Page 55 of Decimation

I don’t move, I don’t intervene. I just continue to watch because I need to see this.

I need to sear it into the back of my eyelids so that every time I blink, I see his hands on her.

I need to destroy the last vestiges of loyalty I had for him, the last excuses too.

God demands a burnt offering of my affections, and this right here is the fire. I must let it consume every soft thing left in me.

If I look away, I am a coward. If I stop it now, I am a fool. The Lord tests those he would elevate, and this is my Gethsemane, to watch, to wait, to let evil have its hour so that I might inherit the authority to end it forever.

I always laid the blame at Ines’s feet. That my brother was led astray by her, hoodwinked by a pretty face and a sweet little cunt. I told myself he was weak because she made him weak, that the rot entered through her and spread. But now, now it is like God has removed the veil and I see him for what he really is. A fool. An evil, selfish, pitiful man who will ruin us all with his ineptitude and his selfishness. The revelation is a blade between my ribs, cold and clarifying.

Ines was never the poison, she was just the cup. It was him. It was always him.

He is not worthy of being Grand Master, he is not worthy of any of the honours God bestowed on him. He is a thief who stole a destiny meant for steadier hands. Every breath he takes is an insult to the divine order and I, I am the instrument of correction, but instruments must be tuned. They must wait for the precise moment to strike the note that shatters stone.

Most importantly, he is not worthy of her. Of this woman. My woman. The thought is a brand pressed into my brain. She was always meant for me, I see that now. God shaped her in Ines’s image not as a cruelty but as a gift, a second chance, a redemption wrapped in flesh. And my brother, my blundering, rapacious brother is defiling that gift even now. Every grunt, every thrust is a blasphemy.

I could kill him for it.

I will kill him.

But not yet. Not until the hour is ripe, and the sin is full.

I clench my fists, I clench my jaw, fighting down the voice screaming bloody murder in my head. It howls like a wolf caught in a trap; all instinct, fury, and righteous rage. If I act now, if I do something I will be just as stupid as he is.

And I am anything but that.

No, I need to be smart, savvy.

I will need to be strategic. The Lord does not reward the impulsive; He rewards the patient. Abraham did not rush the altar, he walked three days with his son, each step a covenant with obedience. This is my three-day walk. This doorway is my altar and this woman, my woman is the lamb.

The logical part of my brain wars with the rest of me. It is a cold, crystalline voice beneath the screaming, a surgeon’s hand steadying the tremble. There is no redemption without sacrifice, it whispers. You want to be Grand Master? Prove you can pay the price. Prove you can watch your own heart be broken and still keep your eyes open. I cling to that voice like a drowning man clings to a spar of wood. It is the only thing keeping me sane, or perhaps it is the proof that I have already gone mad.

My eyes dart to her precious face. She looks almost at peace now. It is a small mercy, a blessing to escape his disgusting violations, but she will have to endure more. The thought is a hot poker straight into my gut. She will have to tolerate this for the moment. My beautiful, innocent love dragged through the mire so that I might climb out of it.

Oh, I hate myself for it.

I hate God for asking it.

And then I repent of the hatred, because this is the path. This is the only path. The cross before the crown, the blood before the blessing.

If I am to topple him, if I am to usurp his throne and take my rightful place then I will need him distracted, and what better way than with the ghost of his wife? That is why she was brought here, that is her purpose. She is the perfect lure, the irresistible bait. He will be so consumed by his obsession, so blinded by the past wearing her face that he will never see the knife until it is buried in his back.

“I’m sorry.” I whisper low enough that my brother does not hear over his continued fucking. The words are ash on my tongue. They are a prayer, a confession, and a vow all at once.

I’m sorry for what you suffer.

I’m sorry for what you will yet suffer.

I’m sorry that I love you enough to let this happen, because the alternative is a world where he remains Grand Master, I remain nothing, and you remain his prey forever.

This is the lesser horror. This is the mercy inside the monster.

My poor love will have to wear the mask of Ines, to endure his hands and his madness, to walk through the valley of the shadow while I stand in the dark and chart the course of his destruction. God asked Abraham for Isaac, but He stayed the knife. He is not staying this knife. He is watching to see if I will flinch, but I will not. I will let her bleed so that she may one day reign beside me. I will let her weep so that I may one day wipe every tear away. This is the covenant I make with the Almighty, here in the reeking dark; her suffering now for our glory later. Her pain as the down payment on his ruin.

Till I can destroy the world for her, and I will. I will unmake the very foundations of this order, tear down the pillars and salt the earth, and from the ashes I will build her a throne.

But first, I must stand here. I must watch. I must let the horror wash over me and through me and make of me something new, something harder, something holier, something utterly without mercy.