But that couldn’t be true. Michael never showed emotion. He’d never confided in Joseph, rarely even spoken to him, had never once told him he loved him.
Bara began unbuttoning his shirt. Joseph wondered why, only for his question to be answered immediately. As Bara’s white shirt fell open, Joseph saw the Saint Peter’s cross brand on his torso. One by one, the other boys did the same. A lump built in Joseph’s throat. Then finally, Michael unbuttoned his shirt. Joseph closed his eyes. Everyone had been branded. The Brethren believed them all to be demons. Evil. Born evil. That’s what Purgatory was. A place for children they believed to be innately evil . . . devil-branded. Joseph didn’t want to believe it. He couldn’t equate the priests he’d loved so much with atrocities of this kind. He had always known his younger brother was darker in nature than anyone else he had ever met, but this kind of punishment . . . exorcisms? It couldn’t be the way to help Michael heal.
“You’re not like the rest of us.” Joseph opened his eyes to see who had spoken—Raphael. Joseph met his disturbingly golden eyes. Bara had called him a pretty boy. The title didn’t do his beauty justice. He was as perfect as Michelangelo’s David. Raphael was studying him like he was abnormal, alien. “You’re different.”
Joseph took a soft breath, fighting through the agony blistering his chest. “Diff . . . different?” he rasped out, voice barely audible.
“You don’t seem like you want to kill people, I think he means.” Joseph’s eyes widened at Bara. He was smirking. The brand on Bara’s chest was fully healed. Joseph wondered how long he’d been here. How long they all had been. What they had endured under the Brethren’s hands. Joseph didn’t give a response to Bara or Raphael. He needed the Brethren to believe he was like the rest of them; he wouldn’t confess to his act. He had to be here for Michael. Michael, who, when Joseph looked for him, was staring at the vial of blood Joseph had gifted him, the need and desire for the crimson liquid evident on his flushed face. His concern for Joseph seemed already forgotten.
Uriel folded his arms over his chest, pulling Joseph’s attention. He had the face of an angel. His new name suited him. “You’re normal.” Uriel laughed without mirth. “Whatever the fuck that means in this place.”
Joseph tried to bear the pain wrecking his body, but it was becoming too much. All of the boys seemed to see he wasn’t going to speak. They all went back to their beds. That’s all they seemed to do. Exist in this dark room, no light but for a dim lamp, and nothing to do but wait. Joseph pictured the torture devices in the room he had just been in and knew what awaited them whenever the dorm room door opened.
Joseph thought of each of the boys. He wanted to take them from this place. He pictured their chests, the scars he’d noted marring their skin. All of them had been branded. Been hurt. And Michael, Michael had been hurt too. Joseph had failed. He hadn’t protected him. Three months Michael had been in this place. Three months of the torture room.
Joseph would be sure he protected them now.
He thought of the name Gabriel. Thought of the archangel he was now named after. His name meant “God is Great.” Gabriel was a messenger of God, a protector of people, and a warrior of good. Joseph let that name wash through him. A protector. He had been a protector of his brother. He wouldn’t stop now. He couldn’t. It was who he was.
Joseph opened his eyes, only to still when he found Diel still at the foot of his bed. The boy’s blue eyes were fixed on him. His chain was taut, pulled as far as it could go. Joseph met Diel’s eyes. He didn’t think the other boy was going to say anything, until Diel said, “They’ll die one day. They will all die for doing this to us.”
Diel walked back to his bed as though he hadn’t spoken a single word. Joseph noticed Diel’s bed was bolted to the floor. Diel lay back down just as the door opened. Joseph’s heart shattered like a fallen statue on a stone floor as Father McCarthy moved to Diel’s bed and unlocked his chain. The priest secured Diel’s wrists behind his back with handcuffs, then led him from the room.
It felt like hours before Diel returned. Joseph had fought the pull of sleep, staring at the metal door, waiting for the boy to come back. He needed to see if he was hurt. When Diel was dragged through the door, blood staining his face and body, his eyes rolling back with unconsciousness, Joseph felt rage like he had never felt before. Father McCarthy attached the chain to Diel and left the room. When the door opened again, and Sela was taken, Joseph felt he would combust.