“The world changes?” Bitter echoed, as if saying it again would help it make sense.
“It burns,” Vengeance said, and its voice glitched back into the thick guttural sound, heavy and dead. “Worlds burn when the angels return.”
Bitter scoffed for a second. “This world’s already burning.”
Vengeance turned to her and smiled again. “Yes,” it crooned. “It is. It can burn even better.”
Something about its assurance pulled at Bitter. It sounded like it had a vision. “What does better look like?” she asked.
The creature purred roughly, the sound wavering through its smoke. “Death,” it said, and it made the word sound like every desire in the world was caught up in it, like it was everything anyone could ever want, like it had waited lifetimes to reach this point. It set off warning bells in Bitter’s head.
“We have enough death,” she said.
“Not enough,” Vengeance replied. “I felt what you wanted. Theron. Your leaders. How many humans have died from them?”
“I don’t—I don’t know.” The answer was too many. She was lying and she knew it, and if what Vengeance had hinted at was true, about being able to detect her lies, then it knew it as well.
“We agree with you. How much peace would their deaths bring?” Before Bitter could even think of a response, Vengeance reared up, and its smoke undulated in strong waves, directed out toward the window, toward Lucille. “We will hunt them. All monsters must die.”
“Hold up nuh.” Removing Theron’s power was one thing; killing him was another. “Can’t you just take their money away or something? Redistribute it?”
Vengeance slowly turned its scaly head to look at her. “No,” it said. “All monsters must die. The world bathes in evil again and again, no matter how many cleanses are washed through it. Wherever there is evil, there will be a hunter.”
“I doh want people to die like that!”
“Hunt with me, child. We must hunt together—that is the way. Angel and human. With the hunter comes the stripping light, the purged souls, the chance for another world to burst forth. All births are full of blood.” It looked distracted again, like talking to her was keeping it from something else, like she was taking too long to cooperate. “Not everyone survives.”
Bitter was properly scared now. She had made this creature, and if it went around killing people, wasn’t that the same as if Bitter killed them herself? “Please,” she said, “enough people have died. Don’t make it worse.”
Vengeance’s voice softened, and it lowered its head to be level with Bitter’s. “Don’t worry, child. We will make it better.” It sounded like it was trying to be kind, and somehow that made it even more terrifying.
“If you hurt people, it’s like I’s the one hurting them, don’t you see? Because I made you.”
Vengeance drew its head back sharply. “You did not make me, child. You brought me through.” Half of its eyes flickered. “There is a difference.” Its smoke rippled. “Time passes. The hunt must begin. Will you come?”
The thought of her creatures existing somewhere else before and without her was a new and unwelcome one. Bitter took a step back, shaking her head. “I—I can’t. I can’t be part of what you’re trying to do.”
Vengeance hummed, the sound conveying disappointment with surprising clarity. “So be it. I will seek another hunter.”
Bitter opened her mouth to object again, but before she could say anything, Vengeance had poured itself through her window in a long spill, leaving the glass undisturbed. It swirled briefly, then soared off into the sky. Bitter stood by the window, her hands trembling as she watched. She could feel something stretched between them, a connection that ached as it vanished from sight. She sat heavily on her bed, her heart thudding, her arm perfect. The door to her room slammed open, and Blessing rushed in like a memory from another world, her eyes tired and her face smudged with dirt.
“Come on,” she said, extending a hand. “It’s Eddie.”
*
Bitter held tightly to Blessing’s hand as they slipped along the side streets into a small park that was filled with people, all holding lit candles. A little kid was handing out marigold garlands, their hands draped in heavy gold flowers. Bitter and Blessing both received garlands and whispered thanks to the child before joining the crowd. Everyone was looking toward a small dais filled with the Assata kids. Bitter gasped when she saw Eddie standing among them, her face bruised and swollen, one dark eye piercing the crowd and a gauze patch covering the empty other. Her body swayed; she must have been on so many painkillers to be able to be out here. Her comrades were thick around her, holding her up. They parted only to let Ube roll his wheelchair to the front. His face was serious, but his mouth was relaxed as he lifted a megaphone to his lips, and his eyes were pools of darkness in the glow of all the candles.
“Thank you all for coming on such short notice,” he said, his voice undulating through the air, rich and warm. “We will keep this brief. After many years of fighting, Lucille is speaking with one voice and we will be heard! Tonight the powers that be tried to silence us with force, with their weapons and violence, the only language they speak, the only language they know.” A thread of sorrow wound into his words. “We lost one of our own—Chijioke Jackson fell on the front lines today. Eddie DeSantos was injured trying to protect him.” The crowd’s gaze swung over to Eddie, who raised a fist, her jaw tight. Someone’s arm was firm around her waist. Ube continued, somber and steady. “This war is bloody—we all know this too well. They will not give us our freedom, so we must take it! They must understand that Lucille is the people, Lucille is us, Lucille is not a machine that churns out money on the backs of its citizens.”
A sharp and short cheer went up from the Assata kids.
“But today we are gathered to take a moment for the costs of this war, the price freedom demands. Chijioke Jackson should be alive. We deserve so much more than what we have been given. We are magnificent beyond measure, we have known more grief than is righteous.” His eyes swept over everyone, and Bitter felt a chill cross the back of her neck as tears stung her eyes. “We are here tonight for all the ones we’ve lost. Join me. For Amadou and Moon, for Carmen—”
Other voices began to chime in, lifting up from in between the ocean of small flames.
“… Ola and the twins …”
“… Felicity, Helen …”
Bitter saw their hands clench around the candles, the marigolds drenching their arms, and she fought back tears alongside them.
“… Deshaun, Shondra, and their baby …”
Ube’s voice came back in, rich and rolling. “All of them, they did not die for nothing! We will not let them have died for nothing! We will not stop until all of us are free, until we have torn down what these monsters have built, until we have made a better world—for ourselves, for our children! And when they put one of us in the ground, what then?”
The crowd roared back. “A thousand of us will rise up!”
“We will never stop! And if they make us all angels, each one of us standing here today, fighting here today, then we will be angels!”