an impression forced itself upon me of being on the scene of some unexpiated crime

To expiate the burden

in expiatory sacrifice

If I’d meant my little courier run as another crumb of expiation, I’d failed. If I’d meant my service here on the island as a larger penance, that, too, had fallen short.

had shot demonstrators, and had spent the night gathered in their barracks in a long session of self-recrimination. Now its men confronted their captain, Lashkevitch, and declared expiatory mutiny. They would not, they told him, shoot again

it gave him an opportunity to expiate his guilt

remained behind to expiate the country's collective guilt

what he curses in his mission is this expiation of expiation itself

The sole expiation I can make is to beg your forgiveness

his passionate and expiatory nature

if mythic violence brings at once guilt and retribution, divine power only expiates