She shrugged. “I was a reaper once upon a time. Ain’t now. End of story.”

“No,” said Chong. “I’m dying, I get to be nosy. You’re a walking contradiction. You have the same skin art as the reapers, but you went after Brother Andrew like you owed him for a lot of hurt.”

Riot ran a hand thoughtfully over her scalp, then sighed. “I was no more’n two years old when the plague hit,” she said slowly. “My dad was raising me. He was a country doctor down in North Carolina. He’d divorced my ma ’cause she was a drunk and a bum and no damn good.”

“I’m sorry,” Chong began, but she waved it away.

“That’s the nice part of the story. Y’all want to hear it or not?”

He nodded. His skin was cold and clammy, and he had an incredibly bad headache. He sat cross-legged with his back to the wall.

“I could use the distraction,” he admitted.

“Well, when the whole world turned into an all-you-can-eat buffet, Pa packed me in his car and drove northwest. Got as far as Jefferson City, Missouri, before the EMPs killed the car. After that we joined up with a buncha folks who was running from the dead. I don’t remember nothin’ about that. All kind of a blur. We was always running, always hiding, and always hungry. People came and went. Then we met up with a bigger bunch of folks, and when they found out Pa was a doc, they made sure that he was always safe. Me too.

“My pa was always trying to steer over toward Topeka, which was the last place he knew my mom to be living. And sure enough, she was there and she was alive. My pa said it was like a miracle. Only thing was, Ma was hooked up with a group that was calling itself the Night Church, and she was keeping company with its leader, a man named Saint John.”

Eve wormed closer to Chong, her thumb still socketed in her mouth. It frightened Chong that the child was barely talking. She’d said a few words after she woke up, but then she seemed to shut down. It was so sad.

“Saint John said that it really was a miracle that my ma found me,” continued Riot, “and he said that it made me special. Like I was some kind of holy person.” She gave a bitter laugh. “Me. Holy. Right.”

“This Night Church,” asked Chong, “they’re the reapers?”