Father had replied sharply, that it wasn�t a matter of how far we would go, but of the depth of our faith. Connor had subsided into silence at that, but I knew his heart like my own and could see that his eyes were still dark and anxious as he turned away and tried to sleep. I let one arm steal over his side, trying to remind him with my body that I was there with him, always. As long as we were together, we could face down whatever man and God sent at us. Hadn�t we proven that?
But he pulled away from me, and I let him go. He just needed a bit of time, I decided. He�d come around back to the mission. I could wait for him.
The next morning, his face was paler than usual, but he seemed normal enough. Perhaps his eyes were more troubled and his hands shook a bit, but he did his share of the driving, ate his lunch and smoked his cigarettes, bickered with me about what television show we would watch when we settled into the next night�s seedy room. And so it went for three more days, with him gamely carrying on, but with paler face and wilder eyes each passing hour, sometimes jerking his head up like he�d heard someone call his name. Until on the fifth day of our run, when morning came and he couldn�t rise from the bed.
�I�ll be a�right,� he mumbled, eyes bright and feverish. I brought him some water, and he sipped at it fitfully. �Give me a day�s rest, it�s just a bug. I�ll be up and about tomorrow, I promise.�
Our father wasn�t pleased with the delay, but there was nothing he could do about God�s will. So we paid for an extra day and settled in with bad motel coffee and worse TV.
But as the hours wore on, Connor grew sicker, tossing and sweating in the sheets. By the next morning, far from being ready to travel, he had slipped into delirium, so feverish he almost glowed in the dimly lit room. He shivered, he groaned, he raved in all the tongues we knew. His hands clutched at me, and his voice grew panicked if I moved away, so I remained seated beside him, sponging his forehead with a damp cloth and forcing him to sip water.
Da stood at the foot of the bed and stared down at his son as he lay gasping and crying in twisted sheets, �Heavenly Father...forgive us for what we�ve done...oh, Jesus, forgive...�
�Should we call a doctor?� I asked in a low voice, trying to soothe Connor with my hands. He fought them off, cursing in German, and I winced as his fingernails sliced into my skin. �He�s very sick, Da.�
�This isn�t a sickness of man.� There wasn�t a shred of doubt in my father�s voice. Looking up at him, silhouetted against the sickly yellow light as he was, he resembled nothing so much as the engravings I�d seen of Old Testament prophets, the madmen who spoke to God and brought His words to man. And wasn�t that just what my father had ever been to me, a memory of God�s word? �This is God�s own sickness.�
�Why would God want to hurt Connor?� I asked, gently catching my brother�s wrists and holding them together as he began to claw at his own face. �There never was a faith truer than his.�
Da shook his head and frowned down at both of us. �No. He had doubts, remember? He doubted the purity of our purpose. And so God is testing him. Listen to him, he�s doubting still.�
�Forgive, forgive,� moaned Connor. I released his wrists, and he clutched his arms about himself, shivering wildly. �Oh, sweet Jesus, forgive us, what we did was wrong...sin against God and man...�
Da sighed and touched his own rosary. �Doubt is a sin, Murphy. Our work, what we�ve done....it was given to us personally, by God. We strike down the wicked at His orders. So there is nothing to forgive. God is placing him in the fire until he realizes that, burning the doubt out of him. If his faith is strong enough, he will come through pure and strong. If not, he will be consumed. Such is the will of God.� He turned and left the room then, shutting the door firmly behind him.
I remained at my brother�s side, silent and stunned. I didn�t have a rebuttal for my father, even if he had stayed to hear it. But my heart ached with his words...because I knew with utter certainty that my brother�s faith in the mission had never wavered. I knew Connor�s heart like my own.
The killings were not what my brother begged forgiveness for. Not at all. It was something else, a sin of a different order.
I knew this, because I shared it.
***
The first time was the night the vision came to us, the night that God spoke down to both of us in a voice of thunder as we sat bolt upright in jailhouse beds, shivering with the current of His power. We whispered our pledge, to stamp out the wicked so the good might flourish. As the ecstasy released us, Connor�s head had dropped to the side and turned to me. Our eyes met with understanding and a fiery purpose. We knew our Lord�s will, His plan for us, and we embraced it with all our hearts.
�Shepherds we will be,� murmured Connor, reaching out a hand towards me. I touched his fingertips gently with my own, and the current of divine power that still quivered within us sparked in the dim light.
The touch was an echo of the heavenly ecstasy, the breath of God. Connor�s eyes glowed in the darkness. We had always been in tune with each other, bonded since we came screaming into this world, one right after the other. Now, with God�s power still in both of us, I could feel his heartbeat echoing in my chest. I could hear the blood singing through his veins, sense his breath like a ghost of my own. I knew, in a way that had nothing to do with my mind and all to do with my heart, that he was aware of me in the same way. And somehow, touching each other, bringing the energy within us into contact, was the perfectly and utterly right thing to do.
I think I moved first, but it couldn�t have mattered less. I eased myself over into his bed, moving up beside him so the line of my body touched his. He shivered slightly but pressed closer, the skin of our torsos clinging to each other. We were both sticky, covered in a fine sheen of sweat.
His hands reached out awkwardly, fumbling with the button on my jeans. I instinctively moved to help him; skin to skin was right, these fabric barriers between us vile. When we were both naked on the thin cotton sheets, I brought my hands up and gently tipped his face towards mine. I kissed him, not out of cheap mortal lust, but from a desire to bring the two trembling currents even more together, to let them join at the very core of our beings. It was only after, when the two met with a shock that ran through both of us like lightning, that all restraint fell away and we began groping for each other with frenzied, desperate passion, like we�d found water in the desert.
Somehow we retained the sense to remain quiet; there was a police station right through the door, after all. I held my hand gently over Connor�s mouth as we ground together, gazing down at him as he writhed and whimpered, face contorting with pleasure and awe. I took my hand away and kissed him again, drinking in his little cries and grunts as we both came.
The energy dissipated then, fading away into the stationhouse air. Slowly, consciousness and reality fell back into us, and we drew away from each other. I pulled my jeans on, flopped back onto my own bed. Connor did the same, his eyes fixed on the floor. We were silent for a few long, disoriented minutes.
Finally, he spoke. �Was that us?� he said, his voice a broken whisper in the still air. �Or was it the Spirit? Who was that?�
I felt like my heart was being twisted inside of me. I knew which answer I wanted to give, but when I turned my head and met his haunted eyes, I couldn�t say it. I swallowed down my hurt and longing and told him what he needed to hear.
�It was the Spirit, Connor. God�s given us a mission now, it was just an overspill of being touched by th� divine. Don�t worry about it. It wasn�t you.�
He nodded slowly and rolled onto his back, staring up at the ceiling. �Then...there�s no need to confess it.�
�None,� I whispered, looking up at the cracks where God�s tears had rained down a few moments before. �Stays just between us, this does...�
And it had been all right. It eased his heart to dismiss what had happened as the work of the Spirit. I brushed it aside as well, forcing the odd feelings in my heart away while we learned the ropes of our new calling.
But the night after Papa Joe�s mansion, the night we found our father again, there was no more room for excuses, nowhere to shift the blame.
Da took us back to the hotel where he was staying and bandaged up our wounds. There was a lot that needed to be said between the three of us, but I felt as if I was going to explode, and I could tell without looking that Connor was the same. So we told Da that we needed to go for a drive, to clear our heads. He gave us the keys to his stolen car, and we were gone.
Down by the dockside, in the backseat like thousands of young couples in the dark, we sweated and writhed together, all hands and tongues and fevered kisses. We were frenzied, but bound to gentleness by our wounds. He cradled the hand he�d crushed to free me, whispering prayers for forgiveness in every language until I kissed him silent. I could still taste blood, clinging faintly to his skin. We had been baptized in each other�s blood that night, confirmed in our mission together.
It was after that night- and the similar nights that followed, as we found we couldn�t deny the need- that Connor began to pray with an edge of desperation, that he clutched his rosary like a lifeline.
And now it seemed that he had been right, that God didn�t approve, and it would take a trial by fire to atone.
***
�Blessed Mother...� he moaned. �Holy Mary, mother of God...�
�Shh, shh,� I whispered. �It�s all right, Con.� I brought more water to his lips, but he pushed it away. He flung his arms out fitfully, and for a moment, as he lay still, I saw him as Jesus on the cross, suffering for the sins of the others. I glanced at his wrists, at the marks where the handcuffs had bit into him, half-expecting to see them run with blood again in stigmata.
He should have all the saints lined up to intercede for him, I thought bleakly. His was the stronger faith, always.
I remembered when we were children, getting picked on at the playground for being fatherless blighters. Connor and I would stand our ground together against the bullies as long as we could, just as we would for all our lives- but in the end, back then, we�d be beaten down.
The nuns watched out for Connor better than they did for me. They had hopes of making a priest of him, I think; certainly they nudged him in that direction. He would�ve been a good priest, my brother. He had the heart. But seminary would have meant being separated from me, and he wouldn�t hear of that. We refused to be apart an hour more than necessary. We never even thought of going to college, or of learning a trade that we couldn�t do side by side. It was never said aloud, but we�d known since childhood that we�d walk the path of this life together.
�Always,� I murmured, brushing his sweaty hair off his forehead. �With you always.�
�Leave him be, Murphy,� Da�s voice rumbled from the other bed. It was late, now; I�d thought he was asleep. �It�s in God�s hands, there�s naught you can do. Let the Devil be burned out of him or take him, as God wills it.�
I closed my eyes. But I share his guilt, I thought, willing the words up to heaven. If either of us is to be punished, let it be me. I�m not sorry for what we�ve done, I�ve shown you no repentance. I haven�t spent hours on my knees as he has, worrying my rosary to dust with mea culpas. Send the fire to me, if either of us must burn.
I kissed Connor�s hot forehead gently in the dark and settled back in my chair to try to sleep a bit. I dreamed of the day we killed the Russians, of the way Connor had knelt beside the corpses with his head thrown back and arms spread wide as an angel�s wings, lost in the divine ecstasy of the mission and the joy of being God�s instrument.
When I awoke, Con�s fever had broken.
***
�Murphy,� he whispered, staring up at me with a tired smile.
�Yes,� I said, barely able to speak through the huge grin on my face. �Here, I got juice, and some toast...you need to get your strength back, you silly bastard. We�ll have you back to beer in no time...�
�Murph,� he repeated, still smiling, his eyes less haunted than they�d been since the night we�d been called.. �We�re forgiven. I walked through the fire, and God said...�
I blinked and turned to the tray of food. I didn�t want to hear what had to come next, a reminder that the condition of forgiveness was to never repeat the sin. Not even to desire to repeat it. That was a promise I could never keep...
�There was nothing to forgive.� He voice rang out stronger, filled with a righteous certainty. I looked at him, questioning. His smile grew broader as he met my eyes.
�God sent us here together for a reason, Murphy,� he said softly. �He made us for each other, so we could comfort and protect each other through the mission. We�re two halves of one soul, we are.� He reached for my hand and laced his fingers through mine. I still couldn�t find a word to say.
�And since we�re one being, meant to be together...it�s all right, Murph. He told me so, on the other side.� He smiled again, the simple innocent smile of faith and peace I remembered from when we were young. �We�re right with God.
I stared down at his fragile hand, at the ropy scar around his wrist where he�d slashed it with the handcuffs, breaking the toilet free from the floor when the Russians had me. A reminder in flesh of how he�d risked his own life, let his blood spill out on the floor, to save me. Never a thought for self, only me. I remembered his foot crashing down against my hand again and again in Papa Joe�s basement, crushing the bones so I could pull free of the handcuffs. Feeling every blast of pain in his own soul, but doing it because I asked him to. Sacrificing for me. I thought of him kneeling in the dark, desperately clutching his rosary, frantically begging forgiveness but knowing it might not come. Knowing he might have to sacrifice his very faith and soul- for me.
My brother, my soul�s twin, my beloved. I leaned forward and kissed his innocent, joyous smile. I thanked God for His mercy, for not demanding Con�s faith in sacrifice to the mission.
�We need to get you strong again, brother,� I whispered, pressing my forehead against his. �There�s work to be done.�
�Right,� he said, easing back against the pillows and reaching for the juice. �People needing the justice of the Saints.�
I nodded and absently touched my rosary. By our faith, God was always watching us. I knew that he knew my thoughts right then, as I watched Connor drink, half his face illuminated by a weak shaft of sunlight.
We both would serve the mission, carry out God�s work with our hands...but only one of us had the faith to walk with angels. Only one would ever stand a chance of being a saint.
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