Lowering my head in sadness I could not dispel and uninterested in seeing my people’s continuing disapproving glares, I stared at the long green grass rushing below my feet, until that green grass turned into gray cobbled stone, until that cobbled stone turned into the hardwood flooring of my new quarters.

Brother Luke and my father came to an abrupt stop in a sparse room and threw me down onto a bed. I hit the soft mattress and struggled to sit, showing my obedience to the elders.

As I lifted my heavy eyes, I witnessed Brother Luke and my father staring down at me. They were side by side, both had aged considerably. Both gray in hair, now showcasing lines on their faces that had not been there when I was a child. They had both put on weight. My father’s eyes had a slight milky tint to them, obscuring the brightness of the blue they once were.

Brother Luke shook his head and placed an arm around my father’s shoulders. “Well, Isaiah, we could not have been more right. This… harlot is most certainly a Cursed. Those large eyes, that sumptuous mouth. She is alluring beyond measure. In fact, I am fighting against the urge to join with her as we speak.”

A frightened cry escaped my lips and I scurried back on the bed.

Brother Luke shook his head and cussed. “I must leave before I fall,” was all he said, fleeing the room and closing the door.

My father still started at me, and I could not help but think of all the times he snuck into my bed as a child, scooping me in his arms and stroking at my skin. Could not help but think of all the times he sat me on his lap, locking all my other siblings out of the room, running his fingers through my hair. And I could not help but think of the time he told me to cleanse with him in the bath, where he had taken my hands and—

My eyes snapped to my father’s and a wave of anger engulfed me. His eyebrows rose, clearly catching my change of expression, as I whispered, “What kind of father makes his six-year-old daughter touch him… intimately? What kind of father strokes his daughter in salacious ways?”

My father’s eyes widened in shock at my words and all color drained from his face. “How dare you?” he hissed, but I shook my head, praying the threatening tears in my eyes did not tumble down my cheeks.

“How. Dare. You!” I repeated his words with a strength in my voice I did not expect. “You made a pure relationship dirty. What you did to me was wrong and unclean!”

With a rage-fuelled snarl, my father leapt forward and backhanded me across my cheek, my mouth instantly filling with blood. I held his gaze as he snapped, “You truly are evil, Beelzebub! You tempted me, came into my dreams, and warped my mind to think of only you, of taking you as only a man should take a woman.”

My fists clenched with frustration in my bound hands. “No, Father, I did not. You were wrong. You made me think the way you treated me was as any father should treat their child. But I have learned that it was not! It was sinful… morally wrong!”

My father’s face flushed with crimson and, retreating from the room, he announced, “I am eager for Micah to begin his exorcism of your evil. That demon, that wicked evilness living inside you must be cast out of your soul once and for all. Failing that, Delilah, you shall pass on to the next life for the Lord to judge you, just as your mother did for sleeping with Satan and creating you!”

This time blood seeped from my face, and I began to involuntarily shake. “My… my mother?” I asked, and I saw the triumph clearly expressed in my father’s expression.

Gripping the doorknob, his eyes flared. “Your mother was tried and found guilty of witchcraft and dwelling with the Dark Lord. She welcomed Satan into her bed, and her joining with him produced you. She was found guilty of heresy and paid the ultimate price. She is now burning in hell for all eternity.”

He opened the door and glanced back. “You may have left this commune once, Delilah, but there will be no escape for you again. New Zion is a fortress, a stronghold keeping the Lord’s people safe from the malevolent evildoers beyond our great gates. You are a Cursed and, as such, you belong here with us for the sake of your own salvation. It will not be long before the Lord will return for us all. Prophet Cain reveals it is so, and when he does, you had better pray Brother Micah has been successful in purifying your tainted core.”

As the door slammed shut, I shook with fear. The ropes were burning my skin, tightly bound around my wrists and feet. Casting a glance round the room, nothing felt familiar. These quarters were nicer than I had been raised in with Bella, Mae, and Maddie. The walls were a shade of off-white; there were gauze curtains at the long, wide windows and cherry wood flooring beneath my feet. I felt like a prisoner trapped in a cell of luxury.

Curling up on the white linen that covered the bed, I let the tears fall. And fall they did. I was so confused, so torn. I wanted Mae and Maddie. I wanted to talk to them, to laugh with them, but above all… I wanted Ky. I cursed myself for running to the river tonight after we made love, after he declared his love for me. I cursed myself for not fighting my captors harder. For not screaming, alerting the Hangmen to my presence. But even now as I lay here on this strange bed, in this strange room, in this new and strange commune, daggers plunged into my heart. I loved Ky, and that love was pure, unguarded, but his love was a ruse, a spell, the consequence of what I was… and would always be?

As hard as it was for me to accept, I knew being here amongst my kind, my people… my saviors… was the place I had to be. As much as my heart broke second by second, I must be here in New Zion… I had to be saved from sin. Only then would I know if Ky truly could love the lost girl underneath.

Chapter Seventeen

Ky

Standing at the front of the compound, I pulled out a smoke and took a long sweet drag as I watched the back gate like a motherfucking hawk.

Reaching into my jeans pocket, I checked the time on my cell. Four hours had gone by, four fucking hours since those pointy-hooted bastards took my woman and we had no idea where. Tank’s fascist friend was scheduled anytime with intel, and as soon as we got what we wanted, I was gonna rip some fuckers apart, tear off their limbs, and club them with the fuckers. I may be some pretty boy good-looking bastard, but I was a good-looking bastard with zero remorse and a distinct lack of shitting morals.

A cough sounded beside me, and I saw Styx. He pulled out a smoke, lit up, and stood watching the gate with me.

“Y-you good?” he asked, blowing out his smoke and taking another long drag.