soft look. “Then surely every man, woman, and child on earth is just as capable of redemption as I am. And if they want redemption, then who am I to cut them down before their true day of judgment?”

I shake my head, at a loss. “So you’re going to stop the killing?”

He gives a slight nod. “So I’m going to stop the killing.”

I don’t knowwhen the two of us doze off, locked in each other’s embrace, only that I’m pulled from sleep by a phantom voice.

Surrender.

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