The girl at the door blinked, then smiled again, the expression flawless. "There are no wrong people. Only those who haven’t accepted their place yet."

A small silence fell.

Zubair felt the weight of the rifle in his hands and the absurdity of it—aiming metal at smiles and pressed collars. He didn’t trust anything that clean.

The girl closed her binder, tucking it under her arm. "We won’t keep you. You’ve had a long journey, I can tell."

Lachlan gave a single nod. "That’s one way to put it."

"We’ll come back at nightfall," the man added pleasantly. "There’s always time to change your mind before the darkness comes."

Before anyone could reply, they turned together and walked away down the dirt path.

Their steps made no sound.

Lachlan stared after them until they vanished beyond the fence. "Did anyone else catch that? They didn’t leave footprints."

Elias moved to the window, scanning the yard. Nothing. The grass lay unbent, the dust unstirred.

Zubair re-engaged the lock and exhaled through his nose. "They’ll come back," he said.

Luci whined once, pacing in front of the door. His fur was still bristling, ears flat, tail low—a hunter uneasy in his own den.

Sera knelt and rested her hand on the wolf’s head. "They were polite," she murmured, almost fondly.

"That’s what worries me," Zubair said.

Lachlan huffed out a laugh that didn’t sound amused. "I’ll take screaming raiders over polite any day."

Outside, the light didn’t change. It never did.

But the air felt thinner, stretched too tight.

Sera stayed at the door a moment longer, her fingers resting on the knob, as if she were listening for something only she could hear.

Then she smiled faintly. "Let them come back," she said. "I want to see what they think forever looks like."

Zubair didn’t answer. He just checked the rifle’s chamber and set it beside the window, the muscle in his jaw ticking once before he forced it still.

Luci kept growling, low and constant, until the sound became part of the silence.

------

Luci’s growl shifted pitch before the first note of singing reached the porch.

Zubair was already moving... his boots on floorboards, his rifle ghosting into his hands, and his breath steadying itself to a slower gear.

He didn’t want to bring his fire out to play at the moment. He liked to keep that option in his back pocket. People were a lot more predictable if they thought you were, too.

These people would expected guns and knives, but he didn’t know if they were expecting fire and ice.

The house still held that bright, unblinking light. The clock on the stove showed nothing since the power was out, and the sun never moved.

The song came through it anyway, thin and cheerful, the kind of tune used to teach children letters.

Lachlan pushed off the doorframe, grin crooked with nerves he’d never admit. "Round two?"

Elias closed the cupboard he’d been stocking. "Same number of steps in the yard," he murmured, cocking his head to the side. "But more voices."

Alexei slid into the hallway without sound. Knife at his hip and his eyes half-lidded the way a cat half-pretends to nap.

Sera reached for the handle with the same calm she used with everything else.

Luci blocked the bottom half of the door with his weight, his hackles up, and his tail low.

Zubair put a palm to the wood above the wolf’s shoulders and leaned, pinning the door on its hinges for the count of three. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"Open," he decided. "On me."

Lachlan unbolted the upper lock and Zubair eased pressure. The door swung open just a bit before the chain lock caught.

The man in the white shirt stood where he had before.

Identical tie, identical hair.

Beside him, the girl in the pale blue skirt hugged her binder to her chest like a hymnbook.

But behind them were four more, two men and two women, all dressed the same.

Clean clothes in a filthy world.

"Good afternoon," the girl beamed. "We prayed you’d still be here."

"Apparently, we aren’t hard to find," Lachlan drawled, rolling his eyes.

"The Lord sends who He wills," the man answered, voice smooth as the tie at his throat. "We come with good news."

"You came with a choir," Alexei noted from the shadows.

The girl’s smile brightened. "We always sing when there are new ears to hear."

Sera stepped up beside Lachlan, curiosity naked on her face. "You promised forever," she reminded them, almost light. "Show me how you picture it."

The man lifted a booklet from his satchel, the same crisp ink as before. The Fold of Light — Eternal Life in the Second Dawn.

"There will be no hunger and no pain," he recited, "no rot, no decay. The dead will not rise to trouble the living. Lions will lie down with lambs. Families will be restored, and the world will be washed clean."

"In fire," Alexei put in, dry.

"In light," the girl corrected gently. "Fire belongs to those who refuse or who are already condemned."

Zubair watched their shoes again...polished and unmarked.

It was like even the dust on the porch was scared of these people.

He shifted his stance so the rifle lived invisible along the doorjamb but close enough to be useful. "You mentioned nightfall."

The man’s eyes warmed as if Zubair had remembered a shared appointment. "We hold a small service when the world turns. Nothing too frightening. A prayer, a reading, an invitation to step into the light of obedience. We’ll bring lanterns so you can see to sign your names."

Elias’s knuckles whitened on the back of a chair. "Sign what?"

"The roll of the Fold," the man answered, unbothered. "So you can be found when the trumpet sounds."

Lachlan’s mouth tilted. "There’s trumpets, now. Lovely."

Sera reached toward the booklet, then stopped a breath short. "What if we listen and don’t sign."

The girl’s expression didn’t flicker. "Then we’ll come back tomorrow."

"And if we never sign? What happens if we don’t believe in eternal life?"

"Everyone signs in the end," she assured her, so kind it hurt. "And just because you don’t believe in God, it doesn’t mean that God doesn’t believe in you."