It was a statement of fact. "I did," Elias said. He did not look away this time. "I cannot change it. I cannot bring them back.
If I could cut open my chest and give my heart to replace your sons, I would do it, but I can't." "Words." She spat. "White man's words. You say you are sorry, and then you go on living.
You eat, you sleep, you breathe. My son does not breathe. I do not sleep." Elias shouted, his control finally snapping. He hit his chest with his fist.
"Do you think I sleep? I see their faces every time I close my eyes. I live in hell." "Naya, good." She said, cruel and soft.
"You deserve it." "I know I do." Elias cried. His voice cracked. "I know.
That is why I am here. That is why I bought the ranch. I thought I thought if I could just live quietly, if I could do no more harm, maybe the ghosts would let me be. But they don't." He looked at her, tears cutting tracks through the dust on his face.
"When I saw you in that pen, I saw them. I saw the women I failed, and I thought maybe maybe if I save one, just one, it would count for something." Naya stared at him. She saw the raw, bleeding wound of his conscience. It did not wash away her anger.
Her anger was a mountain, solid and immovable, but it made him human again. He was not just a monster. He was a man eaten alive by his own sins. "You cannot buy forgiveness with $30." She said.
"I know," Elias whispered. "And you cannot fix the past by playing house." "I know." She leaned forward, her eyes burning into his. "If you truly want to atone, Elias Ward, if you truly want to pay for what you did, then you do not get to die.
Dying is easy. Dying is escaping." She pointed a shaking finger at his chest. "You have to live. You have to live and fight for the ones who are left.
You have to stand between us and the wolves. You have to bleed for us. You have to give your life to this, to me. Not as a husband, but as a shield, until the day you die. You belong to the memory of the ones you killed.