Tomorrow was the first Gathering, my big coronation, the start of a new era in my life, in the life of the Farm, maybe even in the life of this whole world. The church had been cleaned out, the floors scrubbed and sparkling, the lawn tended, the preparations made. I could feel the Spirit thrumming in my heart, feel it rush through my veins, the tingle of it in my bones. Jeremiah followed me like a shadow, my guide and comforter. And my people seemed to love me. They really did think I was someone special, chosen. Sometimes they were even afraid to talk to me, scared to shake my hand.

I knew I could be a good leader. I was on the true path, my heart was right and pure, and I would guide the Farm into the future.

Maybe I could be greater even than Jeremiah.

Chapter 45

That night I had a vision.

Oh man, did I ever have a vision.

I saw myself, clad in a black suit like Jeremiah’s, standing on the stage in the church. I was older, maybe in my twenties, and the church was huge, a brand-new building even bigger than the one that was there now. It was fancy, with red carpets and oak pews and flowers all over the place, everything bright and shiny and new. Light streamed through the stained glass windows showing pictures of my visions, mystical symbols the Spirit had shown me, and the whole place took on a glimmer like we were already in heaven, and light suffused everything around us.

I looked taller and handsomer than I ever imagined I could be, and when I spoke, it was my voice, but it was Jeremiah’s too—it was the perfect synthesis of the two of us, like we were speaking together in perfect harmony. Usually when you hear your own voice in a recording or something, you hate the sound of it, but my voice was wonderful. I loved hearing it belt out wild and loud over a crowd of believers, every single last one of them loving me. They loved the words pouring out of my mouth like a flood of dreams, of benedictions and curses and blessings, of the right ways to live and the wrong ways to die, of all the good and true things that lay in the hidden heart of the world. I could listen to myself make pronouncements and illuminate dreams all day and night for the rest of my life, it sounded so good.