My Mother Divinity [Unedited]

Chapter Twenty-Two

Ollie drags the knife across the jutting bone of Brodie's ankle. He is crying silently and his tears fall slower than the blood; brave, always trying to be brave, because such things he has grown used to. Such a sweet, harmless kid, who doesn't deserve these lasting scars on his legs where his socks and shoes will catch the scabs and reopen old wounds. Such an innocent child undeserving of any pain the world wants to give him.

Ollie looks worse - he'll be lucky not to need stitches. It's a drastic solution that hardly even works, but they're desperate and will take anything, and so the fat lines on his stomach are good enough to hide them while Amon and Cali go after the witch. It's peculiar to see the blood spill in from the sides of each motion, because each cut is deep enough that the liquid oozes, moves and churns like off milk, disturbed and confused. He has to stop himself from praying.

There's blood on the walls; blood he put there himself for a purpose. The shapes and lines are hurried and messy but the right people will know what he's trying to say.

There is knocking on the barricaded church doors just as red starts to seep into the floorboards. He can't hide what he's done. Ollie rolls up Brodie's sock and tells him to hide, and Isla takes the smaller child's hand and drags him underneath the pews. It's an open space without many opportunities for hiding spaces but their bodies are small and cowering and they fit under the benches, just. Finally, the knocking becomes banging and the door splinters open.

"I've been looking—" Gail has to cut herself off. She's staring blankly at the mess, the poison on such a sacred floor, the reality of what her friend has done. "Ollie," she whispers, mortified.

"I'm scared," Ollie blurts out, which is as much the truth as anything he might say. He'll make things up as he goes along. Not even Gail can know the full extent of the plan here; she wouldn't believe that the Gods she looks up to and worships aren't real. He keeps a lid on it and crosses his fingers that she won't go snooping and find the kids.

"What are you doing?" Gail asks. It hasn't sunk in yet. A fleeting expression of anger passes her face. "Have you seen the smoke?"

"The smoke?"

"They burned that girl," she explains, "the heathen that survived the Treatment." The moment of silence, of weakness and defeat, is palpable. "They'll burn you next."

"They burned her," Ollie repeats mostly to himself. His tongue is dry and quivering in his mouth - he hadn't expected things to go this badly but really, his optimism was always misplaced. Of course this was going to be a suicide mission; of course he would have to face the consequences. "They'll burn me," he goes on, echoing her sentiment.

"You defy the Gods," Gail tells him matter-of-factly, because to her this is the biggest truth of all, the most unforgivable sin, "you've... you've always defied them, haven't you? You've always fought against them even though you knew one day it would kill you." The anger comes back with a vengeance. "It will kill you now, and maybe it'll serve you right."

"Gail—" Ollie starts. He's barely grown himself and each step he takes forward is timid and young, and his vision swarms with speckles of grey from blood loss. He drops the knife somewhere on the steps and the air is heavy, gravity wanting to tug him down. "Gail, please don't say anything."

"How can I not say anything?" She wails. If she remains silent, she's accountable too. Nobody gets away with pulling this without punishment and she won't be dragged down with her. She has much still to lose; she isn't ready to die. "That blood won't come out of the floorboards; those scars won't go away. The neighbours see you and this building every day!"

"You have to trust me, Gail," says Ollie, and finally he reaches her, and reaches out for her, but she recoils. Her eyes brim with something - tears? Remorse? Ollie has chosen this dark path, has he not? She misjudged him.