Lead scanned the judge’s face. He tried to think of a defense, he tried to think of precedent or Church wisdom to act as mitigation for his crimes. He wanted to find saving words but could not think past the pain in his body, the hunger in his belly, the dryness of a mouth which had received little water in many days.
“Your Holiness,” he started and then paused, looking for more words. “I’ve committed sin against the Church. I did not shoot the mark Terence Wood.”
Lead tried to gain his feet. It felt important to stand straight. He looked into the judge’s eyes.
“I did not shoot the mark, I had him under the choice, but he refused the rope. I could not make myself shoot him.”
The judge looked back at his scroll. He jabbed it with his finger.
“It says here, Goodman, that you slew twelve marks under Church command. What made this one different?”
“I don’t know, your Holiness. I lost the killer inside me. I couldn’t put a bullet to him.”
The judge leaned back in his chair; he drew forth a scrap of paper and read out loud.
“Crusader Eliphaz supplemental report: Mark Leonard Marchez passed through a village of nomad heathens on the outskirts of Havasu Perish. One heathen was slain by two gunshot wounds from mark Lead’s .38 caliber pistol. Two more nomads sustained injury by blunt force, possibly the mark’s pistol or a club, or a rock.”
The judge held the scrap of paper to the candle flame. It blackened and curled and turned to ash on his podium. It caught and burned to nothing. The judge stared through Lead. He spoke slowly, letting each articulated word echo in the courtroom.
“You are a hypocrite, Marchez. You claim the Lord stayed your hand from committing violence and yet you commit violence against heathens outside of Havasu a day later. What say you?”
Lead forced himself to stand straight.
“I admit I fired upon the heathens. They attacked me, I defended myself.”
“Terence Wood attacked the Church. He stopped apprehending marks. He stopped purging sin from our precious society, even worse; he let the sinners roam free in hiding. The fabric of our society is based on civil rules, Mr. Marchez. That which undermines our rules undermines our society. Terence Wood was a harbinger of chaos and his sins were unforgivable. Sin hurts society, sin hurts the Church, and as such, sin hurts you, mark. Sin brought our society to despair. Sin destroyed the first world nations, and it is sin that you were charged to fight.”
The judge drew forth another scrap of paper.
“Crusader Eliphaz supplemental report: Upon apprehension Goodman Terence Wood refused the rope and was brought under the blanket. In the ensuing combat Crusader Jerrod Black was shot and killed. I was wounded when the mark Leonard Marchez stabbed me through the left forearm with a knife.”
The judge held up the knife, the blade was still stained with Eliphaz’s dried blood. He put the knife down and held the Crusader’s report to the flame. Ashes scattered across the podium and drifted to the courtroom floor. One of the guards collected the ashes in his hands and laid them on the table in front of Lead.
“You are not an innocent, Marchez. You make claim to losing the killer inside; your very words of defense. And yet you stab a Crusader in the course of his work. Not only have you broken your accord with the Church, Mr. Marchez, you act as an enemy combatant of the Church. You sir, are treacherous.”
The judge raised his hands and the guards tightened their grip on Lead. One put his hand on the back of Lead’s neck while the other kicked out his left knee. Lead sprawled onto the table. The scarred guard twisted Lead’s head around so he faced the dome ceiling of the courthouse. Another guard pressed his jaw muscles until his mouth puckered open, and a metal pipe was forced past his teeth and into his throat. Lead tried to yell out but his words were muffled by the gagging pipe.
“You were a trusted Preacher of the Church, and you became an enemy of the Church, a lover of sin and treachery. You are a traitor against God and country and there can be no worse crime.” The guard with the pile of ashes approached Lead. He held the ashes above the pipe.
“For the foulest of crimes you are to be banished to the foulest of places. You are to consume the ashes of your sins. Eat your sins and pray that they will sustain you, for you are going to the Pit of Traitors. There you will be given no sustenance save the Earth’s clean water. Let your sin fill your belly, for the Church has no will to.”
The judge raised his hand and the guard poured the ashes into the pipe. Lead’s throat was instantly coated, his body tried to cough, but the gagging pipe and ashes blocked his air. Lead convulsed and lights flashed before his eyes when he was suddenly released by the guards. Lead pulled the pipe out and coughed a wet black mess on the courtroom floor. The judge sneered in disgust.
“Remove this creature from my sight.”
As Lead was being dragged away, a guard leaned in and whispered.
“Listen mark, you’re going to be rolled into the Pit. Stays in the Pit are short but few survive. You will be given no food. If you partake of the flesh of man, you know, eat people, you will never be removed. If you take in no sustenance but water, you will be absolved and survive your trial.” The guard smiled and nodded encouragingly. “Pray God be with you and cure you of your sin.”
The guard stripped the remains of Lead’s trench coat and tied a length of cloth over his eyes. Another guard pulled Lead’s arms back and tied him to a long plank. He was lifted and taken out of the courthouse. In the distance men whispered, desert birds chirped, the wind stirred grit.
“Good luck, sinner,” the guard said.
Lead’s binds were cut and his body thrown end over end. He tumbled over loose dirt and gravel for short seconds that stretched long in his fear and panic.
Lead impacted solid dirt and immediately tore off the blindfold. The sun stung his eyes; his lungs breathed air thick with human stink. The Pit was massive, perhaps twenty yards across. At the end farthest from Lead stood a shack cobbled from planks and rope bindings. The Pit squirmed with life. Innumerable emaciated men crawled on hands and legs to find shade against the sun’s blaze. What showed of their skin, what wasn’t caked in dirt and blood, was burnt and bubbled.
The Pit’s shack was its only structure. Three men stood in front of it. Their bellies were pouched in malnourished distension and their skin was a dark shade of gray, but aside from Lead they were the only men in the Pit with the strength to remain on their feet.
“Oy, give us your wood, new man,” shouted one of the gray men.
They approached Lead together, slowly, like predators accustomed to overwhelming prey. They ignored the moans of the emaciated men they stepped on or over.
Lead searched the ground for the plank he’d been thrown in with. Behind him, one of the emaciated men had wrapped his body around it and gripped it like a serpent. Lead tried to reclaim the plank, but could not pull it loose. In frustration, Lead stepped on the starving man’s hip to wrench the board free. He turned to the gray men, clutching the plank in both hands like a sword.
“Come on, lovely,” the gray man said. “Give us your wood.”
A gray man charged Lead with hands raised like claws. Lead sidestepped the man and swung the board into the back of his skull. The gray man collapsed, the emaciated men around him crawled away like frightened sloths.
“Right, tough one we have,” said one of the standing gray men.
“You like to fight, we like to fight too,” said the other gray man.
They moved to circle the ex-Preacher. Lead leapt back and pressed spine against the Pit’s edge. He held the board high over his head, ready to strike.
“Leave me be,” Lead said. “Let me serve my time to release and I will leave you be.”
The gray men paused just out of striking range.
“You are to learn,” said a gray man.
“That no time here is served out. The Pit consumes all who enter. No man leaves,” said the other.
The gray me
n retreated, pulling their unconscious compatriot back into the shack. Lead slumped against the dirt and watched them. One of the emaciated men touched his leg. Lead raised the plank above his head.
“Hold, new man,” the emaciated man pleaded with hands raised. “Please let me sit near you,” he whimpered.
Lead looked the man over. He was ageless in that he might be old or very old. Sun blisters and filth masked the man’s features, creating a creature both disgusting and pitiable.
“Sit where you are and talk if you will, I just want to serve my time,” Lead replied.
The creature crawled closer to Lead.
“There’s no serving here, sir. The cannibals did not lie to you. I’ve never seen a man leave this Pit, nor has anyone I’ve spoken to,” the man whispered.
“Cannibals?”
“True, they that possess the shack do consume men’s flesh. They have been here the longest for they do not starve. They will consume us all eventually.”
The emaciated man rolled until he faced the shack.
“They hide their deeds from the light, but all know; those who are captured and brought in are consumed.”
He turned to Lead. Pleading eyes peered through scars and seams.
“They whisper that my time has come. I’ve been with out food for ten days and have no strength to stand or fight. Please help me.”
Lead looked into the man’s eyes. He looked across the Pit at the other pathetic creatures, at men rendered into worms by need and lack of sustenance.
“What was your sin?” Lead asked.
“I am a traitor to the Church, same as all in the Pit. I assisted a couple of Marys in escaping Globe Parish. They were young and scared and were to be married to men of ill and violent temperament. I guided them to the New Mexico border. I was declared a traitor to the Church for this action. I was captured and bound outside of Globe. I do not regret what I done; but I don’t want to die like an animal.”
The emaciated man looked again to the shack.
“I need to sleep. I’ve been vigilant for days against the gray men. When I awaken, you must get sleep. I promise to keep watch over you and cry out if they stir.”
Lead nodded in agreement. The emaciated man crawled up against the dirt wall. Lead rubbed moist dirt onto his skin to try to ward off the sun. Both stared at the plank shack.
“I was a Preacher. I’m not anymore,” Lead whispered after the emaciated man had risen.
“One of the grays was a Preacher, too,” whispered the emaciated man. “So I heard.”
Lead woke to hoarse screams. His stomach was caved and empty. His skin was hot from the relentless sun.
“Say nothing, do nothing,” the emaciated man hissed.
Across the Pit, the gray men lifted a skeletal man by his arms and legs. He did not struggle, only let out a hoarse scream against the attackers. The gray men dragged the skeletal man into their shack. The creatures of the Pit squirmed to clear a path. Lead tightened the grip on his plank and stood up.
“Don’t!” The emaciated man said. He clutched Lead’s ankle but his grip was a weak reflection of his dying vitality. Lead pushed has hand down with the plank.
“I have to,” Lead said.
He walked away from the emaciated man’s whimpered protests. The skeletal man’s screams radiated from the shack. Lead walked slowly, imagining where the gray men would be in the shack. He wanted to form an attack plan, but found it almost impossible to think past the hunger in his stomach and the fear of the impending fight. The screams were suddenly cut off by a wet slap. Lead ran to the entrance.
Inside the shack two of the grey men held the skeletal man down while the third struck his face with a fist-sized rock. The rock was painted in blood. The skeletal man’s face was caved and not recognizable as human. The floor of the shack was strewn with the fleshless bones of men. The gray men looked at Lead.
“What do you want to do here, new man?” Asked the gray man holding the rock. “Care for a bite? The meat is terrible raw, but we have much.”
“You can’t eat that man,” Lead said, holding the plank in a fighter’s stance.
“He’s not a man,” The gray man said and stomped on the skeletal man’s face with a loud crunch. The man’s body shook with convulsions and just as suddenly stopped.
“He’s sin. I feed off sin. You feed off of sin, that’s our punishment.”
The gray man stepped over the corpse, the other two stood. Lead backed away from the entrance. Panic gripped his chest in a thousand cold needles; his breaths came out as shallow gasps. He backtracked slowly to the center of the Pit, plank raised over his head.
The gray men stood at the entrance of the shack.
“If you’re not a sin eater, you’re not allowed in our house,” the lead gray man said. “Only survivors are allowed in this house. You’re not one of us. Me and mine will feed on you soon enough.”
The gray men backed into shadows of the shack.
Tears streaked the dirt on Lead’s face. He relived the scene in his mind, replayed the foot snuffing the starving man’s life, imagined himself crushing the gray men’s heads; doing anything but retreating in fear and panic.
Lead yelled out in frustration. He screamed and shook his board at the shack, like an animal. Inside the gray men laughed and the Pit was soon filled with the wet sounds of tearing and gnashing.
“You will kill no one else!” Lead shouted at the shack. “Every man here is under my protection and the Lord’s protection and you shall eat no one else!”
There was a pause in the wet sounds. The leader of the gray men appeared at the entrance.
“You do that. Protect these men. We’ll just wait for you to wither and weaken and we will take what is ours.”
The gray man stepped back into the shadows. The sound of men eating man again filled the air.
“Get up! Get up!” The emaciated man croaked as he tugged on Lead’s arm.
Lead sprang awake, the plank in both hands. His eyes cleared in time spot the gray men approaching from across the pit.
“Aw,” the leader of the gray men said. “You have an alarm. How very cleaver, we’ll come back later.”
The gray men backed into the darkness of their shack. Lead looked around himself. He was surrounded by creatures of the Pit. Innumerable men, all on or near the verge of death, surrounded Lead with their bodies. Lead’s stomach clenched, the creatures reeked of sweat and decay and their proximity made Lead woozy. His last meal was days away. At mid afternoon, the guards had lowered water buckets into the Pit, but the liquid did nothing to dissuade his hunger. The plank shook in Lead’s hands.
“I feel weak,” Lead told the emaciated man. “Please tell me there’s something hidden away to eat, some bread or meat. I’ll protect you, but I need food.”
“We have nothing, though God has cursed me with dreams of banquets and rivers of liquor, I truly have nothing,” the emaciated man said. “Please hold strong, Preacher. I’ve been here so many days, maybe they’ll let me out. They have to release someone; otherwise what would be the point? Why punish for sin without a possible redemption?”
The emaciated man raised his hand to the waxing moonlight. His fingers were twigs, his arms were sticks and skin and veins. He wept shamelessly.
“Why punish me just to have me die? It does not make sense.”
Lead put his hand on the emaciated man’s shoulder. The man’s skin was loose and knurled like burlap.
“I don’t know why. I’ll protect you.” The words gave Lead strength though they felt like a lie. How could Lead protect any of them with the fading strength in his arms? How long did he have before the gray men came and consumed him like the rest of their cattle?
Two days passed with no stirring from the gray men’s shack. They remained in their protective hovel, gnawing on bones and letting time do work they wouldn’t have to.
The hunger in Lead’s body grew and whittled away at his reason. The afternoons were spent burning in the sunligh
t, staring at the shack that neither stirred nor gave noise. One of the creatures near Lead died; none of the creatures took action to move the body. All waited.
On the fourth day the gray men came out. Lead was still awake from the night before. Black-robed guards had descended in the night and removed the dead creature. Lead rose to his feet but was met with the muzzle of a rifle. He’d stood awake since.
Lead’s legs shook, he hefted the plank but its weight was almost unmanageable, like it was dipped in gold. It swayed with a life of its own.
The gray men were still, without hunger. They watched Lead stand on unsteady legs and swing an unsteady board.
“What say you, holy man? Do you have strength to protect yourself?”
The leader of the gray men strode forward with a fist-sized rock in his hand.
“Can you lift that wood to save yourself?” He asked.
Lead took a deep breath. He lifted the plank with both hands and held it in a fighter’s stance. His arms shook, but the plank finally stood steady. The hunger dimmed his fear.
“If you want me, come to me then,” Lead said.
The gray men separated and approached from three sides. The leader held his arms and rock outstretched to the sky. He twirled his wrists and the two others ran for Lead from the left and right. Lead closed his eyes and swung with his shoulders and back. The plank missed the first gray man, who ducked, but struck the second soundly across the ear and temple, snapping the plank into two pieces. The struck man dropped to the ground clutching his head. His ear had tripled in size from rushing blood under the skin. The second man tackled Lead to the ground. Instinctively, Lead’s hand went to his chest, for the Van Cleef that was not there. The gray man gripped Lead’s neck in both hands and squeezed his throat.
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