How dare he scold me after his actions? It was wrong for a woman to dishonor any man through tone or action, so he was in his rights. But who was he to leverage laws even as he was breaking them? I wanted to tell him as much, but I’d already broken too many laws to gather the courage.

A flash of remorse crossed his face. “Sorry. Just out of sorts, that’s all.” He paused. “I’ve been thinking . . . What if there never were any monsters?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. We all saw them.”

“Only that once, thirteen years ago.”

“Once was enough for me,” I said. “And we heard them when God removed his hand of protection ten years ago. How can you doubt what’s so obvious?”

“What if it’s all in our minds?” he pressed. “Like the make-believe stories you tell the kids all the time. Like Lukas and the imaginary world you disappear into all the time.”

“Stop it—”

“What if Sylous is the real monster? What if this place is our hell with all the rules and fear and there’s nothing out there but the real world? What if Sylous got us seeing something that wasn’t really there? For that matter, what if the Fury are actually good and he’s the devil?”

I felt my face flush. He was talking the kind of heresy that would get him banished! But he still wasn’t finished.

“Even if they do exist,” he continued, “we don’t have any evidence they’ve taken over the world like Rose insists.”

“Because we’re in Haven Valley, protected by Sylous!”

“Really? So where is he? No one’s seen him in ten years. At the very least we should wonder if the Fury are gone and all we have to do is go out and take what’s ours.”

“The great testing hasn’t come, so we know it’s not the end. Please don’t talk like—”

“Yes, the infamous great testing. A wolf will come in sheep’s clothing after all this time, because even now we still haven’t proven our purity. It’s nothing but a convenient teaching to keep us in fear, Grace! Can’t you see? If there are Fury out there, why am I safe?” He spread his arms. “Do I look like a ravaged soul to you? Why would I need Sylous’s protection from something that doesn’t exist? Meanwhile, we waste away in our own personal little hell. Why?”

“Because there’s evil out there,” I snapped, thrusting a finger at the horizon. “Fear protects us. You know that as much as I do. If you didn’t fear, you would just throw yourself off a cliff, and that’s exactly what you’re doing now. Please, Jamie. I’m begging you.”