Exit Kingdom

name, someone calls through a bullhorn.
    What happened? he says again. They got my brother.
    State your name, the voice repeats.
    But he doesn’t have to reply this time, because there is commotion. Someonemust recognize him from the night before, because he is taken and escorted onto the compound, across the wide
courtyard. The lights on the jaw-bone chapel illuminate the structure violent against the blackness of night.
    Inside, he is taken to a new place, a large room where people in uniforms of authority are gathered around a table in grim, controlled debate. On the sidelines, Moses spotsthe old man, Pastor
Whitfield, who approaches him.
    Marauders, Whitfield says before Moses has a chance to ask him anything. A caravan. It was led by a man in a sombrero.
    Fletcher, Moses says.
    You know this man?
    He took my brother. Where’d he go? Which direction?
    You aren’t . . . affiliated with him?
    I ain’t affiliated. Except in the sense that I’m the man scheduled toremove the head from the rest of his body.
    They broke through the fence.
    They were after the girl, Moses explains. The Vestal.
    Whitfield looked confused.
    But they didn’t take the girl, Whitfield says.
    You repelled them?
    We did. At some cost to our people.
    He’s still got my brother. Do you know where they went?
    Slow down, says Whitfield. You don’t understand.
    He reaches a hand out to touch Moses’ arm, and Moses strikes it away. There is something happened inside him. Some safety turned off – some tribal code of civility gone away in the
face of his brother’s abduction. He gives Whitfield a look as violent and full of murder as any on the wild plain.
    Tell me now, man of God, he says. Two heads are the same as one to me. Godful or godless, it makesno difference.
    The Pastor Whitfield does not flinch. He simply gives Moses a mild look and a gentle, pitying smile.
    You’ve been on the frontier too long, my friend, he says. But so have we all. I’ll give you the information you want. But you must listen to me.
    Moses relents. He has no choice.
    We’ve already sent a regiment. This man Fletcher – apparently he’s allied with some localbandits. Together they levied an effective assault. They did a great deal of damage
and took some valuable equipment. The fear is that they are gearing up for a larger assault. So we are going to end it. We sent a battalion.
    Who? Moses asks. How many?
    Whitfield shrugs.
    I’m simply a pastor. My colleagues at the table there are the ones who specialize in land conflicts. I watched thesoldiers go. Maybe fifty.
    Where?
    Apparently there’s a gasworks some miles east of here. It’s where the bandits call home – where your man Fletcher might be as well. But listen, my friend, this is a battle
between two stubborn factions who have not yet realized that possession means nothing any more. You don’t want to get in the middle of that.
    What
I
want? Moses chuckles sourly.Then he repeats the words, shaking his head: What I want. Pastor, what I want is so far from what I got . . . it’s all semaphores across an empty
ocean. I’m gonna check on the girl. Then I’m leavin.
    Wait, Whitfield says. Wait.
    But Moses ignores him, walking to the door of the wide room – wanting out of the noise and commotion of miniature human strategy.
    The girl, Whitfield saysmore loudly just as Moses reaches the door. She’s not here.
    Moses stops and turns. Whitfield walks quickly over to him.
    That’s what I was trying to tell you, he says.
    You said they didn’t take her.
    Whitfield shakes his head.
    They didn’t take her, he says. She left.
    With Fletcher?
    Whitfield shakes his head again.
    By herself, he says. Shortly after you left. She didn’teven stay the night.
    You didn’t hold her?
    We don’t keep people against their will here, says Whitfield. This is not a penitentiary.
    But for her own good.
    One’s own good – that’s exactly the kind of thing you can’t define for people. As much as we might like.
    Moses is silent for a moment. He looks at the floor and contemplates all the silly things in the world – all the thingsimpossible to get your mind around.
    Then, in a quiet voice, the Pastor Whitfield says:
    They found something out about her.
    Why she ain’t attacked?
    Whitfield nods.
    She’s got a condition, he says. A . . . genetic disorder. Related to something called Huntington’s Disease.
    She’s sick?
    In a sense. Always has been. It’s something you’re born with even if it