The next morning, Jace was already awake by the time my eyelids barely started to flutter open. She was seated on the window ledge, looking out at the morning horizon, reveling in the beauty the mountains could bring to such a desolate landscape. Her blue hair, I noticed, was developing streaks of black, where her natural color was starting to grow back, and her face was already softening under the gentle caress of motherhood. Briefly, I wondered how she would ever tell her child all that it needed to know. An innocent child should not be subjected to such horrors, but could not be denied the truth.

Stretching, I swung my legs out of the bed and rubbed my eyes, knowing that I need not be on full alert with Jace only a couple feet away. Even after all my moving around, it wasn't until I had walked over to the door that Jace looked away from the window to me.

"I'm leaving now," I stated bluntly.

"And where, exactly, Ben, do you plan on going?"

"I don't know. I'll figure it out as I go along. I always have. I have the cash to go anywhere."

She murmured unintelligently, showing neither approval nor disapproval in my plan.

"Do you know where Zack is?" I questioned, scratching lightly at the tip of my nose, which he had injured on more than one occasion.

"No…I haven't heard from him in awhile, which would lead me to believe that he's in hiding in Canada, but I really don't know."

"Oh. Well, I'm just trying to avoid running into him. We didn't part on the best of terms, and I don't want a lecture about how poorly I'm misbehaving or for him to merely beat my face into the ground because he's having a bad day."

"No," she agreed.

Neither of us said anything. I didn't want to leave her so soon, but I felt as though I were suffocating in such an environment because she knew and understood so much about my life that I labored to keep extremely secret.

"Ben," she said, "you can stay with me, if you want. I wouldn't mind. You'd actually be somebody to talk to besides myself."

"No." I shook my head fervently. "I can't. I have to keep on moving."

"I understand." Smoothly, she climbed off the windowsill and walked over to me. "Take care of yourself-okay?"

"I'll try."

She smiled and gave me a hug. The gesture, coming from a hardened Manticore assassin, surprised me, yet I didn't shy away from it as I might have done only months ago. "Remember what I said, and be careful."

I nodded mutely.

"If I do see Zack, anything you want me to tell him?"

"Make up something."

She laughed softly. "All right."

I moved closer to the exit, ready to leave her and all her warnings. Just as I opened the door, I turned back to where she stood. "Where did you say Max was at?"

"She's in Seattle…Why? Planning to go there?"

"Maybe."

"Well, you'll recognize her right off," Jace remarked. "Dark curly hair, brown doe eyes, slightly tan skin…sort of a gypsy look. But, she's changed a lot from the girl in Manticore, she really has, so don't hold any of the past against her."

"Max. Seattle. Okay. Got it." I paused again, before saying, "Thanks Jace, for just…you know."

Smiling faintly, she nodded, understanding my inability to express appreciation. "Go on, Ben," she told me and with that, I was finally gone.

I stole a car in the ski lodge's parking lot and merged onto the nearest northbound highway. Although I wasn't sure why I was going to Seattle to see a sister I had despised for so long, I supposed it was more or less curiosity. Jace had said Max was different, so maybe I would actually tolerate her now that we were both grown. Besides, even without Max, it was possible that in Seattle, I would find something I hadn't ever experienced before.

The road in front of me was endless, and as the sun set, the black pavement began to glow like hot lava. It was a straight road with both a direct beginning and direct end. There were signs posted on the edge of the even road, rusty and faded, but signs nonetheless, telling a person where to go to achieve the destination desired. I could have stayed on that road, driving straight up to Washington, but I didn't.

Miles from Denver and eons from Seattle, I pulled off at an exit and found myself amongst twisting gravel back roads. The signs were few and those that did appear were covered in teenage graffiti. Yet, I felt more comfortable on those roads than I had on the main highway. It was the way I had lived my life, after all, by turning away from the safe and direct main course, which provided more safety and direction than another route; on the dissimilar roads, I was in complete control.

I could choose life. I could choose death.

It was the way I always had been and would continue to be.

Zack, Jace, and the other siblings whom I had not seen in nearly a decade could hand me all the maps they wanted. They could give me the car to ride the straight road. They could even kidnap me and personally drive me on the direct route. No matter how hard they pushed and pleaded for me to cease my differential routes, though, I would not.

They hadn't seen all that I had. They hadn't loved so deeply and lost so much. They hadn't felt the 'nomlies' hot breath on the backs of their necks. And, the only reason I made it through all of my struggles was because She was with me.

I couldn't stop. No matter how dangerous it was, I would never stop serving Her or driving on the dangerous back roads. She was the angel who had protected me since Manticore and would continue to do so as long as my servitude continued.

As the sun set, it created shadows and glimmers of false images in the trees. Although I knew what I was seeing were just mirages, I couldn't help but relish in seeing my Lady warmly smiling down at me through the lush green trees.

I smiled back at Her, and the sunlight danced over my face like water droplets, a lush caress across my bruised mortal skin. Slowly, as the road continued, the forest began to engulf the car under its loving embrace of fleshy leaves and glistening grass, and the light at the end of the forest began to grow ever more vibrantly before me.

It was the light for my deceased siblings.

It was the light for me.

And I whispered, "Amen."