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Because you are destroying my world.

“I can’t change you, Pestilence, only you can do that.”

“Hear me, Sara: Iwon’tchange.”

Now it’s my turn to stiffen in his arms.

He turns us so that he can gaze down at me. “I am merely pretending to be a man, nothing more,” he says. “My body does not need food, nor water, nor sleep, nor all the mysteries of the flesh. I indulge in them because I indulge in you.”

“Oh, and that’s the only reason?” I say, just a wee bit snidely.

I mean, give me a goddamn break. He indulges in all those things because he enjoys the taste of food and strong spirits and the feel of his body close to mine. Pestilence may not be a man, but he very desperately wishes to be one.

“Enough of this,” he says, sharp like a knife. “Do you want to know why it is I wear this crown?”

I can already tell by his tone that he means to hurt me, to scare me, to remind me of the monster he is. Should I tell him that this, too, is a human trait? How we mortals love to push each other away to protect ourselves from our own pain?

“I am the first horseman,” he continues, “the one who was tasked with toppling your old way of living. You and your foolish brethren believed you could outpace God. You built and innovated, and in your quest you robbed the earth of its purity and forgot that you all had another master.

“You all turned your backs on God—yes, even you, dear Sara—and I am here tomake you remember.

“I am your mortality. I am the ugly truth that your bodies are impermanent, feeble,corrupt. I am the reminder that all men must face a great and fearsome reckoning.” The rain thunders with his voice. “This is who I have always been and will always be—undying, unchanging.”

He falls to silence.

“That issuchhorseshit.”

I feel, rather than see, his surprise. “You think I’m lying?”

“You’re acting like you cannot change, but to liveisto change, and right now, you arealive. Even though you can’t die, you still walk among us. You love like us, and you feel pain like us.”

He doesn’t say anything to that, so I plow on.

“Maybe the world has forgotten God, and you’re supposed to rain down His righteousness, but don’t act like it isn’t a choice. Every time you pass through a city, youchooseto infect it. You choose to kill, and no god you stand behind can protect you from that truth.”

Several seconds pass, the violent patter of rain against our tent the only sound between us.

“If I am such a monster,” Pestilence finally says, “then what does that make you, who have willingly fallen into my arms?”

“A fool and an idiot,” I say, “but that’s nothing new.”

“I will not stop.”

I could swear he sounds bothered, but I can’t say which part of our conversation got under his skin.

“And I won’t shut up about it until you do.”

“You cannot hope to win this,” he warns.

“If you think this is aboutwinning,” I say, “then you haven’t been listening to me at all.”

“Hmmm,” he muses, stroking his hand down my arm while he gazes down at me. “You have given me much to think about.”

Wait, something I said actually gotthroughto him? And just when I’d assumed I’d have more sway talking to a wall.

“Enough of this for tonight. I want to feel those foolish, wicked lips of yours on mine and your body beneath me—for such is the price of my companionship,” he says, his breath fanning against me.

“Awfully optimistic of you to think about getting boned after that little speech of yours …”