Only fire, only fire, like traveling preachers used to call out on the street as he and his mother hurriedly passed by. Alba had been baptized by them as a baby, promised fire and brimstone if he didn’t worship their book—but god had never done anything to save him from the devil that came calling when he was thirteen. He didn’t need god where even salt couldn’t cleanse wickedness—he would bring his own fire. He would take care of the devil, himself, with the flames of cast-off souls and a shotgun in his hand.
