Silence.

“I know you can hear me.”

He doesn’t respond.

I sigh. “Really? You’re just going to ignore me?”

He heaves out a breath. Yes.

I pick at a loose thread of my borrowed bedspread. “We drew lots,” I begin. “To decide who’d kill you.”

Pestilence is still quiet, but now I swear I can feel his eyes on my back.

“There were four of us left,” I continue. “Me, Luke, Briggs, and Felix. We worked together at the fire station, and for the last several days before you came we helped the Mounties warn residents that they needed to evacuate. We weren’t positive, of course, that you’d ride through our city. Whistler isn’t all that big, but it lays right on Highway 99, the same highway the news had previously spotted you on.

“By the time we drew lots, all the other firefighters had already left with their families. Those of us without families of our own, we stayed behind.” My father’s face floats through my mind.

You had a family, just like Felix and Briggs and Luke did. You just didn’t have a husband and kids. And in the end, that’s why you all took the final shift.

Fewer people to miss us.

“There were four of us left,” I continue, “and we thought maybe—”

“Why are you telling me this?” Pestilence interrupts.

I pause. “Don’t you want to know why I shot you?” I ask.

“I already know why you shot me, human.” The horseman’s voice is sharp. “You wanted to stop me from spreading plague. All these justifications you’re spewing aren’t for my benefit, they’re for yours.”

That shuts me up.

I was trying to save the world. I’m not evil like you think I am, I want to say. But somehow, his words burn those explanations away like acid.

The room is quiet for a long moment.

“You’re right,” I finally say, flipping over to face him. “They are.”

My reasons make no difference to him; they don’t change the fact that I shot and burned him. That I didn’t listen when he begged me to stop.

The horseman has his forearms resting on his bent knees, his penetrating gaze on me. “What do you hope to gain by agreeing with me?” he asks.

“You’re the one everyone calls Pestilence the Conqueror,” I say. “Can’t you even tell when you’ve won an argument?”

Pestilence frowns.

I pull at that loose string again. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

“About what?”

“Killing you—or attempting to, anyway.” Twice, technically, since Pestilence probably only lived through the gunshot wound because he was undying.

He lets out a hollow laugh. “Lies. You’re only telling me this now because you’re my prisoner and you fear what I mean to do with you.”

It’s true that I’m afraid of whatever terrifying punishments Pestilence wants to exact on me, but—

“No,” I say. “I don’t regret trying to kill you. I absolutely hated what I did to you, and I’ll never be the same because of it, but I don’t regret my choices when I made them. Still, I am sorry.”

The horseman is silent for a long time as he scrutinizes me.

“Go to sleep,” he eventually says.

And I do.

Chapter 7

I wake in the middle of the night, ripped from sleep by the sound of crying.

I blink, looking around.

Thought the neighbors had all evacuated …

I grope for my bedside oil lamp before I realize there is no bedside oil lamp.

Not my room. Not my apartment.

Then the last few days wash over me like a cold shower.

Drawing matches, shooting Pestilence, the brutal runs I’d been forced to endure until I could no longer. As the memories flood in, so do all my lingering pains.

You made this shit sandwich, Burns, now you got to eat it.

The sound of crying cuts through my thoughts, and I remember the homeowner. How many hours has it been since we showed up on her doorstep?

Twelve? More? Less?

I grope around again for an oil lamp; now that power is spotty, people keep lamps and lanterns around. My fingers slide over a bedside table, but what they bump into isn’t a lamp. I feel around the glass of water and the pitcher next to it.

Did Pestilence leave this here?

I balk at the thought. That would be far too kind for the likes of him.

Pulling off my blankets, I get out of bed and slip down the hall, ready to head towards the sound of the crying, which seems to be coming from a room at the back of the house. But then I hesitate.

What are you going to do, Sara? Comfort her? You’re a stranger playing Goldilocks in her house. You think she wants anything to do with you?

I stand there, second-guessing myself, when finally my head catches up to me.

My eyes pass over the dark hallway once, twice, looking for Pestilence. I prowl back to my room and peek inside. The darkness obscures a lot, but it can’t hide a horseman, and there isn’t one in my room.

He’s gone.

I don’t give myself time to wonder where Pestilence slunk off to. I’ve got who knows how much time until he returns.

Not going to waste it.

I have to force myself to ignore the woman’s cries. Can’t help her now. She’ll die like the rest of them—like I should be dying—and there’s nothing I can do about it.

I tried, I want to tell her, I tried but the horseman can’t be killed, and I’m so sorry but I don’t think any of us are getting out of this alive.

Except that I am. Tonight. Right now.

I grab the pile of clothes I shed earlier from where they lay next to the bed. As silently as I dare, I slip them on, my hands fumbling with the buttons as they begin to shake.

Hurry, hurry. Before he comes back.

Grabbing my boots, I slip them on and pad softly to the window. I wiggle the pane open, wincing against the blast of frigid air that blows in, stinging my lungs and rustling my hair.

Damnit. Really don’t want to go out there on a night like this.

I hesitate. I could stay with Pestilence; he’s not trying to kill me after all.

He wants to make you suffer.

There will be more running, more bleeding wrists and more days like today where I can’t keep up. And that’s assuming Pestilence doesn’t decide I need to suffer more than I already am. I’d rather not stick around to see what creative punishments he comes up with.

Mind made up, I punch out the window screen. A moment later, I hear it thud softly as it hits the ground below.

Deep breath for courage.

I swing first one leg, then the other, out over the window ledge. Outside, it’s snowing again, a thin layer of it carpeting the ground. It’s that ground that has me nervous. Sitting two stories up as I am, the drop could break my legs. It would have to be a bad landing, but it could. Painstakingly I lower myself until I’m dangling out the window by my hands and thanking the fates that firefighting has given me good upper body strength.

And then I let go.

For one long moment, I’m weightless. Then the moment ends, and my feet slam against the ground. Slowly, I straighten. No rolled ankles, no broken bones—for once, luck’s with me.

I give the house a final, passing glance, and then I bolt.