Iscariot: A Novel of Judas

by Tosca Lee

I could not mistake the way his voice broke as he cupped the leper’s face. As he said again: “I am willing.”

I had relished that I could hold sway over such a heart. That for as many as looked to him . . . he should look to me. As though none of it mattered without my love.

And that was the greatest fear of all, wasn’t it? The reason we grappled for our laws, and our ways, and our Temple. This fear that without them God did not—would not—remain.