Allie's POV
We used to play a game called Death.
Down deep in the old coal mines we'd sit and chant and die. I had died, so had Dot and Bobby and all of the others. Askew's list of the dead wandered the walls. We were special, the descendants of the oldest families in stonygate.
Kit was special. Kit was special as soon as he arrived. He came to play the game called Death. I liked to think of him as the angel, the pure one, among the black, black world of the devil.
We stopped playing a game called Death a long time ago.
Now we play at Life, with our mothers and fathers and school.
Kit and Askew, they play a game called Love. Slowly Kit is pulling Askew out of the darkness and showing him the wonders in everything.
They are experts at this game called Love. Without Kit Watson, John Askew wanders round aimlessly. When Askew is ill, Kit cannot stop worrying. It's almost comical the way he gets so wound up.
If you want to see the game called life you will find them down in the fields. The land between the mines and the village. This is as close to the mines as they can go. They lean against the fence, Kits head in Askew's lap contemplating the world.
We used to play a game called Death. Now we play a game called Life.
And they play a game called love.
