DEATH, IN WHITE

“It is in good sense that we ostracize the adusto. They are not like us, they are monsters.

Beasts. It is for the best that they live amongst themselves and let the good people of this town

be. Who knows what havoc they’d wreak if we gave them the chance? Who knows what sins

they would commit against us?” Bishop Brouford’s sermon was too long and too boring, as

usual. Aiden Slate, at the precocious but self-aware age of 11 years old, glanced sidelong at his

twin brother, Gerard, who instinctively caught his eye across the pew.

I want to go home, Gerard mouthed animatedly enough for their mother to skewer him

with a look that read, “If you do not behave yourself, so help me!” Gerard frowned in defeat and

turned his body back toward the front of the cathedral, where Bishop Brouford continued his

elaborate monologue about the dangers of the grey-eyed demons trying to live among regular

people. Mrs. Slate turned toward her second son to ensure he was facing the bishop as well,

which Aiden was smart enough to do as soon as he witnessed his brother being chastised for it.

When she looked away, he turned to Gerard to gloat over his clever victory, only to find that his

twin was already staring daggers into the side of his head. But when the boys’ eyes met, all

pretense of anger melted away and their lips spread into identical, crooked smiles.

Once the sermon had concluded and their mother finished taking her painstaking time in

catching up with neighbors and flattering the bishop’s supposed skill in oration, the brothers

were at last free to race home. They laughed and pushed each other the whole way, feeling very

seriously that whoever came in second would be doomed to a life of misery. With a rather dirty

extension of his left leg at the last second, Gerard slapped his hand on the front door first — and

sentenced Aiden to a mouthful of dirt in the process.

 “Hey! That’s no fair!” Aiden whined as he righted himself, spitting out bits of the earth

from his mouth.

“You never said we had to be fair!” Gerard smirked triumphantly, the eternally twinkling

glint of mischief in his bright blue eyes flaring to emphasize his prideful wit. Aiden pursed his

lips indignantly but remained silent.

“Brother, don’t be a sore loser!” Gerard rolled his eyes, knowing the subtle shifts in his

twin’s expression all too well. This only caused Aiden’s face to flush a deeper red, and Gerard

sensed the comings of a squabble. Feeling very ill-equipped to argue, Gerard racked his brain to

find a distraction that would make Aiden forget his grief — he settled on an answer right away.

“Come on then, I know what will cheer you up.” Gerard snatched Aiden’s arm before he

could rebut and started off toward the woods behind their farmhouse.

“Wait, we’re— not allowed— to— go here!” Aiden huffed as he fruitlessly attempted to

match Gerard’s manic pace toward the trees. Though it wasn’t worth trying to resist his pull

either. Gerard had a preternatural strength for a boy of his size, and Aiden didn’t want to spend

the rest of the week enduring his teasing for chickening out of the forest anyhow.

“No one will know!” Gerard egged, though he was already very assured in his victory

over Aiden’s weak resolve. Without any further complaint or questioning, the two brothers

stepped up to the forest’s edge. The trees clung to one another in a dense labyrinth of leaf and

bark. The shadows of unseeable creatures danced in the depths of the woods, which became

more difficult to make out as it stretched toward the horizon.

“I think we should go home, Gerard. Mother must be worried by now.” Aiden tried to

keep a steady voice to mask his mounting fear, but Gerard’s brows arched in self-indulgent

surprise as he picked up on the shaky lilt of the words.

 “We haven’t even been gone a half-hour. She’ll still be in town now, there’s nothing to

worry about. Let’s just go inside… unless you’re too scared?” Aiden stared into the goading blue

of his twin brother’s eyes and felt distinctly in his chest that this response would define the way

Gerard saw him for the rest of their lives.

“I’m not! Too scared, I mean… I’ll go in there right this second!” Aiden shouted, loud

enough to convince himself more so than Gerard.

“Ha, go ahead then. I’ll be right after.” He ceremoniously extended an arm toward the

void between trees where a faint path had been trodden into the dirt. Aiden cleared his throat and

made a grand show of taking one step further in the forest.

“See? I’m not afraid of anything. It’s just a bunch of trees.”

After a few minutes had passed, Aiden started to believe his own posturing. This isn’t so

bad, not at all, he assured himself. But Gerard was only thinking about the perfect opportunity to

torment his brother in an extraordinarily unprecedented manner. A devilish smile grew on his

face, contorting his features into a childish caricature of evil underneath the shade of the woods’

canopy.

“Since this is just a bunch of trees, why don’t we stay here a while longer? Go in

deeper?” The brothers locked eyes in a standoff, each daring the other to make a move. Finally,

Aiden gulped past the growing lump in his throat and wordlessly stalked further into the forest’s

foliage, showing Gerard he refused to be the first one to crack. Gerard followed, amused, and

wondered how long Aiden would last before he inevitably had a nervous breakdown from the

woods’ dark uncertainty.

Quite a ways longer than Gerard could ever imagine, was the answer.
 “Brother, it’s getting so dark out, we should start heading back home!” he called out to

Aiden — who had pulled ahead on the trail, seemingly enraptured by the beauty of nature.

“Who’s scared now?” Aiden jeered back. Gerard gritted his teeth, in disbelief that his

usually weak-willed brother wasn’t showing any fear while he was starting to grow uneasy from

the darkening landscape.

“Don’t be ridiculous, brother, I’d never—”

A twig snapped in the distance. Aiden froze. Gerard froze with him. The two boys’ eyes

widened in shock as they whipped their heads around, trying to identify the culprit. They found

each other’s gaze and held it, seeking comfort in the familiarity of their faces.

I want to go home, Aiden mouthed to his brother. Gerard nodded in agreement. They

carefully turned around and began to retrace their steps, eyes locked onto their shoes and lips

sealed shut as they did not dare to make a noise. A bush rustled to Gerard’s left, and Aiden felt

something brush against his right hand. They both paused, and their feet became firmly planted

on the trail — each wishing with all their might they may turn invisible if they could keep their

bodies still enough.

Aiden was the first to see it.

“Adusto,” he whispered under his breath. His heart was palpitating, struck by wave after

wave of bone-tingling fright. Gerard shook his head — again, again, and again.

“No, no, no, no, no,” he muttered. “Can’t be… can’t be.” Gerard lowered his gaze,

refusing to see it, to acknowledge it. He stared intently at the dirt, willing the beast to go away.

Shining grey eyes reflected the sparse moonlight streaking through the leaves from

behind a thick, towering tree trunk. They blinked slowly, curiously, as they took in the sight of

the terrified young boys.

 “No-grey?” the voice shuddered, unsure of the question it posed even as it said the words

aloud. Aiden’s jaw dropped.

“You speak!?” he exclaimed in bewilderment. Suddenly, his limbs didn’t feel so tense.

Suddenly, his lungs didn’t feel so constricted. Every child in Valouria had grown up being fed

tales about the wicked adusto that made their homes on the outskirts of society, just within reach

of naughty kids ripe for consumption. Usually in caves, mountains, or woods, adusto were said

to take shelter in the wilderness near the hometowns they had invariably been exiled from once

people caught sight of their scornful grey eyes. People claimed their infamous grey eyes were

just the first sign of a worse transformation to come and the true form of an adusto was

monstrous beyond belief.

“They may have once been one of us, but they have since lost their humanity and only

know bloodlust and cruelty,” Bishop Brouford had explained in one of his sermons. Aiden

believed this, for he had no reason to cast any doubt. But the figure he could make out behind the

tree was not monstrous, and its voice was not demonic.

“Yes… I speak.” The figure stepped forward, into a patch of light in front of the tree they

had hidden behind. It looked like any other boy, around the twins’ age, who could have stepped

straight out of town square for all they knew. Aiden was dumbstruck. Adusto are supposed to be

demons… This is no demon. Aiden took a step closer to the figure, but seeing this finally broke

Gerard out of his paralyzed shock. He quickly stooped to pick up a rock from the trail and pelted

the figure before him.

“Leave us alone!” he shrieked righteously as the adusto recoiled in pain from the rock’s

direct hit.

“Gerard! What are you—”

 Gerard gave Aiden no time to lament. He wrapped his hand around his twin’s wrist like a

vice and bolted away from the figure, who had since slunk back into the shadows and away from

the two boys. He did not stop until they were safely at their back porch, gasping for air.

“Was that… real?” Aiden’s voice trembled. He appeared to be in a daze, not only from

the extensive sprinting but from uncertainty about the night’s events.

“It doesn’t matter,” Gerard declared firmly — already recovered from the lengthy run.

“Don’t speak of this to anymore. We will never go back to the forest again. You understand?”

Aiden nodded silently, in too much shock to deliberate. Though he would never dream of

defying his stronger, faster, and self-proclaimed smarter brother, he felt disturbed by what he had

witnessed. Not the adusto itself, but the way Gerard had moved so quickly to attack it. The way

everyone had talked about it while being so shamelessly far from the truth.

Though Aiden had nodded in agreement to Gerard’s decision, he couldn’t help himself

from wondering if the adusto were not as they seemed.

∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙⸶⸰⸷∙

SNEAK PEEK AT THE CONTINUATION…

Aiden Slate stared idly at his reflection in the water. The ripples on its surface obscured

the lower half of his face — his sharp jawline and the meticulously pruned specks of facial hair

stippling his cheeks — and instead they drew clear attention to his eyes. A piercing, unsettling

hue of plaster-grey, dappled by hints of bright snow-white. Adusto. The Old Tongue had largely

fallen out of use among the civilians of Valouria, but people tended to cling onto words of

prejudice and hatred like cotton onto wet skin. He shifted his weight at the river’s edge, trying to

angle himself closer to its shimmering surface. It was as though the water taunted him,

highlighting only the feature of his face which forever marked him as a demon. Those eyes. The
mark of an adusto. Aiden squeezed them shut — tighter, tighter, tighter — until he could no

longer see the burning grey in his eyes. Then, he screamed.