Page 34 of Chapel at Ender’s Ridge (Ender’s Calling #1)

“People like you and Willa helped him.” Catching his harsh tone, Decker softened.

“Having a long life has benefits; he’s funded the church, from the stained-glass to the candles, and ensured his safety.

He must have gone underground after Willa sniffed him out in Santa Fe,” he said, nudging open a bundle of fabric.

Instruments clattered onto the table, most old and pitted with rust. Five blades glinted under recently dried blood.

Even if you were born human, you possess some sort of twisted magic to survive this long. Goddamn cockroach .

Decker swallowed down the taste in his mouth and moved on to the stack of crates in the corner.

He pried off the lid of the long, rectangular crate in two pieces, taking clumps of melting ice and straw with it.

Glass clinked together as Decker pulled out a jar, lip curling as the thick, dark liquid stuck to the sides when he tilted it.

“Is that—” Laurie still sounded faint.

“Blood. Must be too warm.” It smelled off, like even if it had been fresh it still belonged in the stench of the room.

The lid of the second crate opened easily. Mildewed pages joined the rotting smell pervading the room.

Beady eyes bulged at him as the mouse huddled in its nest of shredded paper, and it quivered until Decker shooed it away with one finger to begin sorting the tomes. Most were languages he had no knowledge of, the letters unfamiliar to him.

Laurie hovered over his shoulder as if pressing closer would make him forget about the entrails lining the wall behind them. “Latin,” he said suddenly, motioning at the book Decker was holding; thick, leather bound, with chipped golden swirls.

“You know it?” Decker handed it to him and lifted out the next book. This one he could read, and he deciphered the yellowed, thin pages with illustrations of metal instruments nearly as old as him.

“Seminary was good for some things,” Laurie murmured, flipping through the pages. “They’re mostly medical books. Maybe shipped from England, or from the older practices out East.”

“He could have brought them with when he came for the war. He was well on his way to experimenting back then. ”

Laurie frowned at the pages before putting it to the side and taking the next one from Decker. “If Whitton’s only a man, he couldn’t be the cause of the plagues.”

I wish it were that simple.

“An ancestor is needed to harness magic. Most never learn it but some families—like Safine’s—have built their legacy on cures and curses. Whitton has to be dabbling in some amount to keep him alive this long,” he said wryly.

“And he kept notes.” Laurie never looked happier to be holding a book bound in human skin. He hadn’t noticed, and Decker wasn’t about to tell him.

Laurie suddenly sounded distant, dog-earing a page back and forth as he stared at the words. “You said before the plagues started, humans in Ender’s Ridge couldn’t remember?”

Decker paused, balancing a stack of journals against the crate. “As soon as they crossed the bridge it was like they didn’t even see us—couldn’t understand some of us were different, looked different.”

Creasing the edge of the paper until it fluttered to the floor, Laurie finally flipped the page. “What will happen to me when we fix this?” He sounded small, as if the cave was swallowing up his words in a stifling crush of earth and roots.

Decker needed to stop lying. He should have told him they’d try their best, and even if they could fix this, the town might not return to how it used to be.

He should have told him the truth, that if the Blessing plunged Ender’s Ridge back into a foggy memory, Laurie might not remember how they were.

Might not remember the way he’d longed for him, and the way Decker’s resolve thinned and nearly snapped into teeth and tongue and regret .

Laurie would not remember why they’d been close neighbors. Good neighbors.

The thought twisted something deep inside his chest.

“Nothing will happen.” A smile touched Decker’s lips. “Elias remembered. Must be in the blood,” he said, picking up the next journal.

This one was machine-stitched, the inside brilliant white.

Different from the scrawled books cobbled together by Whitton.

Diagrams and neat lines of notes covered the pages.

He squinted and flipped to the middle, eyeing the uniform, straight writing.

Some words seemed familiar, like a mirrored memory, but nothing was for certain.

Decker held it out.

Laurie’s brow furrowed as he took it, carefully slotting the journal he’d been reading back into place at the bottom of the crate. “It’s some type of Latin. I can pick out words here and there. This is different handwriting than Whitton’s other journals,” he said thoughtfully.

A door creaked open far above them.

Decker doused the lamp, the room a blur as he darted to the table.

A faint, stitched-together heartbeat reached him.

Laurie’s hand crept into his own and he held his breath in the tomb-like silence.

Dust sifted from the carved ceiling.

Footsteps stopped at the last pew.

Decker’s nerves coiled under his skin as he waited for the scrape of wood.

One, two, three—

Another heartbeat.

Weak, urgent, familiar.

Another pair of footsteps at the door. Then a voice, faint but ringing strong through the church.

“Devil take you.”