Page 83 of The Chosen
“That suffering is the first step toward purification.”
My stomach churned. I had a difficult relationship with religion, especially after the shit my father did. He was strict, but he wasn’t twisted like this.
“What happened to your sister? To Chandler?”
“I could see her slipping. Could see her becoming compliant. I knew I had to get her out of there. Especially after…”
“Yes?” I pressed, desperate to know more.
“He loved playing mind games. Tests of loyalty. One day we were all called to chapel. It wasn’t for a normal church service. It never was. But this time, I sensed something was wrong. And I was right.” He squeezed his eyes shut, his muscles scrunched up tight. “When I walked into that space, my mother was there.”
“She was?” I asked, although I sensed it wasn’t to reunite them.
“Isaac gave some spiel about how she was a sinner who put our lives in danger. I don’t quite remember exactly what he said. All I can remember is how he gave Chandler a gun and told her to shoot her. This was the sort of thing he did. He manipulated and brainwashed the most vulnerable to blindly follow and obey. But that day? I could tell Chandler was struggling. She still had her humanity, and I refused to let her live with that kind of guilt.” He hung his head, his entire body seeming to tremble beneath the weight of everything.
Then he slowly lifted his eyes to meet mine. “So I did it. I took the gun from Chandler and killed our mother. After that, I knew I had to get her out of there before Isaac twisted her mind completely. So I helped her escape.”
“And you?”
He slowly shook his head. “I had to make sure Isaac was…distracted.”
I swallowed hard, not wanting to ask what he had to do in order to distract this sick fuck.
“But you eventually got free.”
He nodded. “When I was about seventeen.”
“How?”
“I knew the only way to survive was to make Isaac think I was a believer. I had to do a lot of shit I wasn’t proud of, but it was the only way to earn his trust. Eventually, I did enough for him to start inviting me to play chess with him. One night, I hid a knife and stabbed him, then ran as far as I could.”
“Wow,” I exhaled, staring into the distance for a beat, my mind spinning. Then I sucked in a breath, flinging my gaze back to the symbol on his chest. “That brand… Did everyone he took get one?”
He nodded, his brows furrowing. “Why?”
“It’s… It’s probably nothing.”
“Tell me. What is it?”
“Amber… Sarah’s mom. She had something similar. Or part of it. She had a jagged scar cut through it. Like she’d tried to remove it. The only parts left were the blade and the crown. I’d asked her about it, but she never wanted to talk about it.”
Blake straightened. “What did she look like?” he pressed, borderline frantic.
I shook my head. It had been years since I’d seen Amber. Not since she reached out and told me about the cancer and I hacked into the adoption records so she could pass away knowing our baby had the life we hoped for her.
“A lot like Sarah, actually. Except for her eyes. Sarah has my eyes. But the rest of her — her hair, her smile, her nose — that’s all Amber.”
“Show me.”
“What?”
“A photo, Henry. Show me a fucking photo.”
“I don’t have…,” I began but trailed off. I reached for my wallet, pulling out the photo I’d kept there for years. The only photo I had of Amber holding Sarah in the minutes before the social worker came in to take her to her new family.
Swallowing hard, I handed it to Blake.
The second I did, he released a sound that was between an exhale and a sob.
