Summon The Keeper. The Second Summoning

She wasn’t supposed to like people being nice to her. Well, so far onlyperson notpeople, but still…

It wasn’t right.

Or more to the point, it wasn’t wrong.

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“No shit, man! I’m an angel, too!”

Samuel studied Doug’s slightly furry, gap-toothed smile and bloodshot eyes and shook his head. “No, you’re not.”

“Yeah, I am.” Carefully placing his fork beside his half empty plate, Doug leaned forward and lowered his voice. “I’m undercover. That’s why, you know, no wings.”

“Can you make your head light up?”

“Fuck, yeah.” He glanced around, checking for eavesdroppers. Satisfied that no one else in the crowded room was paying any attention, he elaborated. “It’s usually pretty lit by now, but they don’t allow that stuff in here.”

“But shouldn’t I know it if you’re an angel?”

“I didn’t know till you told me. Why should you know till I told you?”

That made sense. Not a lot of sense but, under the circumstances, enough. And Doug wasn’t lying. Samuel could tell when people were lying and Doug believed every breathy, fermentation-redolent thing he’d said. Feeling as though the weight of the world had been lifted off his shoulders, Samuel leaned forward as well. “Do you get covered in pigeons?”

“Nope. Butterflies. Hundreds of ’em, movin’ their little feet all over my body.” Eyes widening, he glanced down at this chest and began smacking himself with alternating palms. “All. Over. My. Body.”

Samuel grabbed his wrists.“What are you doing?”

“Swattin’ butterflies.”

Ignoring for the moment the absence of butterflies to swat, Samuel looked sternly across the narrow table.“Angels can’t enact violence on a living creature.”

“What the fuck does that mean?”

“We don’t swat!”

“You never wanted to swat them pigeons?”

“Well…yeah.” Which wasn’t something he wanted to discover about himself—even justifiable urges to commit violence on a flock of flying rats was just anti-angel. Releasing Doug’s wrists, he buried his head in his hands. “I’m very confused.”

Doug nodded sagely.“Happens.”

“I don’t know why I’m here.”

“I do.”

That was more than he’d dared to hope for. “You do?”

“You’re here to eat.”

And hope died.

About to point out that angels didn’t eat, Samuel watched Doug lift a forkful of mashed potatoes and gravy. Doug was eating. Most of it was even going into his mouth. Wrapping his fist around his own fork, he mirrored the motions of the undercover angel sitting across from him. After a few moments, he got the hang of not chewing his tongue with the food. Then he swallowed.

All of a sudden, he was ravenous.

When a bit of stuffing came back up through his nose, he slowed down enough to breathe. He drank juice until it was gone, then he switched to water. He had seconds. And, although what food remained had become a little difficult to identify by then, he even had thirds.

This was the best thing that had happened to him in this body. He couldn’t believe what he’d been missing. He wanted to thank Doug for the gift he’d been given, for new information shared, and all he could think to do was to share information in turn.

“I have genitalia.”

“They’re called giblets, kid.”

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She’d poison the gravy. Given who—or rather what—she was, it was the only logical thing to do under the circumstances. The box of rat poison tucked neatly onto the shelf of gardening supplies had called out to her as Eva Porter led her through the enclosed porch and into the house. At least she thought it was the rat poison, her teeth were chattering too loudly to be sure.

“Now, then, let’s get you out of those wet shoes and socks, eh.”

“I don’thave socks.”

“Then I’ll get you some.” Unwrapped, Eva wore a dove-gray sweat suit over a white turtleneck. Given her proportions…

“You look like a pigeon,” Byleth muttered sullenly.

“I do, don’t I.” Her eyes widened as she took in the overalls. “Good heavens, child, you’re hardly wearing anything at all. Well, I can do something about that, can’t I?”

“Can you?” She’d intended the question to be sharp edged, mocking, but it emerged sounding rather pathetic. Holding the freezing length of the overalls’ zipper away from her body, she followed Eva into the living room and watched wide-eyed as she pulled several brightly wrapped packages outfrom under the tree.

“These are for my granddaughter, Nancy; she’ll be coming up to spend New Year’s with us. Fortunately, you’re about the same size.”

“You’re giving me your granddaughter’s presents?” She’d have refused the kindness except she’d caught sight of her reflection in the living room window. The overalls were gross. And theydid make her look fat.Still: Granny gives Nancy’s presents away. Nancy gets angry. Big family fight. Byleth could live with that. Of course if Nancy was as whacked as Granny, she might not mind.Don’t ruin things, she told herself sternly, following Eva upstairs.Believe anything that’ll get you out of these overalls.

As instructed, she had a nice hot shower, staying in until she’d emptied the tank. She left the soap sitting in water in the soap dish and the towels in a crumpled heap on the floor. It wasn’t much, but it felt good to be proactive again.

Black jeans. Black, ribbed turtleneck; tight enough to offer some support to the breasts which were rapidly becoming a colossal nuisance. Thick red sweater. Red fuzzy socks.

Pivoting in front of the mirror, toes working against the thick fleece, she realized she looked good. The black, the red, the hair—it was working. Back in the bathroom, she went through Eva’s makeup bag, pulled out the reddest lipstick she could find and applied it liberally. She liked the effect so much, she completely forgot about her intention to infect the lipstick with a particularly virulent STD.

Harry Porter was standing in the living room when she came downstairs. He smiled and introduced himself.“Just between you and me,” he added, leaning toward her slightly, “that outfit looks much better on you than it would have on Nancy.”

Had there been anything remotely sexual in the comment, she’d have known how to react. But there wasn’t.

Why were her ears so hot?

She tried a provocative smile anyway.

Harry deflected it with amused indulgence.

Her ears grew hotter. So did her cheeks. What the hell was going on?

“I’llgohelpwithdinner.” The words came out weirdly strung together. Hurrying into the kitchen, she held on tightly to the thought of the rat poison and getting her world back on track.

It took only a little more momentum to bounce into Eva and spill cranberry juice all over her.

“Oops, sorry, dear.”

Byleth closed her eyes and counted to three.“Why,” she demanded when she opened them, “are you apologizing? I bumped you.”

“True enough. I spoke to Harry and he says if you still want to go to the city in the morning, he’ll drive you to the bus station in Huntsville.”

The bus? There was just no way she was taking the bus. Smelly people took the bus. Poor people took the bus. People being environmentally aware and not driving their cars took the bus. Demons didnot take the bus. Unless they took it somewhere really, really nasty and left it there. If Harry wanted to play taxi, he could drive her all the way to the city. He’d be easy enough to coerce.

“Byleth? Would you mind stirring the gravy?”

Since Harry had just become useful and she couldn’t poison Eva without killing him, there could be only one answer. “Yes.”

“Thanks, dear.”

Staring at the spoon in her hand, the other end circling around in the pan of gravy, she wondered how that had gone wrong.

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519 Church Street served food but couldn’t provide shelter for the night. Unwilling to lose the company of the only other angel he’d ever met, Samuel followed Doug out the door and fell into step beside him.

They walked for a while in silence. Higher knowledge informed him that pigeons roosted after dark so, until sunrise, life was good. Or it would have been except…

“What’s the matter, kid?”

He shook his head, he wasn’t sure. “There’s pressure.” A quick glance down showed a small wet spot on the front of his trousers. “And I’m leaking! Again. First my hands and now this. Am I supposed to be leaking?”

“Must be time to take a piss.” Grabbing for the front of his own trousers, Doug crossed the sidewalk and stood facing the wall of Harris’ Auto Body.

“We can’t take something that doesn’t belong to us.” In a world of uncertainties, this he remained sure of.

Doug rolled his eyes as a stream of liquid hit the bricks with enough force to knock off a few peeling paint chips and wash them down to float in the streaming puddle on the concrete.“Urinate, kid. Your. En. Eight.”

Discharge urine. A pale-yellow fluid secreted as waste by the kidneys, stored in the bladder, discharged through the urethra.

“Oh.” Opening the zipper turned out to be more difficult than it looked. Closing it when he finished…

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“Don’t worry about it, kid. Hardly anyone keeps their foreskin these days.”

Still unable to completely straighten, Samuel found that of little actual comfort. Moving awkwardly, he followed Doug up a set of broad steps and was astonished to discover they were entering a cathedral. When he paused, Doug grabbed his arm and pulled him ahead.

“St. Mike’s only got room for fifty, kid. He who hesitates sleeps outside. Merry Christmas, Father.”

The priest nodded without glancing up from the clipboard.“Names?”

“I’m Doug. This here’s Samuel. Samuel, not Sam. We’re angels.”

“You know the rules?”

“You betcha, Father.”

“Go on, then. Clear the door.”

“This is my favorite flop in the whole city,” Doug confided as he dragged Samuel across the nave and in through the big double doors. “Whadda you think?”

The peace and beauty of the Sanctuary wrapped around the angel like a blanket. Like arms of light.

“Did you know your eyes was glowin’, kid?”

“Sorry.”

“Not a problem. Kind of pretty.” Arms spread wide, Doug turned on the spot, thin gray ponytail streaming out behind him, dirty gray overcoat flapping like wings. Pigeon wings. But why ruin the image. “Can you think of a better place for two angels to sleep?”

Actually, he couldn’t.

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Byleth had merely picked at dinner, pushing the food in circles around her plate, unable to forget how huge her butt had looked in the overalls. Then Eva brought out the lemon meringue pie, a quivering three inches deep with drops of liquid sugar glistening in the valleys of the meringue. Suddenly remembering that gluttony was one of the big seven, she had three pieces. An hour later, when the sugar high suddenly wore off, she’d found herself blinking stupidly atWhite Christmas—a movie too woogie for words—and had allowed Eva to steer her unprotesting up to bed.

She made an explicitly salacious invitation—more because she felt she should than through any desire to corrupt—which Eva didn’t even begin to understand. Without the energy to explain the unfamiliar terms, she merely took the offered nightgown and staggered off to bed.

The sheets in the spare room smelled of fabric softener. The mattress was soft. The blankets warm. She had nothing against comfort; a lot of very nasty things had been done for comfort’s sake.

“She’s certainly rude.”

“Yes, she is.”

Rolling over on her stomach, she peered off the edge of the bed at the hot air grate set into the old linoleum floor.

“She left the bathroom in a mess and borrowed my makeup without asking.”

“I saw that.”

Eva’s and Harry’s voices drifted up through the grate from the living room below.

“Her table manners are atrocious. You’d think she’d never held a fork before.”

“And the hysterics in the bathroom later…”

Well, how was she to know that was supposed to happen?

At least she seemed to be having a negative effect on the Porters. As long as they were complaining about her, the evening hadn’t been a total waste.

“Did you see her go through that pie?”

“I know; isn’t it nice to have a teenager in the house again?”

“I am not a teenager!” Both palms hit the floor as she threw herself off the bed toward the voices. “I am ademon!”

The house was silent for a moment.

Then…

“Did you put Byleth in the front bedroom?”

“Yes, I did.”

Eva’s voice grew suddenly louder, as though she now stood directly under the grate. “Sorry, dear. We forgot you could hear us.”

Teenager.

That apology, she’d accept.

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Claire closed her new laptop with a snap. The machine and the e-mail account had been another Christmas present from her parents. While she appreciated the difficulties the Apothecary’d overcome setting the system up, she couldn’t help thinking that socks and underwear would have been more useful. “According to Diana, Father Harris has no idea where the angel went. Didn’t even realize it—he—was an angel.”

“So what are we after doing?”

“We keep answering the Summons…” She frowned, searching for a plural. “…s I get. Nothing else we can do.”

Unconvinced, Dean sat beside her on the bed.“Shouldn’t we tell someone, then?”

“Who?”

“Other Keepers?”

“Actually, they know.”

“They know?”

“Not exactly about the angel, but they know we, uh, consummated our relationship. Apparently it echoed through the possibilities.” He looked so appalled, she managed what she hoped was an encouraging smile in spite of her own pique. “Everyone was very impressed. Keepers who’ve never used anything more complicated than a ballpoint pen suddenly felt obliged to send me an e-mail about it. Isn’t technology wonderful. But,” she added emphatically, the smile slipping, “since the world’s in no danger, I’m not telling them about the angel until we absolutely have to. There’s no point giving them more to discuss, is there? They’ll all start telling me we should have used precautions.”

“We did.”

“Metaphysical precautions.”

“Oh.” Cleaning already spotless glasses on the edge of his T-shirt gave him a moment to find the right words. “Claire, I’m not happy with our…with what we do, being discussed, you know, electronically.”

“I’m not happy about it either,” she admitted, tossing the laptop to one side. “But all they know that the Earth moved. Nothing specific. Without details, they won’t discuss it for long.”

“The Earth moved?”

“Well, only around the Pacific Rim…” Rising up onto her knees, she took the edge of his earlobe between her teeth. “…so you needn’t get too impressed with yourself.”

He twisted, caught her around the waist, and they fell back on the bed locked together.

“Hey! Watch the tail!”

“Oops, sorry, Austin.” As Dean sat up, Claire rolled off the bed, grabbing a pillow in one hand, scooping Austin up with the other. “And thanks for reminding me that you’ll be starting out in the bathroom tonight.”

“Oh, please. I have no interest in watching the two of you do whatever it is the two of you are intending to do.”

“I’m not so much concerned about the watching,” she told him, adjusting her hold, “as I am about the commenting and the criticizing.”

“Look, if you can’t take a little criticism…”

“Good night, Austin.”

He glared at her as she set the pillow down just inside the bathroom door and then set him on it.“This is cat abuse. You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.”

“Would a salmon treat forestall litigation?”

“No. But a salmon might.”

“Dream on.” Handing over the treat, she pulled the door closed. “Feel free to join us after we go to sleep.”

“Uh, Claire…” Dean nodded toward the door. “How can he join us if that’s closed?”

“A closed door has never stopped a determined cat.”

“Uh-huh.” His T-shirt stopped halfway up his torso. “So you’re saying he can come out any time, then?”

“No.” Smiling, she reached into the possibilities and laid them against the latch plate. “He can come out when that wears off.”

Austin’s indignant, “Cheater!” was muffled but distinct.

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“I’m sorry, Claire. This has never happened before.”

“You’ve only done it once before.”

“And this didn’t happen!”

Rising up on one elbow, she bent forward and kissed him softly.“Just relax.” Kissed him a little harder. “Everything’s going to be fine.” Kissed him with more enthusiasm. Stopped kissing him. Leaned back. “Or maybe not. You’re so tense I could bounce quarters off you…well, off most of you.…What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Is it me?”

“You?” Her question had been delivered with a total absence of emotion. Without his glasses, he couldn’t tell for sure if she looked hurt or angry. “It’s not you. It’s nothing.”

“And I know when you’re lying, remember?”

Dean sighed and surrendered.“Okay.” He stared up at the tiny red dot on the hotel room’s smoke detector and thanked all the gods who might be listening that Austin was in the bathroom. “I can’t stop thinking about what happened the last time, and it’s got me some caudled up, I can tell you.”

“Shouldn’t those be happy thoughts?” Deep burgundy fingernails tapped against his skin in a way that should have been enough to raise a reaction all on its own. It wasn’t.

His cheeks flamed.“Not those thoughts. I keep thinking about how we made an angel.”

“And you’re worried it’ll happen again?”

“No…”

“You’re worried it won’t?” His silence was all the answer she needed. “But we don’t want it to happen again.”

“But you want it to be that good.”

“Well…”

“Good enough to make an angel.”

“Yes, but…”

“That’ssome good.”

All at once, she understood.“You’re afraid you won’t be that good again!”

A faint“I heard that,” sounded from the bathroom.

Dean closed his eyes.That was all he needed to finish the night off right.

Resting her chin on his sternum, Claire considered the situation. She supposed she could see how ripping a hole through the fabric of the universe big enough to slip an angel through the very first time he had sex might cause Dean some performance anxiety. She didn’t know what to do about it though. “Dean, you can’t expect to make an angel every time.”

“I know.”

Now she was really confused.“Well, then…”

“It’s not about knowing. It’s aboutknowing.” He waved his outside arm for emphasis, hoping that its shadow movement through the dark would add clarity.

It didn’t.

“It’s me, isn’t it?”

NINE

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VAGUELY AWARE HE WAS BEING PULLED FROM SLEEP, Dean sighed deeply and arched his back. He could feel the sheet sliding away, warm air currents brushing against him, and…His eyes snapped open. “Claire, what are you doing?”

She smiled up at him.“Solving the angel prob…” Glancing down, she sighed. “Okay, should have wordedthat differently.”

“Claire!”

“I just thought that if you got going without thinking about things, momentum would keep you going. And it was working.” In the dim winter light seeping around the edges of the hotel curtains, she looked distinctly miffed. “I should never have said the ‘a’ word.”

He fumbled for his glasses.“Claire, I’m sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry.”

“You’re both pathetic.”

Ears burning, Dean dragged a blanket around his waist and slid out of bed.“I’ve, uh…you know…bathroom.”

“Try a verb,” Austin snorted from a pile of Claire’s clothes on the unused bed.

As the bathroom door closed behind Dean—and then opened again as he pulled the blanket inside—Austin leaped carefully to Claire’s side. “Do you want me to talk to him,mano a mano?”

“Thanks for the offer, but no.”

“Why not?”

“Well, to begin with, you had your mano removed.”

“Not my idea.”

“Still.” She stroked the velvet fur between his ears with her thumb. “I think this is something Dean and I have to work out on our own.”

“You mean something Dean has to work out on his own. It’s not actually about you.”

Claire shook her head.“You’re wrong.”

“Of course, I’m wrong.” Austin sat down and curled his tail around his front toes. “This has nothing to do with a young man who desperately wants to make you happy and, because of an inadvertent angelic evocation, is afraid he’ll never be able to make you that happy again. Oh, no, this has to do with you being older and more experienced so that he’s intimidated. Or it has to do with you being a Keeper because he wouldn’t have caused an angel if you weren’t. Or it has to do with you being a Keeper and therefore responsible for everything under the sun.”

“That was sarcasm, wasn’t it?”

The cat sighed.“Duh.”

“So what should I do? No, wait.” A raised hand cut off his reply. “Don’t tell me. I should feed the cat.”

“Good choice.” Jumping from the bed to the dresser, he sat down again by his food dish. “You see how much easier life becomes when you concentrate on the essentials?”

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The hair Diana had found in Father Harris’ house was very dark at the bottom and very blond at the tip. The style was popular with the male trendies at her school, but she’d never considered it an especially angelic look. Apparently, Lena did.

Technically, the angel—Samuel—was none of her business. Technically, he wasn’t Keeper business at all.

“Mom? Do you have any clear packing tape?”

Attention on breakfast preparations, Martha pointed across the kitchen with the spatula.“It’s in the junk drawer.”

Junk accumulates. Even those with very little, those chased from their homes by war or natural disaster, those for whom home is no more than a rough shack or a circle of barely roofed thatch, even they find themselves accumulating odds and ends for which they have no immediate need. In North American kitchens, the junk drawer can be found two drawers below the cutlery, just above the drawer holding the clean dish towels.

“It’s jammed.”

“Jiggle it.”

Even in houses with no more metaphysical content than could be found in a frozen, microwavable dinner—which at that, has more metaphysical content than actual food content—these drawers contain far more than is physically possible.

“Dart of Abaris, elf shot, scissors, string, Philosopher’s Stone, half a dozen ponytail elastics…” Diana’s eyes widened as she dumped the cloth-covered elastics into a small golden chalice. “Do you even care we could get big bucks for this thing on eBay?” she demanded, brandishing a tiny beanbag polar bear with a maple leaf on his chest.

Her mother glanced up from the toaster.“E what?”

“Gack. Am I the only person in this family who pays attention tothis century?”

“Yes.”

“Explains a lot,” she muttered, shoving three plastic forks and a discolored envelope of dried mugwort aside to finally pull out the packing tape. “I’ll be heading into the closet later, so don’t worry if you can’t find me.”

“Diana, we talked about this…”

She sighed and grabbed a piece of toast on her way out of the kitchen.“I’m not going toconsciously impose my will on the Otherworld.”

“Again.”

Continuing down the hall, she raised her voice without turning.“It was an accident, Mother.”

“It’s always an accident, Diana, but no one likes replacing all their closet doors.”

“It’s not like I didn’t apologize,” she muttered, shoving the last of the toast in her mouth and grabbing her coat and boots from the front hall. “And, hey, not my bad the tabloids got involved; if you don’t want people to know you have skeletons in your closet, don’t keep skeletons in your closet.” It had been sheer bad luck for that British Keeper that the force of the explosion had blown the tibia out the window and onto the street.

Back in her bedroom with the door securely closed and warded behind her, Diana threw her coat on the bed, pulled off a piece of tape about twenty centimeters long, picked up the angel hair with it, and wrapped it around her wrist. While she hadn’t exactly lied to her mother—shewas going into the closet—she’d neglected to mention that she planned on going out the other side, a maneuver generally considered too dangerous to attempt.

The only reason Keepers exited at the same place they entered was plain old lack of imagination as far as Diana was concerned. So what if there were no other geographical references to the real world—she had that covered.

And all she had to do was make a phone call.

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“Isn’titabeautifulmorning!Lookatthewaythesnowsparkles!”

Doug sucked muffin out of his teeth.“First cup of coffee, kid?”

“Ican’tbelieveI’vebeenherefortwodaysandIonlyjustdiscoveredthis.” Grinning broadly, Samuel raced down the front steps of St. Mike’s and back up again.

“You have to remember to breathe, kid.”

“I do?” Well, now he did. Sucking in a huge lungful of cold air, he started to cough.

“Cough into your cupped hands,” Doug told him. “Then you breathe in the warmed air.”

It took Samuel a minute to catch on, then another minutes for his lungs to get the idea. Finally, eyes watering, nose running, he looked up and gasped,“Ow.”

Doug nodded agreeably.“Life’s a bitch.”

“A female dog?” Samuel asked, wiping various bodily fluids off his face before they froze.

“Oh, yeah.”

And things were just starting to make sense.…Trying to work out this new worldview, Samuel turned, stiffened, and raced down to the sidewalk. “Are you crazy?” he demanded, yanking the cigarette out from between cracked lips and throwing it on the ground. “You’re destroying your body! You only getone, you know.”

Craig Russel, who’d been smoking since he was twelve and in better economic times had maintained a two-pack-a-day habit, peered out at Samuel from between the tattered ear flaps of his deerstalker, then down at his cigarette lying propped almost on end by a bit of dirty snow. Not entirely certain what had just happened, he squatted and extended fingers stained yellow-brown with nicotine.

“Didn’t you hear me?” Samuel ground the cigarette into pieces and the pieces into the snow. “Those things are bad for you!”

Grizzled brows drew in.“You smashed my smoke.”

“Well, yeah. It’s poison.”

“You smashed my smoke.” Craig stood, slowly, and leaned forward to stare into Samuel’s face. “My last smoke.”

Eyes beginning to water again, Samuel leaned back.“Do you have any idea how bad those things made your breath sm…” His mouth opened and closed a few more times, but no sound emerged. Up on his toes, back arched, he pushed at the air with stiff fingers.

“Let him go, Craig.”

“He smashed my smoke. My last smoke.”

“Yeah, I know, but you keep hold of his balls any longer and people’ll start to talk.”

Craig stared down at his right hand as though he recognized neither it nor the crushed fabric and flesh it held.“He smashed my…”

“No shit. But I bet he’s really, really sorry.” Scratching at a scab buried deep in the stubble on his chin, Doug turned a bloodshot gaze on the younger man. “Ain’t you, kid?”

Samuel nodded. Vigorously. The pigeon about to land on his head banked left and settled on his shoulder. A second pigeon, following close behind, touched down on the other side.

“Oh, man.” Eyes wide, Craig opened his hand and backed away. “He’s got pigeons!”

Three.

Four.

Craig turned and ran.

Bent nearly double, both hands cupping his crotch, Samuel whimpered. Five pigeons landed on his back, jostling for space.

“You shouldn’t of smashed Craig’s smoke, kid.”

“But they’re…bad for…him.”

Finally freeing the scab, Doug flicked it away.“Worse for you.”

That was hard to argue with.“He’s stronger than…he looks.”

“Yep.”

Finally beginning to get his breath back, Samuel cautiously straightened, dumping the five pigeons into the feathered crowd gathered around his feet.“Is there an up side to these things?” he demanded, cautiously pulling fabric away from his body. “They’ve been nothing but trouble since I got them.”

“Them? Oh. Them. Well, there’s girls.”

“What do they have to do with girls?”

Doug frowned thoughtfully.“I forget.”

Half a block away, a pay phone began to ring. The diaspora of street people fanning out from St. Mike’s paused as one, then began moving again. Phones had nothing to do with them.

“Half a mo, kid. That’s probably my bookie.” A little more than half a minute later, he was back. “Not mine, kid. Yours.”

“But I don’t have a bookie.”

“Que sera. She still wants to talk to you.”

The pigeons reluctantly gave way before him and fell in behind.

Samuel picked up the phone—patented by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876, and he had no idea why he knew that but didn’t know which end he was supposed to speak into. Finally, he figured it out. “Hello?”

“Samuel? My name is Diana, and I’m a Keeper. Do you know what a Keeper is?”

“The people who maintain the metaphysical balance of good on this world.”

“Ta dah.”

He thought about everything he’d seen and heard over the last two days, especially about the things he’d heard last night in the shelter. “You’re not doing a very good job.”

“Give me a break, I’m still in high school. I want to meet you, so I need you to do me a favor. Find a closet door, open it enough to get your arm through, and wave it around.”

“Wave it?”

“Your arm. When I grab your hand, pull me through to your side.”

“You’ll fit through a space I can get my arm through?”

“Excuse me?”

“You said…”

“Yeah, I know what I said. You can open the door a little wider when you pull me through.”

“Oh.” He wondered if she was pretty. Then he wondered why it mattered. Then he found himself wondering about her breasts. He had a feeling he shouldn’t be, but he couldn’t seem to stop.

“Samuel?”

He pushed a pigeon out of the phone booth.“How do you know my name?”

“Father Harris told me. Are you all right?”

“My genitalia hurts.”

“What have you been…never mind. I don’t want to know.Can you find a closet door?”

Samuel sighed and shrugged even though he knew the Keeper couldn’t see him. “Sure.”

“Brillig. I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

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St. Patrick was right. Therewas something funny about that boy. Lacing up her boots, Diana went over their conversation but couldn’t put her finger on it. For an angel, he’d sounded pretty much like any of the guys she went to school with, right down to that last, irritating“Sure.”

Minus the comment about the genitalia.

Or given a different choice of words at the very least.

She shoved her arms into her jacket, stuffed her hat and mittens into the outside pockets, checked her inside pocket for her wallet, and stepped into the closet, pulling the door closed but not latching it behind her. She’d have preferred to be traveling with her backpack, her computer, and her cell phone, but the possibilities reacted badly to electronics. Last time she tried to take her computer in with her, every window in the Otherworld had to be closed and reopened before things stabilized.

Tripping over a pile of shoes propelled her half a dozen staggering steps into the darkness. Arms flailing, she finally regained her balance after careening off a number of hard objects she couldn’t identify through the bulk of her jacket.

“Stupid goose down…makes me look like the Michelin Man.”

Stupid winter.

Stupid cold.

“Like it would’ve killed my parents to have settled outside of Disney World?” she asked the darkness. The darkness answered with the distant strains of a familiar theme song. Wincing, she redirected her concentration toward the angel, wondering just what made subconscious control of the Otherworld so different from conscious control.

Worse luck that Samuel wasn’t in Florida. She could use a break from late December in Canada.

It grew lighter.

The ground compacted under her boots.

A jack pine dropped a load of snow down the back of her neck.

“Oh, man!”

By the time she finished dancing around, flapping the snow away, it was fully light. Or as light as it was going to get at any rate. Snow-covered hills rolled away into the distance. To her right, a jagged rock outcrop rose up only a little grayer than the sky. To her left, and pretty much directly above her, evergreens bowed under their burden of snow.

Blowing out a disgusted plume of air, Diana dug for hat and mitts thinking that Mrs. Green, her CanLit teacher,’d be creaming herself at so much landscape and isolation. “Yeah, right,” she muttered, dragging her hat over her ears. “Like Canada in late December doesn’t include coffee shops and Boxing Day sales. Couldn’t have landed in an Otherworld Starbucks or HMV, oh, no.That would be too easy.”

What made subconscious control of the Otherworld so different from conscious control? Well, that was obvious: conscious control created a place where people actually wanted to be.

She couldn’t see the angel’s arm.

Which wasn’t surprising since there weren’t any doors.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“You can’t go back in there, kid.”

Samuel paused, one hand on the small door leading into St. Mike’s. “Why not? It’s a House of Light, and I’m an angel.”

“Well, yeah, but the priests get all bent out of shape if you hang out inside during the day. They got stuff to do, you know.”

“I won’t get in the way. I have to stick my arm into a closet.”

“Why?”

“It’s for a girl.”

“Hey.” Both Doug’s hands went up. “Say no more re amore. You go put your arm in a closet, and I’ll be waiting right here when they toss your ass back into the cold.”

“Sure.” Hurrying along the side of the sanctuary, he found himself really loving that word. It was a good, all-purpose sort of a word. “Sure,” he told himself softly. It could mean anything. Passing a niche holding a statue of Mary cradling an infant Christ, he smiled up at her. “Sure,”he said.

“And just what does that mean?” she demanded, shifting the baby to her other hip.

“You know…”

“If I knew, I wouldn’t have asked. Stand up straight, Samuel, don’t slouch. And what have you done to your hair?”

“Um…” He touched his head. He hadn’t done anything to his hair. Had he? “I, uh, have to go put my arm in a closet.”

“Fine. Just remember to clean up when you’re done.”

“Sure. I mean, okay.”

“Teenagers,” the statue sighed as he hurried away.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“I refuse to believe my subconscious had anything to do with this,” Diana sighed.

“Beg pardon, Miss?”

“Never mind.” She settled back in the furs, left arm held out, coat shoved up, mitt shoved down. As they came out from under the trees and started across a rolling expanse of snow, the glowing angel’s hair taped around her wrist began to fade. When she pointed to the right, the driver, a purewhite Alaskan Malamute, leaned out, barking, “Gee! Gee!”

The seven Mounties in the traces angled to the right, the sled came around, and the hair began to glow strongly again.

The Mounties were fresh and running well. They were making good time.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Standing in the basement of St. Mike’s with his arm stuffed into a broom closet, Samuel wondered why his hand was getting cold.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“There’s the trading post, Miss. Smells like we’ve found your exit.”

Diana sniffed at the frigid air, then rubbed her nose with the back of her mitten.“All I can smell is aftershave.”

“I had the Mounties groomed this morning.”

“Let’s just not go there, okay?”

The hair taped to her wrist blazed, and an answering light waved up and down at the trading post door. It disappeared for a moment then, just as Diana was beginning to worry, it reappeared again. A closet, wardrobe, armoire, or the like was necessary to enter the Otherworld but any door would do for a way out. Under normal circumstances, walking into the trading post with an intent to travel would put her back in her bedroom, but Samuel straddled both worlds as a metaphysical construct, and could, therefore, anchor an exit. Diana had thought out the theory very carefully.

Checking the ancient texts…

Consulting the mystic oracles…

Watching theNational Geographic special on PBS…

Actually, the idea had come to her at two a.m. when a particularly loud whir/click from her clock radio had pulled her from a dream where she seemed to be either Sharon Stone or Barney Rubble. Which was in no way connected to anything much.

Since here she was and there was Samuel, the theory seemed sound and nothing more would have been accomplished even had she checked, consulted, and spent the evening with public television instead of Laura Croft.

By the time the sled pulled up in front of the trading post, Diana had untangled herself from the furs. Swinging both legs over the side, she sank up to her boot tops in the snow, staggered and would have fallen had the husky not stretched out a foreleg to help her.“Thank you.” Balance regained, she moved away from the runners, just barely managing to resist a totally inappropriate urge to rub his tummy.

“Glad to be of service, Miss.” He touched the edge of a pointed ear with one paw, whistled to his Mounties, and rode off into a convenient and localized sunset.

Diana watched them disappear, then climbed the thick plank stairs toward the light. Which disappeared.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Samuel rubbed his arm where the door kept closing on it and wished the Keeper would hurry.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

The light reappeared, and from beyond it, Diana heard a voice say:“Why the hell does that damned door keep opening?”

Then the light disappeared again.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Ow!”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Appeared.

“There’s nothing wrong with the damned latch.”

Disappeared.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“OW!”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Appeared.

This time, Diana had her mitten off. She reached into the light, felt fingers close around hers, and kicked the door open.

She heard the unmistakable hollow impact of wood hitting forehead, half an expletive, and then she was standing in a dim basement staring into the gold-flecked eyes of the angel. She could see the light he was made of, and that was good, but that wasn’t all she could see, and that was bad. Standing almost nose to nose, she realized he wasn’t much taller than she was and unthreateningly attractive in a boy band sort of way.

“Thanks for hurrying,” he muttered, releasing her hand and cradling his arm against his chest.

Diana blinked.“Are angels allowed to be that sarcastic?”

“Apparently.”

“Hey! What are you kids doing down there?”

They turned together to face the middle-aged nun stomping toward them.

“Please, excuse us, Sister. We were just leaving.”

She stopped in mid-stomp.“Right. Fine. Get going, then!”

“You can’t do that to a servant of the light,” Samuel protested as they hurried up the stairs.

“Yeah, I can. Just did.”

“But you’re not supposed to.”

“Did you want to explain what we were doing down there to Sister Mary I’ve-spent-more-years-teaching-teenagers-than-you’ve-been-alive-so-don’t-give-me-any-lip?”

“Her name is Sister Mary Francis.”

“So what? Look, Samuel, some things you can explain to Bystanders, some things you can’t. Pulling a Keeper out of a closet is totally can’t.”

They retraced Samuel’s path along the Sanctuary. He carefully avoided eye contact with the statue of the Holy Mother.

Half a dozen pigeons waited with Doug on the front steps. As Samuel stepped outside, they started toward him, noticed Diana, and came to a sudden, feather ruffling stop.

“The flying rats with you?” she sighed.

“Sort of. I can’t get rid of them.”

“Not a problem.” She raked a disdainful gaze over the birds and without raising her voice said, “Scram.”

A moment later, the steps were clear, a lone feather lost in the panic the only indication the pigeons had ever been there at all.

“Why didn’t it work when I did that?” Samuel muttered, hands shoved into his pockets.

“You wouldn’t hurt them, and they knew that. I, on the other hand, am perfectly capable of roasting them with a few chestnuts over an open fire and they knew that, too.”

“But you wouldn’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

The gold flecks swirled into the brown.“Yes, I do.”

“Stop it!”

“Kids, kids, kids.” Doug heaved himself up onto his feet and walked over. “Not the place to be spatting.”

“Spatting?” Diana wrinkled her nose at the smell. “Who are you?”

“This is Doug, he’s an angel, too. He taught me how to eat, how to urinate…”

“Eww, gross.”

“…where to sleep. I wouldn’t have gotten through last night without him.”

“You’d have managed, kid.”

Diana snorted.“You’re an angel?”

He spread his arms. The smell intensified.“Fuckin’ A. But my work here is done.” Sliding sideways a step, he elbowed Samuel in the ribs. “You’ve got your girlie to take care of you now, kid. Me, I hear a bottle of…” His brows drew in. “Doesn’t really matter what’s in the bottle, come to think of it.” A grayish tongue swept over dry lips. “But something’s callin’ me, that’s for shittin’ sure. See ya, kid.”

“See you, Doug.”

Watching Doug descend to the sidewalk and head north, Diana couldn’t think of a less likely angel—although she supposed it was a harmless enough delusion. “Come on, I’m freezing, let’s walk.”

Samuel shrugged.“Sure.”

At the sidewalk, she glanced back up at the impressive front of the cathedral. And frowned. It had been snowing lightly, enough to obliterate all but the most recent footprints. A single line matching her boots led up to the wide double doors. She looked down at Samuel’s feet, then she looked north. The snow lay like an ivory carpet, surface unbroken to the corner.

“Son of a…”

A small dog trotting by on the other side of the street paused expectantly.

Diana waved him on.“Never mind.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Claire!”

Down on one knee by the side of the road, Claire waved at Dean to be quiet. She almost had the stupid hole closed and…

Grabbing her under both arms, Dean threw her back toward the truck just as the SUV fishtailed across the highway, slid right over the hole, and came to an abrupt halt at the edge of the ditch.

Claire stared at the skid marks, noted that the heavy vehicle would have gone right through her, then squirmed around in Dean’s arms. “Thank you,” she said, and pulled his mouth down to hers. After a moment, in spite of heavy clothes and subzero temperatures, she got the distinct impression that they could solve the angel problem right there.

“I should see if the buddy in the car’s all right, then,” he murmured, separating their mouths only far enough to speak.

“You should.” She flicked her tongue against his lips and slid her hand up under his coat.

Dean jerked back and slammed his head into the truck.“Lord t’undering Jesus, Claire! Your fingers are like ice!”

“Sorry.”

He touched a hand to the back of his head and winced.“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not okay. That sounded like it really hurt.”

“Hey, Florence Nightingale.” Austin’s head appeared over the tailgate. “The man knows if he’s okay. Get back to work. I’m freezing my furry little butt off out here!”

“You could have stayed in the truck,” Claire reminded him as she stood and wondered if it was against some sort of guy code to help Dean to his feet.

Austin flicked his ear to dislodge a snowflake.“I had to use the little cat room. Now, you,” he fixed Dean with a baleful glare, “check the yuppie mobile. You…” The single eye switched targets. “…close the hole. And you…” Lifting his head, he scowled at the sky. “…stop snowing on me. I’m old.”

“Austin, that’s not…”

A sudden gust of wind blew the last flakes sideways. No more fell.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Only the front wheels of the SUV had gone into the ditch; a good two thirds remained firmly on the wide shoulder. The engine purred quietly to itself, the sound barely audible and nothing came out of the exhaust in spite of the cold. It was a deep maroon with a high gloss finish that looked like it could withstand a meteor strike and, in spite of four-wheel drive and heavy duty suspension, this was likely as far off road as it had ever been.

Squinting through the tinted glass, Dean realized the thin, blonde woman behind the wheel was on the phone. When he tapped on the driver’s door window, she opened it a finger’s width but continued looking down at the laptop open on the leather upholstery of the passenger seat. “Ma’am, you don’t need to call for a tow. You’re barely off the road; you can just back up.”

She ignored him and kept talking.“…telling you the bank beat by nine cents the average estimate of sixty cents a share.”

“Ma’am?”

A slender hand in a burgundy leather glove waved vaguely in his direction.“But you’re forgetting that volatile capital markets allowed a forty-five percent increase in fees, and that’s where you can attribute most of the profit growth.”

“I’m after heading back to my truck now.”

“Look, Frank, it was loan volumes that brought the interest income up nine percent to three hundred and thirty-seven million dollars.”

“Ma’am?”

“Three hundred and thirty-seven million dollars, Frank!”

“Never mind.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Claire and Austin were waiting inside the truck.

“I guess the driver’s all right,” Dean told them as Claire lifted Austin off the driver’s seat and onto her lap, “but she wouldn’t actually talk to me.”

“She? Should I go?”

“Got three hundred and thirty-seven million dollars?” When Claire answered in the negative, he grinned. “Then I doubt she’ll talk to you either.” Putting his glasses back on after carefully wiping the condensation off the lenses, he frowned. “What’s wrong?”

“A new Summons; stronger than these little roadside things.” She rested her chin on the top of Austin’s head. “It feels strange.”

“Is it the angel, then? ’Cause if I wasn’t scared abroad by Hell, an angel won’t trouble me much.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Only one way to find out.” He pulled carefully onto the highway. “Which way?”

“North.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“So, dear, when you call yourself a demon—is that a club?”

“No.” Byleth sagged farther down in the back seat, the shoulder belt preventing a really good slouch. “It’s not a fu…”

“Language.” Half turning, Eva raised a cautioning finger.

“It’s not a club.” Byleth had no idea how the mortal woman did it. Something about her tone of voice, her expression, evoked an instinctive obedience. If the Princes of Hell could figure it out, they’d be…well, since they were already ruling Hell, nothing much would change but the shouting. Hell could do with a little less shouting in Byleth’s opinion.

“It’s not a gang, is it?” Harry asked, trying to catch her gaze in the rearview mirror. “Because I know how seductive gangs can be. Black leather and motorcycles and…”

“Harry.”

Under the edge of his tweed hat, Harry’s ears pinked.

Eva half turned again.“Harry had a bit of a past before he met me.”

“I’ll bet he did,” the demon muttered.

“What was that, dear?”

“It’snot a gang.”

“Oh, that’s good.”

The day was not going as planned. Coercing the old man into driving her to Toronto had somehow turned into a cheerful family outing. With snacks. She should have walked out right after that big homemade breakfast and found some punk kid who’d just got his license and who’d do anything she asked if she just bounced those really annoying breasts at him in a promising sort of a way. Not that she’d keep the promise, of course. Her kind excelled at broken promises.

“Shall we play license plate bingo, dear?”

Fortunately Harry answered before she could.

“Byleth’s too old for that, Eva. Remember what our lot were like at her age?”

“The boys,” Eva began, but Harry cut her off, one hand leaving the steering wheel just long enough to pat a rounded knee.

“The boys played to make you happy, but our Angela drew the line about the same time she started high school.”

“I suppose,” Eva sighed. Then she perked up and half turned one more time. “Where do you go to high school, dear?”

“I don’t.”

“Oh, you have to get an education, dear. After all, knowledge is power.”

“Power is power,” Byleth snarled. She should have power. She should be able to reach into the dark heart of humanity and twist it to her purposes. Not only had some extra anatomy put an unexpected crimp in her plans—and she was so going to kick that angel’s ass when she found him—but her current minions gave her very little to work with.

“Hey, Mr. Porter, that guy in the import flipped you the finger as he passed.”

Which is not to say she didn’t do what she could.

“Harry, that’s no reason for you to drive faster,” Eva warned.

He smiled at her briefly.“Of course not.”

But the speed crept up.

It didn’t take much to keep it rising.

The inevitable siren brought a smile and a frisson of anticipation.

Lips pressed into a disapproving line, Eva kept silent as Harry pulled over and turned off the engine.

Behind them, a car door slammed and footsteps approached along the gravel shoulder. When Harry rolled down his window, Byleth straightened to get a better look.

“License and registration, please.”

The Ontario Provincial Police constable was tall and tanned, his hair gleaming gold in the winter sunlight. His eyes were blue, his voice was deep, and his chin had the cutest cleft. The breadth of his shoulders filled the window.

“Do you know how fast you were going, sir?”

In the back seat, Byleth sat up straighter, tugging at her jacket.

“I’m sorry, Officer. Some kid passed me in a sporty little import, and I guess I just rose to the challenge.”

A quick swipe of her tongue across her lips. Did she still have any lipstick on? Sheknew she should have put more on at the last rest stop.

“You can’t let other people do the driving in your car, sir.”

That was clever. He wasn’t only the cutest thing she’d seen since she arrived, he wassmart, too.

“Now 113km in an 80 should be a three-hundred-dollar fine and six points off your license, but…”

Why didn’t he look at her?

“…I’m going to let you off with a warning. This time. If I pull you over again…” His voice trailed off.

And he was merciful.

Handing back Harry’s paperwork, he finally glanced into the back seat, but his gaze slid over her like she was completely unworthy of being noticed.

Arms folded, brows in, she slid back into her slouch, achieving new lows. What the hell did she care about merciful anyway?

“Thank you, Officer.”

“Drive safely, sir. Have a good day, ma’am. Miss.”

Her eyes narrowed.“Whatever.”

He glanced into the back again, then he smiled at Harry.“Teenagers, eh?”

“Teenagers, eh?” Byleth mocked as the officer returned to his cruiser. “What a jerk.”

“Good-looking man, though. Wasn’t he, dear?”

“I never noticed. And what are you smiling about?” she demanded as the Porters exchanged an amused glance.

“Nothing.”

“Good.” Glaring straight ahead, she refused to acknowledge the police car as it passed, repeating, “Jerk. Jerk. Jerk. Jerk,” vehemently under her breath.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Careful, Austin.” Scooping him back up onto the seat, Claire wore a worried expression. “Are you all right? You were sound asleep, and then…”

“And then I wasn’t. Yeah, I know.” He got his legs untangled and climbed over to her right thigh, where he could stand and look out the window. “Something we passed woke me up.”

“Do you want me to pull over?” Dean asked.

“No.” He put a paw on the glass and watched the traffic across the median speeding south. “It’s gone now.”

TEN

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_4]

“YOU ARESONOT LIKE WHAT I IMAGINED an angel to be. Your hair, your clothes…”

“My genitalia,” Samuel added a little mournfully.

Diana made a disgusted face and shoved mittened hands deeper into her pockets.“I wouldn’t know, and I’d really rather you quit mentioning it.”

“Them.”

“Whatever.”

“Why?” For no good reason, he jumped up and smacked the No Parking sign, checking out of the corner of one eye to see if the Keeper was impressed. She didn’t seem to be.

“They’re just not something people talk about in public.”

“Should we go someplace private?”

“You wish.”

“For what?”

“Pardon?”

“What do I wish for?”

“Well, if you don’t know, I’m not going to tell you.”

“But if I knew, you wouldn’t have to tell me,” he pointed out reasonably as they turned the corner onto Yonge Street. Across the road, a double line of people stood stamping their feet and blowing on their hands. “Those people are cold. Why are they standing there?”

“Best guess, they’re waiting to get into the electronics store for the Boxing Day sale.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why? Because it’s a sale.” She rolled her eyes. “I thought you had Higher Knowledge.”

“I do. The 26th of December is called Boxing Day because in Victorian England that’s when the rich boxed up their Christmas leftover for the poor.”

“Really?”

“It’s one theory. But it still doesn’t explain that.” He waved a hand at the crowd across the street. “Most of those people are anxious, over half are actually unhappy, and although they’ll be saving money, they’d all be better off if they just didn’t spend it. A new stereo won’t give meaning to their empty, shallow lives.”

Diana grabbed the back of his jacket as he stepped off the curb.“Where are you going?”

“To tell them that.”

“I’m just guessing here, but I think they know.”

He half-turned in her grip.“Really?”

“Uh-huh. It’s a human thing; a new stereo will help themforget their empty shallow lives.”

“Human memory is that bad?”

“Well, duh. Why do you think platform shoes and mini skirts have come back? Because people have forgotten how truly dorky they looked the first time.” Diana shuddered. “Me, I’ve seen my mother’s yearbook pictures.” She hauled him back up onto the sidewalk. “You hungry?”

“Starving.”

“You’re not supposed to be.” His situation had deteriorated farther than she’d feared. “Come on, I’ll buy you…” She checked her watch. “…lunch and we’ll talk.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“…and that’s why you’re here.” Diana peered over the pile of fast food wrappers in front of the angel. “Are you blushing?”

“You said your sister…you know,” he mumbled.

“I really think you’ve got more to worry about than my sister’s sex life.” Elbows up on the table, she ticked the points off on her fingers. “One, angels are, by definition, messengers of the Lord, but because of the way you came into being, you have no message, thus leaving you with a distinct identity crisis.”

“Thus?”

“Don’t interrupt. Two, you can’t return to the light, so you’re stuck here even though you have no reason to be here and no visible means of support. Three, from what I’ve seen so far, the boy bits seem to be doing all the defining.”

“The what?”

She sighed.“Don’t make me say it.”

“Oh. Them. No, they’re not.”

“Yeah, they are.”

“No.”

“Yes. You shouldn’t be perpetually hungry. You shouldn’t know what a six-liter engine is.” Her eyes narrowed. “And you shouldn’t be looking at my breasts!”

Ears burning, he locked his gaze on her right eyebrow.“You’re a Keeper. You could send me back.”

“Only if you want to go.” Pushing a desiccated French fry around with a fingertip, she sighed again. This was, after all, why she’d come to Toronto. It had only taken a small prod from St. Patrick for her to realize that an angel designed by committee would need a Keeper’s help to go home—her help. “The problem is,” she said slowly, “if I send you back, you won’t be you anymore. You’d just be light.”

“But that’s what I am.”

Diana shook her head.“That’s not all you are. If I send you back, then the you that I’m talking to, the you that’s experienced the world, he’ll disappear. I’ll have killed him.”

“Killed me?” When she nodded, he frowned. “That sucks.”

“Tell me about it.”

“You already know about it.”

“Figure of speech, Samuel. I was agreeing with you.” She dropped her chin onto her hands. “I don’t know what to do, and I really hate that feeling.”

“Tell me about it,” Samuel muttered, unwrapping a fourth…something that seemed to involve chicken ova, a slice of pig in nitrate, and melted orange stuff probably intended to represent a dairy product. He’d eaten the first three too fast to really taste them, which all things considered, had probably been smart. “So, what you do think of the idea that I am the message? That I’m here to help people?”

“How? And don’t give me that look,” Diana warned him. “I’m not being mean, I’m being realistic. You can’t even help yourself.”

“I’ve been managing.”

“No. You haven’t. Can I think of an example? Hmmm, let’s see.” She leaned forward. “How about: without me, you’d be covered in pigeons.”

“Well, yeah, but…”

“And pigeon shit.”

His brows drew in. He didn’t know they could do that. It was an interesting feeling. “I’m still a superior being, I can figure stuff out.”

“How do you know you’re a superior being?”

“I just…know.”

“So does every other male between twelve and twenty,” she snorted, folding her arms. “But that doesn’t solve their problems either.”

Samuel stared at her for a long moment, then he smiled.“I could be insulted, but I know you’re only saying that because of your own sexual ambiguity.” He took a large bite and chewed slowly. “I mean, you say you’re a lesbian, but you’ve never actually made it with a woman although you did make it with a guy and it wasn’t entirely his fault it was such a disaster.”

Her lip curled.“If you were to choke right now, I wouldn’t save you.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

They left the highway just north of Huntsville, heading southwest on 518.

“We’re close,” Claire insisted when Austin pointed out the total lack of anything but Canadian landscape around them.

“Close to what?” he snorted. “The edge of the world?”

“We need to turn right soon. There.” She pointed. “Is that a road?”

It was. After another thirteen kilometers of spruce bog and snow, they passed the first house. Then the second. Then a boarded-up business. Then, suddenly, they were in downtown Waverton—all five blocks of it.

“Park in front of the bank.”

Braking carefully, Dean peered down at the thick, milky slabs of frozen water.“I don’t know, Claire; it looks some icy.”

“We’ll be okay.”

“If you’re thinking of using my kitty litter to make it okay, think again,” Austin muttered, climbing up onto the top of the seat.

“You mean because I’m only a Keeper with access to an infinite number of possibilities and wouldn’t be able to get this truck moving without a bag of dried clay bits designed to absorb cat urine?”

“Essentially…” He paused to lick his shoulder. “…yes.”

Lips pressed into a thin line, Claire reached into the possibilities and slid the truck sideways across the nearly frictionless surface, bringing it to a gentle stop against the slightly higher ice sheet that was the curb.

Dean released the breath he’d been holding and forced the white-knuckled fingers of one hand to let go of the steering wheel long enough to switch off the engine. “You need to warn me when you’re after doing something like that,” he said, still staring straight ahead as though he intended to keep the truck from ending up at the New Accounts desk by visual aids alone. “Sideways is not a good way.”

“Sorry.”

He turned to face her then.“Really?”

“No.”

“Austin!”

“Just giving him the benefit of my experience. You’ve never been sorry when you do that sort of thing to me.”

“When have I ever…?”

“Plevna. December 12th, 1997.”

“How was I supposed to know claws don’t provide traction? It was an honest mistake.”

“Uh-huh.”

Yanking her toque down over her ears, Claire got out of the truck.“He scored the winning goal,” she pointed out to Dean as she closed the door.

“How did you hold the stick?” Dean wondered, pulling on his gloves.

Austin’s head swiveled slowly around. “I. Didn’t.”

“Oh.” His hindbrain decided it might be safer to back away, making no sudden moves. He caught up to Claire by the corner of the bank.

“Someone set this fire,” she said, looking up at the damage. “And that opened the hole.” Hugging her own elbows, she shook her head. “There’s a lot of nasty coming through for the size. This might take some time to seal up; can you keep me from being disturbed?”

“You got it, Boss.”

“You haven’t called me that for a while.”

Their eyes locked.

“You haven’t told me what to do for a while.”

“Maybe I should start.”

“Maybe you should.”

A muffled“Get a room!” from inside the truck redirected their attention to the matter at hand.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Excuse me, Miss!” Mr. Tannison, the bank manager, hurried toward his damaged building from his temporary office across the street, upstairs over the storefront shared by Martin Eisner, the taxidermist, and Dr. Chow, the dentist. “You can’t stay there. Bricks could fall.” He forgot about the ice until his front boot surrendered traction and he began to slide. Before he could steady himself on the truck parked in front of the bank, a large hand caught his arm and set him back on his feet.

“It’s okay, sir. She’s perfectly safe.”

“She is?” Something about the young man made him feel like a fool for asking. He considered himself a good judge of character—well, he had to be in his position, didn’t he?—and by voice, expression, and bearing, this stranger said,“I will have my withdrawal slip filled out properly before I approach the teller, I would never stand too close at the ATM machine, and your pens are sacred to me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Oh.” The blue eyes behind the glasses made him think of contributions to retirement savings plans done monthly rather than left until the last minute. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

“No, sir, St. John’s. Newfoundland.”

“Small world. One of my tellers is from St. John’s. Rose Mooran.”

“Does she have a brother named Conrad, then? I played Peewee hockey with a Conrad Mooran.”

“No, not her brother, that would be her husband.”

“Husband? Lord t’undering Jesus.”

They spent a while longer discussing hockey and the relative size of the world, then Mr. Tannison patted a muscular arm, flashed a relieved smile, and hurried back across the street.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

The clutch of eight-year-olds were a little harder to impress.

When Dean limped back to the truck, Claire was standing by the passenger door looking a little stunned.

“Is it closed?”

She nodded.

“What’s wrong?”

When she held up her hand, her fingertips were dusted with black glitter.

“Char?”

“Demon residue.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“Once you’re in the city, where are you planning on going, dear?”

Byleth stared out past the Porters’ heads at the Toronto skyline, thrusting up into a gray sky like a not particularly attractive pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. “As far away from you as possible,” she muttered.

To her surprise, Harry Porter lifted an admonishing finger toward her reflection in the rearview mirror.“That is quite enough of that, young lady. There is no call for you to be so rude. You will apologize to Mrs. Porter this instant.”

“As if.”

“Fine.” At the first break in traffic, he moved into the right-hand lane and began slowing down.

“Harry…”

“No, Eva. She apologizes, or she walks the rest of the way.”

Demons understood bluffing. Byleth folded her arms and waited.

When the car finally rolled to a stop, Harry put it into park and turned around.“Last chance,” he said. “Apologize, or this is as far as we go together.”

She tucked her chin into her collar and glowered.

“If that’s the way you want it.” He unbuckled his seat belt, got out, and opened her door.

When she stared up into his face through the blast of frigid air, she realized he wasn’t bluffing. “You actually want me to walk. We’re still miles away!”

“We’re still kilometers away,” Harry corrected. “And I want you to apologize. It’s your choice whether or not you walk.”

It was cold outside. It was warm inside the car.

“Get back in the car and drive.”

He merely stood there. She might as well have tried to command a rock.

“I’ll hitchhike, then, and get picked up by a mass murderer, and then how will you feel when they find a broken bleeding body by the side of the road.” It wouldn’t be her broken, bleeding body, but he didn’t need to know that.

Harry shook his head.“Not even mass murderers would stop for you. Not at these speeds. You’ll be walking all the way.”

“I don’t want to walk!”

“Then apologize.”

The car rocked as four transports passed, belching diesel fumes. She contemplated kicking Harry into traffic, but Eva would likely fall apart and be totally useless and although she knew how to bring plagues and pestilence, she didn’t know how to drive.

“Make up your mind, Byleth.”

“Fine.” Anything to get her into the city where she could ditch these losers. “I’m s…” Her very nature fought with the word. “I’m sorr…” She had to form each letter independently, forcing it out past reluctant lips. “I’m sorry. Okay?”

“Eva?”

“Apology accepted, dear.”

“Now was that so hard?” Harry asked, smiling at her reflection as he slid back behind the wheel.

“Yeah, it was.”

“Don’t worry. It’ll get easier with time.”

She was afraid of that.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“Excuse me.” Braced against the movement of the escalator, Samuel reached forward and tapped the heavyset matron on one virgin-wool covered shoulder. “The sign says that if you stand on the right, then people in a hurry can walk up the left.”

“There’s no space on the right,” she pointed out sharply.

“Then you should have waited.”

“And maybe you should mind your own business.”

“You shouldn’t let the fear of being on your own keep you in a bad relationship. Your husband is controlling and manipulative, and just because he doesn’t love you anymore, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t love yourself…”

The sound of her palm connecting with his cheek disappeared into the ambient noise. In the fine tradition of mall crawlers everywhere, those standing too close to have missed the exchange either stared fixedly at nothing or isolated themselves from the incident behind a loud and pointless conversation with their nearest companion. As they reached the second level and the heavyset woman bustled off to the left, Diana smoothed the tiny hole closed, grabbed Samuel’s arm, and yanked him off to the right.

“What wasthat all about?”

Rubbing at the mark on his cheek, he looked confused.“I was just trying to help, you know, do that message thing.”

“And what help is a message telling that woman her husband’s a creep who doesn’t love her anymore?”

“She knows that. Now she needs to move on.”

“Andyou know that because…?”

He shoved his hands in his front pockets and shrugged.“I have Higher Knowledge.”

“Which gives you personal information on the life of a perfect stranger but neglects to tell you what a stoplight means?”

“Yes.”

She’d never heard such a load of sanctimonious crap. “Just don’t do that again, okay?”

“Sure.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Did you know that with the price of those boots you could feed a Third World child for a year?”

Something in the gold-brown eyes compelled an honest answer.

“Yeah, I do.”

“So…?” Samuel prompted, smiling encouragingly.

“So why don’t you mind your own fucking business, dude?”

“That’s the guilt talking.”

“Yeah?” A very large hand wound itself into the front of Samuel’s jacket. “And in a minute you’re gonna feel my fist talking!”

Diana handed the shoebox to the clerk and reached into the possibilities just in time to keep an innocent Bystander from committing mayhem on an angel—as justified as that mayhem may have been. Freeing Samuel’s jacket, she shoved him out of the store and started things up again.

“I was just…”

“Well, stop it.”

“But…”

“No. People like to have their moral failings pointed out about as much as they like to have their personal lives discussed in public by strangers.” She tightened her grip and dragged him quickly past a couple playing what looked like the Stanley Cup finals of tonsil hockey. When she finally slowed and took a look at him, he seemed strangely restrained. “What?”

“Those two people…”

There were thousands of people in the Center, but she had a fairly good idea who he meant.“Yeah? What about them?”

“They had their tongues in each other’s mouths.”

“I didn’t notice.”

He snorted, a very unangelic sound.“They looked like they had gerbils in their cheeks.”

“Okay.” She had to admit she was intrigued by the image. “So?”

“So isn’t that unsanitary?”

“Gerbils?”

“Tongues.”

“Not really. And don’t get any ideas—our relationship is strictly Keeper/Angel.”

“I wasn’t…”

“You were.”

“I couldn’thelp it.”

He sounded so miserable, Diana found herself patting his shoulder in sympathy.“Come on, we’ll duck out at the next doors—a little cold air will clear your head.”

“It’s not my head.”

“Whoa. Didn’t I make myself clear? We’renot discussing other body parts.” If the last pat rocked him sideways a little more emphatically than necessary, well, tough.

The sidewalk outside the mall was nearly deserted. There was a small group of people huddled together at the corner of Yonge and Dundas, waiting for the streetcar, and a lone figure hurrying toward them from the other direction in what could only be described as a purposeful manner.

Hair on the back on her neck lifting, Diana stared at the approaching figure, then looked down at two identical snowflakes melting on the back of her hand.“Shit!”

“What’s that smell?” Samuel muttered. He checked the bottom of both shoes.

“Forget the smell. Move it!”

She hustled the angel north, hoping that Nalo hadn’t seen them. The older Keeper had no more authority over Samuel than she did, but something—the identical flakes that continued to fall, the way every car on the road was suddenly a black Buick, the street busker playing “Flight of the Bumblebee” with his lower lip frozen to his harmonica—something was telling her to keep them apart.

At the corner of Yonge and Dundas, Diana felt the possibilities open.

“Hold it right there, young lady!”

Grinding her teeth, she pulled a token out of necessity, shoved Samuel into the line of people climbing onto the eastbound Dundas streetcar, and told him she’d catch up later.

“But…”

“Trust me.” She pried his fingers out of the down depths of her sleeve and, with one hand on an admirably tight tush, boosted him up the steps. “And try not to piss anyone off!” she added as the door closed. Staring back out at her through the filthy glass, he looked lost and pathetic, but she couldn’t shake the feeling he was safer away from the other Keeper.

Wrapping herself in surly teenager, she turned, stepped back up onto the sidewalk, and folded her arms.“Don’t call me ‘young lady’,” she growled, when Nalo closed the last of the distance between them. “I really, really hate it.”

“Really? Tough. Now, you want to tell me why you were hauling ass away from me, or do you want me to make some guesses?”

They were alone on the corner—there’d be no help from curious Bystanders. Diana snorted and rolled her eyes. Not a particularly articulate response but useful when stalling.

“Your parents don’t know you’re here, do they? Don’t bother denying it, girl…” An inarguable finger cut off incipient protest. “…you’ve got guilt rolling off you like smoke.”

Perfect! True, if a tad trite. Diana could have kissed her. She widened her eyes.“You won’t tell?”

“None of my business. I don’t care if you’re here to waste money, I don’t care if you’re here to see that boy you stuffed on the streetcar—oh, I saw him, don’t give me that look—but Ido care about what you’ve been up to since you got here.”

“But I haven’t done anything!”

“You stopped time, Diana.”

Oops.

“I was trying to prevent a fight.”

Nalo sighed.“Girl, I don’t care if you were trying to prevent an Abba reunion.…”

“Who?”

“Never mind. The point is, you’ve been messing with the metaphysical background noise since you got here The whole place is buzzing.”

“It wasn’t me!”

“No? Then who?”

A black Buick cruised by, and Diana bit her tongue.

“Look, I spent half an hour on the phone with the 102-year-old Keeper monitoring that site in Scarborough who’s positive we’re heading toward a battle between the dark and the light, and I have better things to do with my time than convince the senile old bird we’re not heading for Armageddon. Either tone it down or take it home, but stop screwing up my…what’s that on your arm?”

Diana brushed away a little snow, taking the angel residue with it, and peered down at her sleeve.“Where?”

The older Keeper shook her head.“Must’ve been ice crystals.” She tucked a cashmere scarf more securely into the collar of her coat. “I think I’d like to keep an eye on you for a while. You can join me for a bit.”

Surrender seemed the only option, but she made a token protest regardless.“I can’t afford the kind of restaurants you like.”

“Honey, we’re Keepers. We should be, if nothing else, adaptable.”

“You buying?”

“I might be.”

“Then I can be adaptable.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

Distress bordering on panic pulled Samuel off the streetcar and across the road into a maze of four-story apartment buildings and identical rows of two-story brick town houses. He found the source of the distress crouched miserably at the bottom of a rusty slide and dropped to his knees beside her.

With gentle fingers, he brushed snow off her head.

She turned toward him, looked up into his eyes, and threw herself against his chest.“Lost, lost, lost, lost…”

“Shhh, it’s all right, Daisy.” He had to physically brace himself against the force of her emotions. “Don’t worry, I’ll help. Do you live in one of these buildings?”

Shivering, she pressed herself harder against him.“Lost…”

He could see where she’d entered the playground, but her prints were filling in fast. “Come on.” Standing, he tucked two fingers under her red leather collar. “We’ll have to hurry.”

They weren’t quite fast enough. The paw prints had disappeared under fresh snow by the time they got to River Street.

“Now where?”

The Dalmatian looked up at him with such complete trust, Samuel had to swallow a lump in his throat. Dropping to one knee on the sidewalk, he held out his hand.“Give me your paw.”

She looked at him for a long moment, looked at his hand, then laid her right front paw against his palm.

He reached into himself for the light.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“What was that?”

Diana kept her attention on her stuffed pita.“I didn’t do anything.”

“Did I even mention you?” Nalo swiveled around, her right hand combing the air. “Something shifted.”

“It’s not a hole.”

“No, it isn’t.” She sat down again, eyes locked on the younger Keeper. “So I guess it’s none of our business.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

The glowing paw prints led him to a town house in the Oak Street Co-op. As they turned down the walk, Daisy pulled free and raced for the door.

“Home! Home! Home!”

The door opened before she reached it, and a slender young woman rushed out and dropped to her knees throwing her arms around the dog.“You rotten, rotten old thing. How could you put me through that. Where’ve you been, eh?” Brushing away tears, she stood and held out a hand to Samuel. “Thank you for bringing her home. We just moved to Toronto from New Brunswick, and I think she went out looking for our old neighborhood. She doesn’t have her new tags yet.” Suddenly hearing her own words, she frowned. “So, without any tags, how did you find us?”

Samuel grinned, unable to resist the dog’s happiness. “We followed her prints.”

“Her prints, of course.” As a gust of wind came around the corner, she smiled out at him from behind a moving curtain of long, curly hair. “You must be half frozen. Would you like to come in and thaw out? Maybe have a hot chocolate, eh?”

He was suddenly very cold.“Yes, please.”

“In. In. In. In.” Daisy insisted on being between both sets of legs, but they somehow got inside and closed the door.

Her name was Patricia, her husband’s name was Bill. As Daisy enthusiastically greeted the latter, Patricia took Samuel’s jacket and led him into the living room. Left on his own, he felt a heated gaze on the back of his head. Slowly he turned.

“What is it?” The long-haired apricot-and-white cat turned his head sideways and stared at Samuel with pale blue eyes. “It’s awfully bright.”

“It’s an angel,” snorted the seal-point Siamese beside him, staring down the aristocratic arch of her nose. “Or a sort of an angel anyway. Someone seems to have messed up the design.”

“What’s an angel?”

“It’s like a cat, only with two legs, minimal fur, and no tail.”

“Oh.” Confused but clearly used to taking the Siamese’s word for things, he wrapped a plumy apricot tail around his toes. “It almost looks as if it understands us.”

“It does. Don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Yes?” Patricia repeated, returning with three steaming mugs on a tray. “Oh. I see you’ve met Pixel and Ilea.” Setting the tray on the coffee table, she scooped up the Siamese. “This is really Ilea’s house. She only lets us live here because we know how to work the can opener.”

That was enough to distract Samuel from the heady scent of the hot chocolate.“Really?”

Rubbing the top of her head under Patricia’s chin, Ilea purred. Some questions were too stupid to need answers.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“Turn here.”

Dean glanced toward the boarded-up J. Henry and Sons Auto Repair and then back to Claire.“There’s a big batch of snow blocking the driveway.”

“Park on the side of the road, then, and we’ll walk in.”

When Austin made no protest, Dean sucked a speculative lungful of air through his teeth and pulled as far off the road as he could. It was one thing to have Claire explain exactly what demon residue meant and another thing entirely when the cat faced a walk over snow in subzero weather without complaint. Things were clearly some serious.

He shut off the engine and reached for his hat.“Is it Hell again?”

“I’d like to think we’d have noticed that,” Claire told him, chewing nervously on the thumb of her mitten.

“Well, I’d like to notice about a half a dozen garlic shrimp,” Austin pointed out acerbically, “but that doesn’t mean I’ll get them, and let’s face facts, there was a hole to Hell in Kingston for over forty years you Keepers never knew about.”

“You didn’t know about it either.”

“Hey, I’m the cat. I do comfort when needed and color commentary. I don’t deal with metaphysical rifts in the fabric of the universe, and I don’t fetch. Live with it.” His single eye narrowed. “Now let’s get on with it before it gets any colder out here.”

The snowbank blocking the driveway was about four-and-a-half-feet high but packed hard and easy to climb over. The snow in the parking lot was almost as deep and a lot softer.

“I’d better go first to break a trail,” Dean offered. “You can follow me, Austin can follow you. Which way?”

Claire pointed. A line of footprints, strangely unfilled by blowing snow stretched back behind the building.“Angels walk lightly on the world, they don’t leave footprints. Demons do. Demons want people to know they’ve passed by because you can’t tempt people who aren’t paying attention.”

A side door, leading into a small office, was open. Streaks of demon residue crossed the crumpled lock.

“It was in here,” Claire said softly, turning in place.

“No shit, Sherlock.” Austin kicked snow off first one back foot and then the other. “Its prints lead right to the door.”

The Keeper ignored him.“It took something from that hook, from the back of the chair, and from under the desk. Something that’s been here for a while given how thick the dust is.” Reaching into the possibilities, she filled the empty spaces with spatial memory. The translucent image of a pair of overalls hung from the hooks, a jacket draped over the back of the chair, and a pair of grimy running shoes lay half on top of each other under the desk. “Clothes?”

“Demons don’t wear clothes?” Dean asked, unable to resist poking a finger through the overalls as they disappeared.

“Yes, but I’ve never heard of a demon buying off the rack, let alone…” She waved a hand around the room and shuddered. “Granted they tend to be a little too fond of shoulder pads, but this is just not them.”

“The footprints keep going back into the woods.”

“Then that must be where the hole is, and if you say, ‘No shit, Sherlock’ to me one more time,” she warned the cat before he could speak, “you’ll be sorry.”

Austin stared up at her, whiskers bristling with affronted innocence.“I was merely going to ask if that was where Summons came from, but if you’re going to get snappy…”

“I’m sorry.” Pulling off a mitten, she rubbed at the crease between her eyes. “The thought of a demon wandering around unremarked by the good guys has me a little tense. I’d better lead from now on,” she added, walking back to the door. “If there’s danger out in those woods, better a Keeper face it than a Bystander.”

Although Dean didn’t like it, he couldn’t disagree and stepped out of her way.

“Youwere going to say‘No shit, Sherlock,’ weren’t you?” he asked Austin quietly when Claire had moved a few paces ahead.

The cat snorted.“Well, duh.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Claire picked her way carefully to the center of the small clearing, avoiding the worst patches of filthy snow. Squatting, she dragged her right mitt off with her teeth and extended her hand, fingers spread.

“What’s all over the snow?” Dean murmured to the cat he held cradled against his chest.

Austin squirmed around to get a better look.“Darkness. When it took form, it flaked.”

They watched Claire sift the air for a moment, then stand, frowning.

“This hole is tiny and old. It should have closed on its own and as far as passing a demon—it would have been like passing a kidney stone.” She shook her head. “I could be days defining it well enough to close it.”

“Gee, days spent out in the bush.” Austin sighed and laid his head in the crook of Dean’s elbow. “Words can’t express my elation.”

“You needn’t get too elated,” Claire told him, yanking her mitt back on. “And you needn’t get too comfortable either, I’m going to need you.”

“For what?”

“You get to play bad cop. Dean, maybe you should go back to the truck.”

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, wreathing his head in vapor. She was using the voice Diana referred to as more-Keeper-than-thou and, in his experience, that was never good.“Why should I go back to the truck?”

“We need answers, and we need them quickly. I’m going to gather up the darkness around the hole, and Austin’s going to question it.”

“The darkness?”

“Itis substance; it should be coherent. But this is one of those‘the ends justify the means’ situations and that’s always tricky for the good guys.” Reaching up, she broke a dead branch off an oak tree. “We’ll pull more darkness from the hole. I can contain it in a circle, but it’s going to want out, and you’ll be the only thing it can use to break free.”

“You’ll be inside the circle?”

“I’m a Keeper. I can deal.”

“And Austin?”

“It isn’t actually possible to make a cat do something a cat doesn’t want to do.”

“But we try to keep that quiet,” Austin added as he moved from Dean’s arms to Claire’s. “We learned a long time ago if people can hang onto the absurd hope that someday they’ll train us to stop scratching the furniture, they’ll keep handing over the salmon treats.”

Dean squared his shoulder.“I’m not leaving you if you’re going to be in danger.”

“I’ll be in more danger if you stay. And, you’ll be in danger. If you leave…”

“I won’t be able to help if you need me.”

“You’re fighting testosterone,” Austin murmured into her ear. “Millions of years of evolution that says he has to protect his mate. You can’t win.”

“His mate?”

“Mate, girlfriend, old lady—all valid evolutionary terms.”

“What?”

The cat sighed, his breath painfully loud up under the edge of her toque.“You know, if you watched moreNational Geographic specials and fewer after school specials…”

“You watchNational Geographic to see lions mating!”

“So?”

Without the time to count to ten, Claire counted to three, looked into Dean’s eyes, and reluctantly decided Austin was right. She couldn’t win. If she convinced Dean to leave her, it would diminish him in his own eyes and, all things considered, further diminishing would not be a good thing.

“Okay. You can stay.” His smile made the potential for disaster almost worthwhile. Deep down, she realized how completely asinine that thought was, but she couldn’t seem to prevent a warm glow from rising. “Whatever happens,” she murmured a moment later, leaning away from his mouth, “don’t break the circle.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

To Dean’s surprise, the darkness gathered into a familiar form. Its legs were froglike and ended in three toes. Its arms, nearly as long as its legs, ended in three fingers and a thumb. Its eyes were small and black, and it appeared to have no teeth. Its fur and/or scales changed color constantly.

Imp.

The last time Dean had seen an imp, he’d been scraping the lumpy mass of its pulverized body out from under a sheet of wallpaper. The last time he’d seen an imp alive, it had been dangling from Austin’s mouth.

The tiny piece of physical darkness sat up, looked around, squeaked something that sounded very much like“Oh, fuck,” and disappeared under Austin’s front paws.

Claire squatted beside the cat.“Tell us everything that went on here, and I’ll pop you back through the hole before I close it.”

Faint defiant squeaking.

“Wrong answer.”

Austin’s tail lashed and the squeaking grew louder.

“You’re lying,” Claire sighed.

Indignant squeaking.

“I know, it’s hard for you to tell the truth. But it’s hard for Austin to keep his claws sheathed, too. You don’t honestly thinkthey’d lie to protect you?”

Reluctant acknowledgement. From the intensity of the high-pitched torrent that followed, the imp was clearly spilling more than name, rank, and serial number.

Shifting from foot to foot, Dean tried not to think about how cold he was getting. Maybe he should have gone back to the truck. Maybe he should go now. He’d just go in and tell Claire he’d decided to leave.

Go in?

The toe of his right boot rested less than an inch from the circle Claire’d sketched in the snow with the oak branch. Backing quickly away, he tried and failed to remember moving forward.“…it’s going to want out, and you’ll be the only thing it can use to break free.” But if the darkness could reach outside the circle, did that mean the levels inside with Claire had become dangerously high? Claire was in danger. If he loved her, he had to save her!

If he loved her?

No if. In a world that had become a stranger place than he ever could have imagined, loving Claire was the one thing he was sure of. As he realized that, he realized he was standing back at the edge of the circle. He had to do something to distract himself.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Wow, this is really…tidy.” Claire shifted her grip on the cat and turned slowly to look around the clearing. “Really.”

Dean finished squaring up a pile of fresh cedar prunings and straightened.“Are you okay?”

“We’re fine.” Erasing an arc of the circle with the edge of her boot, she stepped clear. “I got enough information to close the hole. I know why it never closed on its own, and I know how the demon came through. But you’re not going to like it.”

He didn’t.

“So you’re saying that by making the angelwe made the demon possible?” When Claire reluctantly nodded, he felt the blood drain out of his face. It was a distinctly unpleasant feeling.

Austin studied him for a moment, then looked up at Claire.“I hope you weren’t planning on sex any time soon.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

In spite of the cold and the approaching dusk, there were still hundreds of people surging back and forth between the lights at Bloor and Yonge. Most of them, heavily laden with consumer crap they didn’t need, were tired, cranky, and desperately in search of one last bargain. Byleth had never seen anything so wonderful.

One hand clutching the dashboard as though she needed to anchor herself to the car, Eva shook her head.“I don’t like just leaving you here.”

“I’ll be fine.” She’d have been out of the car at the stoplight except the damned seat belt had jammed. And it would be damned, she see to it personally. “Pull over anywhere.”

“We’re willing to take you where you’re going,” Harry told her as he maneuvered the car into a parking place on the south side of Bloor Street, just past Yonge. “Eva’s right. I don’t like just leaving you.”

“I’ll. Be. Fine.” The stupid bulky coat was in the way. That was the problem. She squirmed around and yanked at the…there! A jerk on the handle had the door open. Byleth flung herself toward the world just in time to hear Eva say:

“I’d feel better if you took this money. It’s not much but…”

Half out of the car, she reached back and grabbed the envelope without slowing her forward momentum.

“I wrote down our phone number. Call us if you need help!” Eva called after her.

That would be a cold day in Hell, Byleth decided shoving the envelope in her jeans—Twelfth Circle excepted, of course.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“That’s certainly a generous offer, sweetheart, but I’m afraid you’re making it to the wrong guy.” He winked and patted her shoulder as he moved away. “Sorry.”

Byleth made a mental note not to offer that particular temptation to men wearing eyeliner. Beginning to get cold, she moved into the nearest store and sidled through narrow aisles to a young man examining a portable CD player.“You should steal that, Steven,” she murmured.

“Lifted one this morning,” he told her absently, responding unconsciously to the dark aura. “Besides, right at this mo, I got so many disks down my pants I can hardly walk.”

“That explains why your pants look like they’re about to slide right off your skinny ass,” she muttered.

“What’s your damage?” Projecting tough guy, he shot her a look from under pale brows and folded his arms. “Santa not bring you any prezzies?”

Santa had never brought her any presents—her part of reality never having exactly welcomed the spirit of giving. And frankly, that sucked. In her whole entire life, Santa had never given her anything! Okay, her whole entire life was just under forty-eight hours long and the Porters had given her plenty, but that was so not the point.

The tough guy look vanished.“Oh, man, I’m sorry. I never…I mean…it’s just…” Rifling his pockets, he pulled out a Santa Pez dispenser and held it out. “Here.”

“What is it?”

Steven folded the head back, forcing out a tiny pink tile.“It’s candy,” he said when she hesitated.

Break Santa’s neck, get a hit of sugar. Byleth crunched reflectively.I can deal.

“Take it.”

“What’s the catch?” Taking the Pez, she shifted her weight to one hip and looked him in the eye. “Did you want to have sex with me or something?”

His face flushed crimson, his ears scarlet. It wasn’t a particularly attractive combination. Muttering something inarticulate, he scuttled away as fast as the CDs down his pants and the crowded store allowed.

Byleth was confused. A total stranger had just give her a gift and refused something he wanted in return. Crunching candy, she went looking for store security. Ratting Steven out would realign her world.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Hey, there’s a…”

“I’m dealing with a customer.” The harassed looking young women pushed past without really seeing her. “You’ll have to talk to someone else.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“…particular model has a greater range, you’ll find…”

“That guy over there is shoplifting.”

“…that the battery may need to be recharged more often.”

Byleth pushed between the two men.“Did you hear me?”

“In a moment, Miss. Of course our spare batteries are also on sale, so that could easily solve the problem,” the salesman continued, passing the cell phone over her head.

“What about those chargers that fit into your cigarette lighter?”

“Hey? Hello?”

“We carry them. I’m not sure whether we have any left.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Why won’t anyone listen to ME!” They were ignoring her. It was like she didn’t exist—almost like, like she was actually a teenager! “This is MAKING ME ANGRY!”

“Hey! That’s enough of that!” The burly security guard folded her arms over her imitation police blazer and glared down at the demon. “You’re going to have to leave now, Miss.”

Byleth folded her own arms.“Make me.”

It shouldn’t have been possible.

“Fine!” she screamed from the sidewalk. “Like I care!”

Reaching into the dark possibilities and activating the store’s sprinkler system made her feel a little better.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“Summons?” Diana asked as Nalo paused, head cocked, listening to nothing.

After a moment, the older Keeper nodded.“Close, too,” she said, climbing the last few steps and emerging back out onto the corner of Yonge and Dundas. “Probably no farther than Bloor. Did you want to come with me?”

“Love to, but…” The sudden realization that it was almost dark cut off a fine sarcastic response. “Holy sh…” Nalo’s lifted brow cut off the expletive. “I’ve got to get home!”

And I do have to get home, she reminded herself a few moments later, racing back down the stairs to the bank of pay phones in the subway station. But first she had to find an angel.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

A little confused, Patricia held out the phone.“It’s for you.”

Samuel mimicked the motion he’d just seen Patricia make. “Hello? At the Oak Street Co-op at just up from the corner of River and Dundas Streets, town house four.”

“How does it know that?” Pixel wondered.

“It has Higher Knowledge,” Ilea informed the younger cat without opening her eyes. “It knows things.”

“It didn’t know us.”

“So? Even Higher Knowledge has an upper limit.”

Distracted by the cats’ conversation, Samuel had to ask Diana to repeat herself, twice. Finally he nodded and handed back the phone. “My Keeper is going to meet me here.”

“If it’s all right with you,” Ilea prodded.

“What?”

“Ask my soft, smiley can-opener if it’s all right with her, you moron.”

“Of course it’s all right,” Patricia told him when he’d relayed the cat’s message.

“You’re relieved I have a Keeper?”

A polite response was lost in the gold-on-brown eyes.“Oh, yeah.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Climbing up onto the streetcar, Diana felt her gaze pulled to the north. Something was…was…awareness trembled on the edge of consciousness.…

“Hey! Exact change!”

…and tumbled into the abyss.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

Unrighteous anger kept her warm for a few blocks, but with the setting sun, the temperatures had plummeted. By the time she got to Yonge and Dundas, her teeth were chattering so loudly she almost couldn’t hear the security guard kicking her out of the Eaton’s Center. He walked away, scratching at a brand new case of head lice, but that was of little consequence when she was still out in the cold.

“You don’t look very happy. Maybe I can help.”

Byleth turned to find a middle-aged man standing very close. Under the edge of a sheepskin hat, his hair was graying at the temples, his smile was warm and charming, his eyes crinkled at the corners with sincere goodwill, his heart was blacker than hers.

“All right, let’s get this straight,” she snarled, tossing aside even a pretense of subtlety. “Thinking that I’m lost and alone in the big city, you’re about to get all fatherly and offer me a place to crash. Over the next little while you’ll addict me to heroin, then put me out on the street to quote, pay you back, unquote. You’ll take every cent I make and control me with physical violence.” He stepped back. She closed the distance between them. “Did I miss something?”

“I’m not…”

“You are so. But that’s not the point. The point is you’re trying to pull this bullshit on me.” Her eyes narrowed and went black from lid to lid. “I’ve had a really bad day. I mean, like really bad. I’m not even supposed tohave genitalia!”

“I…”

“You can take a walk in traffic, asshole!”

Emergency crews were scraping him out from under the streetcar when she realized she could have handled that better. She couldn’t feel her feet, every muscle in her body had clenched tight, she couldn’t seem to get her shoulders to come down from around her ears, and her stomach felt like it was lying along her spine.Stupid, stupid, stupid. Next time wait until he’s got you inside the apartment! A quick examination of the gathered crowd suggested there wouldn’t be a next time any time soon. “Isn’t that always the way,” she muttered miserably, “never a pimp around when you need one.”

Manifesting the dark powers left her feeling wrung out and weak—it shouldn’t have, but she couldn’t manage enough energy to care.

“Hey, you look like you could use a place to stay.”

“Well, duh.” Turning, she came face-to-face with…“Oh, great. A God-pimp.”

Leslie/Deter’s lip curled. Pretty much all his understanding and patience had been used up earlier in the day when he’d gotten physical with his so-called friends. “Fine. Stay outside and freeze, then.”

Since that was beginning to seem highly likely, Byleth grabbed his arm as he started to walk away.“You’re supposed to be nicer than that. I’m not, but you’re one of the good guys.” When he continued to look annoyed, she sighed. “All right, I shouldn’t have called you that. I’m so…sorry.”

Harry Porter had been right. It did get easier. The implications made her knees buckle.

Leslie/Deter caught her, apologizing profusely in turn, and walked her toward the mission, explaining that after the meal they’d be hearing the word of God.

“Which word?”

“What?”

“Where I come from, we get a kick out of hearing the old guy try and say aluminum.…”

ELEVEN

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_4]

THE PHONE WAS RINGING when Nalo got back to her apartment. The strident and slightly superior tone suggested she’d best hurry and pick up, or the next call would happen at a considerably more inconvenient time. So there. Some of the older Keepers had a theory that the entire telephone system had been touched by darkness just before the invention of call waiting and had grown increasingly corrupted ever since.

Kicking off her boots before she hit the carpet, she lifted the receiver and snarled,“I am not interested in changing my long distance service provider, but I will change you into something unpleasant unless you leave me the hell alone.”

“Nalo?”

“Oh. Claire.” Turning on the table light, she dropped onto the sofa. “Well, wasn’t that a waste of a bad mood. What’s up?”

On the other end of the line, Claire took a deep breath.“We’ve got trouble.”

“Out there in River City.”

There was cognitive pause, then:“What?”

Swinging her feet up onto the coffee table, Nalo sighed.“Never mind. And while I feel for your trouble, it can’t possibly top what I’ve got going on right here.”

“There’s a demon loose.”

“And then again…” The older Keeper stared down at the black glitter dusting her fingertips. “I closed a couple of holes it opened today.”

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. It seems to be starting small—a little vandalism, a little urban renewal…”

“Urban renewal?”

“It convinced a pimp to walk under a streetcar. Hard on the driver but no loss to the city. There’ll be cascading holes from the witnesses still to track down but, around here at least, it’s been a low-key embodiment of darkness.”

“That’s a relief.”

“And a bit of a surprise.”

“Yeah, well, there’s more.”

“You mean the way we can’t track it down because there’s also an angel walking around big as life and twice as shiny?”

“How did you…?”

“Know that? Well, I’d have to say that a piece of darkness walking around without any of us the wiser was the first clue, but I also ran into your sister today.…”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Why would Diana hide the angel from another Keeper?”

“Why would Diana turn the vacuum cleaner hose into kudzu?” Austin snorted, kneading a pillow into shape. “Why does Diana do anything?”

“Because she’s a pain in the ass?”

“That would be my guess,” the cat agreed.

“Maybe she’s embarrassed about her part in his creation,” Dean offered.

“I don’t think Diana gets embarrassed.”

“Maybe she’s taking him for a test drive.” When both Claire and Dean turned to stare, Austin shrugged. “Well, pardon me for using a euphemism, but didn’t Nalo say that from a block away she thought he was just a guy?”

“Diana wouldn’t…” Claire’s voice trailed off. “Okay, it’s possible,” she admitted after a moment’s thought, “but she says she’s a lesbian.”

“No, she said she was a lesbian back in November. She could easily be a hemocyanin by now.”

“I don’t think that’s…”

“The point is,” Austin interrupted, “is that she’s seventeen and subject to change without notice. And she’s met a young man she can be herself with. Or have you forgotten how seductive that is?”

Claire looked up at Dean, looked past her reflection in his glasses, and sank into the blue of his eyes.“No. I haven’t forgotten.”

He reached out and stroked the back of his hand over her cheek.“I’m sorry I got you into this.”

“We got into this together.”

“Still…”

“Still need to get hold of Diana,” Austin reminded them acerbically.

Claire reluctantly sat back and picked up her cell phone again.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Yes, okay, Ishould have thought of how I’d get homebefore I went into the closet.” Diana held the phone out from her ear, counted to six, then tried again. “Mom…Mom! I’mnot being a smart-ass, I’m agreeing with you. And since there was money for a hotel room, not a bus ticket home, I’m obviously supposed to be here—no harm, no foul. Aren’t you the one who always says, nothing happens to a Keeper by chance?” She winced. “Of course I listen to you. Yeah, okay, I didn’t listen to that. Or that. Mom…Mom. Mother! I have to go now. I’ll stay in touch. ’Bye. No. Now. Goodbye.”

She hung up, leaned back, closed her eyes, and began rhythmically beating her head against the wall.

“You didn’t tell your mother I was with you,” Samuel pointed out from the room’s other bed.

“No, I didn’t.”

“A lie of omission is still a lie, and a lie is the destroyer of trust.”

“Why don’t you just let me deal with that?”

“Banging your head isn’t going to do anything but annoy the person in the next room.”

She opened her eyes and glared at him.“There isn’t anyone in the next room.”

“But still…”

“Shut up.”

“The phone’s ringing.”

“I’m beginning to think Claire was right about this whole joining the twenty-first century thing.” Scooping up the receiver, she closed her eyes again. “Sorry, Mom, but nothing’s changed in the last thirty seconds.”

“It’s not Mom. It’s me.”

“Oh, joy.” Straightening, she mouthed,It’s Claire, so no background noise, toward Samuel.“How did you get this number?”

“It’s your cell phone number.”

About to explain that she didn’t have her cell phone with her, Diana decided that might be something she’d be better off keeping to herself. “Oh. Yeah.”

“Diana, that angel you’re hiding is blocking my…our, ability to find the demon that came through at the same time, so you’ve got to stop playing around and send it back.”

“It’s not an it, Claire, it’s a him and…” The rest of the sentence suddenly clicked into place. “Did you say demon?”

“Demon?” Samuel scooted to the edge of the bed, eyes wide.

Diana mouthed a stern,“Shut up!” at him so she could hear Claire’s answer.

“Yes, a demon.”

“That’s so not good.”

“Low-fat cheese is not good, Diana.This is bad. I don’t know what you’re up to with that angel, and I don’t want to know…”

“Come to think of it, how do you know?”

“Nalo saw you with him and mentioned it when I called her, but that’s not important. He’s got to go back right now.”

“No.” Diana shook her head—an unseen emphasis from Claire’s point of view but emphasis just the same. “Sending him back would be the same as killing him.”

“You can’t kill him, there’s nothing to kill. He’s a being of light.”

“He’s more than that.”

“How can he be more than that? He’s already a superior being!”

“Fine. He’s less than that, then. He’s a person, Claire.” Who was attempting to eavesdrop on both sides of the conversation. A vigorously applied elbow solved that distinctly unangelic problem. Flashing him a triumphant smile, as he flopped around gasping for breath, she amended, “Okay, maybe he’s not entirely a person, but there’s a personin there.”

“No.”

“No, what?”

“No, you are not suggesting that a…a penis and a couple of testicles is what makes a man.” Claire’s tone laid a distinctly weird subtext under the words.

Wishing she had time to translate, Diana sighed impatiently.“No, I’m not suggesting that. But they’ve given him access to emotions and experiences genderless angels can’t have.”

“I’m happy for him, but there’s a demon loose we can’t find until the angel goes—therefore the angel has to go. And if he knew what was at stake, I’m sure he’d agree. Is he there with you right now? Let me talk to him.”

“No.”

Samuel poked her in the leg.“Your sister wants to talk to me?”

She couldn’t lie to him. “Yes.”

“So give me the phone.”

“Not happening.” Scooting out from under his arm, she crossed the room and glared at him from beside the bathroom door, the phone cord stretched taut between them. “One step in this direction and I’ll lock myself in.”

“Diana!”

“Claire!” Attention jerked back to her sister, she rolled her eyes. “You don’t need to yell. It doesn’t matter if he agrees with you or not because I’d still have to kill him, and I won’t do it.”

“For the last time, you wouldn’t be killing him!”

“Would.”

“Stop being so childish. Listen, I can’t get there tonight; the OPP have closed the highway north of Barrie because of the storm. But we’ll be leavingfirst thing in the morning. This is serious. Send the angel back. Remember your responsibili…”

Diana jabbed at the power off button and pitched the phone across the room.“I do not need her to remind me of my responsibilities,” she growled as Samuel rubbed his ear where the phone had clipped him on its way by. “If they knew you, they wouldn’t be able to kill you either.”

“I don’t want to die.”

“Good.”

He sighed and spread his hands.“But there’s a demon in the world, and if returning me to the light would expose the demon…”

“You have to say that,” Diana interrupted. “And knock off the sacrificial pose, I’m not buying it.” She threw herself down on the empty bed.

“Bouncing like that will destroy the mattress and the box spring.”

“Who are you getting your Higher Knowledge from, Martha Stewart?”

“Did you know you can create a lovely mailbox cozy out of a piece of felt and only six hundred dollars’ worth of handwoven French taffeta ribbon?”

“What?” She squirmed around and stared.

Samuel grinned.

The corners of her mouth beginning to curve, Diana grabbed a pillow and heaved it at him.“Jerk!”

He wasn’t sure why he considered that a compliment, but he did. “Diana, you have to send me back. I don’t want to go, but I understand why I have to.”

Squinting in the sudden glow, Diana sighed. Nothing like self-sacrifice to bring out the angel in a guy. If Claire or any other Keeper met him in this state, they’d send him back without even thinking about it. Easy answer—don’t let Claire or any other Keeper meet him.

And how hard could that be? No Summons, no directions—no way to find them.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Mom? Claire. When you were talking to Diana a few minutes ago, did she happen to mention what hotel she’s staying at? Carlton Hotel, room 312. Thanks.”

“That looks like room 81Z,” Austin pointed out.

“I’d like to see you do better with an eyeliner on a condom wrapper.”

“Well, it’s nice you found something to use them for.”

Dean reached across the cat and picked up the address.“I don’t like this.”

“But they’re the only kind we’ve got.”

“What? No!” Suddenly flustered, he dropped the packet. It bounced off the sniggering cat and rolled under the bed. “I meant, I don’t like going to your mother,” he explained, dropping to his knees and running his hand beneath the edge of the bedspread. “It seems, I don’t know, sneaky.”

“No choice.” Claire folded her legs up out of his way. “First of all, Diana’s confused. Secondly, I’ve dealt with nothing but angel or demon sites since it happened, which is telling me pretty clearly that this is my responsibility. Third…” Reaching out, she grinned and ran her fingers through his hair. “…there’s just something about a man on his knees.”

“Claire…”

“What?”

“Found it!” Straightening, he was about to toss the packet onto her lap when he frowned. “This isn’t ours…”

“Eww.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Still glowing, although beginning to dim, Samuel lay back on the bed, hands under his head, and stared at the ceiling.“You know what I’d like to experience before I…go back.”

“You’re not going back,” Diana told him absently. She paced the length of the hotel room one more time, examining and discarding another half-dozen bad ideas. The best she’d been able to come up with so far had involved rather more duct tape than she thought she could get her hands on.

“But still…”

“No.”

“Pizza.”

“What?” Either angels came with euphemisms high school didn’t cover—which was highly unlikely—or that wasn’t the experience she’d been expecting.

“And loud music.”

“Why?”

He shrugged as well as he was able, given his position.“I don’t know.”

Well, she hadn’t come up with any better ideas. “I could handle a pizza.”

“I think I just want to eat mine.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Oh, please, send me back now.” Falling backward, Samuel groaned and rubbed both hands over a visibly distended belly. “Why did I do that to myself?”

Compelled to answer truthfully, Diana snorted.“I think you were showing off.”

“Showing off what?”

“Beats me.”

“I feel awful.”

She dropped down onto the other bed.“What did you expect after a large with the works and half of my Hawaiian?”

“I wasn’t expecting anything!” A mighty belch delayed part two of the protest. Startled but impressed, he waited until the echoes died down before continuing. “I just thought.…”

“Thinking? As if. You were being a guy.” She squirmed back toward the pillows, propping them against the wall. “And speaking of, you’re starting to smell.”

“My olfactory senses have been working since I got here, thank you very much.”

“Right. Rephrasing—you stink.”

“I stink?”

Eyes rolling, she picked up the TV remote.“Don’t take my word for it. Check the pits.”

He lifted an arm.“I’m not supposed to smell like this?”

“No.”

“Good.”

“I’ll show you how the shower works in the morning. After that last incident, I don’t want you approaching new plumbing on your own.”

“I thought I wassupposed to urinate against the wall.”

“Uh-huh.” A quick flip through the available channels brought the expected result: there was nothing on.

“What was that?” Samuel heaved himself up onto his elbows. “No, not that. Back. Back. There.”

Diana frowned.“It’s a documentary on lions.”

“What are they doing?”

She adjusted the contrast, but they were still doing it.“They’re having sex.”

“Kewl.”

“You’re disgusting.”

Vaguely proud of himself, although uncertain of why he should be, he belched again.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

Byleth hadn’t expected to have so much fun. With a sense of Keepers too close for comfort, she’d planned on a low profile and a road trip in the morning. She’d listened to the praying, she’d eaten the meal, and she hadn’t been able to stop a snort of amusement during the preaching.

So they’d asked her if she had a question.

Surrounded by teenagers pulled from the streets, Byleth stood—hands jammed into the pockets of her black jeans, weight resting on one hip, expression sullen—and asked, “If Lloyd leaves London at 6:00 p.m. on a train heading east going 90 kilometers an hour and Tom leaves Toronto at 6:15 p.m. on a train heading west at 110 kilometers an hour, when will they die in a fiery explosion?”

Eyes dark from lid to lid compelled the truth.

“I don’t know.”

“Why?” She threw the word onto the end of his sentence so quickly momentum kept the ball rolling.

“I never paid attention in math.”

“Why?”

“I was fixated on Miss Miller’s breasts.”

“Why?”

“They were perky. What does this have to do with the text?” Leslie/Deter demanded, fingers white on the edge of the lectern.

“Nothing.” The last thing she wanted to do was test the man’s faith. That was the sort of inane probing the good guys got up to. “Boxers or briefs?”

“Egyptian leather thong.”

Things went downhill from there.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

Staring up at the exit sign, Claire listened to Dean breathe and waited for morning. Diana had gone too far this time. She hadn’t been Summoned to the angel, or she’d have mentioned it—Summoned Keepers had the final say on any situation. Diana without a Summons meant Diana should be at home studying or whatever it was teenagers did these days. Piercing something maybe.

Claire hadn’t been Summoned either, but as anactive Keeper that only meant that she was already doing what she was supposed to be doing. The angel’s physical form blocked any attempt to find the demon. Therefore, she had to return the angel to the light. QED—essentially, Latin for “so there.”

Diana’s personal opinions on the matter were irrelevant. Even more so than usual.

If functional genitalia defined personhood, then Dean…

She chopped off the thought before it could crawl out any further. Functional genitalia didn’t define love either, and she loved Dean. In a relatively short time he’d become as essential to her life as breathing. She loved being with him, talking, laughing, traveling, cuddling, touching, kissing, caressing; turning her head, she pressed her face against the warm skin of his shoulder. He smelled so good, she wanted to…

Okay, that’s it. Get up. Which wasn’t, perhaps, the best chastisement under the circumstances. Sliding out from under the covers, she grabbed her robe off the other bed.

“Hey! I was asleep on that!”

“Sorry.”

“I should hope so.” Disdaining the jump, Austin stalked over the bedside table and curled up between Dean’s legs muttering, “Angels, demons, impotence; I see no reason why the cat should suffer.”

She woke Dean at five, and they were on the road by six-thirty. They would have been on the road an hour earlier, but when they went to check out, Dean discovered that the sleepy middle-aged woman behind the desk had once lived in St. John’s right next door to a guy he’d played hockey with. The permutations took a while to work through.

Although the plows had been busy all night, it was still snowing lightly and the driving was treacherous. When it became apparent that Dean needed to concentrate on the road…

You’ll find out what Diana’s up to when we get there.

Could we deal with what happens after the angel’s gone, after the angel’s gone, then.

Claire, please shut up.

…she amused herself by watching a pair of frost fairies skating along the hydro lines. Matched double axles, a star lift, and a thrown triple salkow later, she popped in a tape ofThe Nutcracker.

“This is different.” Austin climbed out from behind the seat and settled in her lap. “You don’t usually like classical music.”

“I know, but somehow it seemed to fit.”

They stopped for breakfast in Huntsville.

“I should get gas,” Dean observed as they pulled out of the diner’s parking lot.

“Igot gas,” Austin moaned, head and both front paws draped over the edge of the seat. “I should never have eaten those sausages.”

Claire folded her arms.“What sausages?”

“Did I say sausages? I meant, uh…” The windows rattled as his stomach made a sound between a gurgle and plate tectonics. “All right. I meant sausages; three plump juicy sausages. Slightly overcooked and containing bits of two items I couldn’t identify. The kid in the next booth dropped them on the floor, and I ate them.”

“When?”

“When Dean was explaining to the waitress how running the dishwasher at a higher temperature would keep the cutlery from streaking.”

“Right. Then.”

“Yeah, then. When you were studying the menu with such intense concentration.”

Pulling up in front of the gas pumps, Dean shot her a quick look.“You were embarrassed?” When she nodded, he grinned. “Why? The waitress didn’t mind.”

The waitress didn’t mind because he’d been smiling up at her and the combination of Dean’s smile and accent and shoulders made most women and a goodly number of men between the ages of thirteen and death temporarily lose cognitive functions. He could have told the waitress how to get black heel marks off the floor, tomato sauce stains out of her apron, and greasy thumbprints off the napkin dispenser—all of which he’d done in the past—and she wouldn’t have minded. In the past he’d never noticed the reactions he provoked, but something in the way he grinned as he got out of the truck suggested that had changed.

“So he’s noticing people are noticing.” Austin twisted his head around until he could spear Claire with a pale green gaze. “So what?”

She watched Dean clean the windshield, carefully lifting each wiper blade and setting it just as carefully back in place.“So I’m not sure how I feel about it.”

“About him noticing that waitress noticed him?” When she nodded, he snorted. “Don’t worry about it. She made him French toast. You made him a man.”

“But he reallyliked the French toast.”

“And once you’ve dealt with the angel…”

“And the demon.”

“And the demon—he’ll reallylike locking me in the bathroom again.”

“You think?”

“No. I’m just talking to hear myself.” Belly sagging, he heaved himself up onto his feet. “Now open the door. There’s a trio of sausages I have to introduce to a snowbank.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“I’d have thought that angels were more the early to bed, early to rise types.”

Samuel heaved himself up into something close to a sitting position, blinked at the room in general for a few moments, and then reluctantly swung his legs out of bed.“Why?”

“I dunno. The whole sentiment is just so sanctimonious I figured it had to be one of…oh, man!” Diana clapped her hands over her eyes and rocked back in the chair. “Like I needed to seethat first thing in the morning. I thought you were going to sleep in your underwear.”

“This is what was under what I was wearing when you said that.”

“Pardon me for not assuming angels would head out commando style.” A quick look elicited a low whistle. “You ought to send Mr. Giorno a nice thank you letter.”

His eyes widened.“It’s doing it again!”

“Well, don’t wave it at me!”

Ears burning, Samuel grabbed a pillow off the bed and held it protectively in front of him.“I’m not doing anything. It just…” He started to gesture, thought better of it, and resecured the pillow. “It just does that,” he finished miserably. “I hate this body.”

“Are angels allowed to hate?”

“Are we allowed to walk around with one of these?”

“You have a point.”

He sank down onto the edge of the bed, pillow on his lap.“Like I need you to remind me.”

Diana could feel the laughter rising. When she tried to hold it back behind her teeth, it escaped out her nose. Any chance she might have had at stopping it after that got blown away by Samuel’s affronted glare. Nothing to do but ride it out. After a few minutes, she wiped her eyes, drew in a shaky breath, and managed a fairly coherent, “Sorry.”

“Sure. Whatever.” He glanced under the pillow. “Anyway, you’ve taken care of the…Would you stop that!”

This time the apology came out in separate syllables as Diana slid off the chair.

Samuel sat and watched her flop about, indignation wrapped around him like a cloak. Finally, he stood and walked into the bathroom, every movement radiating injured dignity.“I’ll figure out the shower on my own,” he informed her reproachfully, reaching back for the door.

Wondering who he could possibly be reminding her of, Diana waved a weak hand in his general direction and fought to pull herself together. With the door closed, with her anatomically correct angel safely behind it, she staggered to her feet and dropped back into the chair. Her stomach hurt. She hadn’t laughed so hard since the time Claire’d coughed half a cheese sandwich through her nose listening to one of Dad’s old George Carlin albums.

Claire.

Suddenly it wasn’t so funny.

Claire was on her way to Toronto believing she had to send an angel back to the light for the greater good. But, logically, emotionally, rationally, and every other ally Diana could think of, destroying a life couldn’t be a part of the greater good.

There had to be another way to find the demon.

“All right…” She stood and walked purposefully over to the big mirror on the wall. Hands flat on the dresser, she leaned forward and glared at her reflection. “Let’s do something radical for a Keeper. Let’s actually think about the situation instead of just reacting to it.”

Her reflection looked skeptical.

“Problem: there’s a demon in the world, a big ol’ walking around piece of darkness. And that’s bad. We can’t find it because there’s also an angel in the world. Which would be good if it wasn’t bad. We can’t find the demon because of the angel. Because the big chunk of light that’s Samuel balances the dark.” She glanced over at the bathroom, then back at the mirror. “Except that the dark hasn’t really been very dark, has it?”

Her reflection frowned in thoughtful agreement.

“You’d think that a demon would cause more havoc, wouldn’t you? All the active Keepers should be scrambling to repair the damage it’s caused, and I should have been Summoned to help. But that hasn’t happened. Why? Why hasn’t the demon caused more havoc?” She was close. She could feel it. “The demon is balancing Samuel. It hasn’t caused more havoc because balancing means it’s an exact opposite of Samuel.”

Following the cord, she dove under the bed for the phone.

In the mirror, her reflection performed a truncated version of Deion Sanders’ touchdown dance.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“All right. The demon’s a fully functional teenage girl. We still can’t find it while your angel is in the world. Yes, that narrows the search but not enough. Diana, I’m sor…” Claire let her head fall back against the seat as she powered down her phone. “She hung up on me.”

“She’s some set on saving that angel,” Dean noted, carefully easing the truck around a blind curve.

“I know.”

“Is there any chance she could be right?”

“No.”

“You’re sure?”

Claire sighed.“I’m a Keeper, it’s my job to be sure.”

Austin stretched out a paw, his claws sinking into Claire’s jeans. “Far be it from me to point this out, but you seem to be forgetting something.”

“I fed you. Although I don’t see why, when you tried to kill yourself with sausages.”

The claws sank a little deeper.“You’re forgetting that Diana is also a Keeper.”

“So?”

“It’s as much her job to be sure as it is yours.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“All right, fine. So Claire can’t find her, big whoop. That doesn’t mean I can’t.” Euphoria having been shot down, Diana sat cross-legged on the end of the bed, reached into the possibilities, and jabbed seven numbers into the phone. “Local call,” she muttered after the first ring. “I’ll just deal with the demon before Claire clears Barrie, and she can stuff her…”

“Greenstreet Mission. Drop by and hear the word of God.”

Diana opened her mouth and closed it again. Finally she managed a strangled,“The what?”

“The word of God.” The young man on the other end of the phone sighed deeply. “And, no, it isn’t aluminum.”

“Okay.”

“Can we help?”

“No. That is, sorry, I’ve got the wrong number.” Hanging up considerably more gently than she had the last time, Diana stared across the room at her reflection. Her reflection stared back, equally appalled.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Higher Knowledge had told him that showers were both the cubicle or bath in which one stands under a spray of water and the act of bathing in same. It offered no help at getting the water the right temperature, but after a few false starts—and he wouldnot give Diana the pleasure of hearing him scream—he worked it out.

Soaping up gave him the first chance to really examine the body he found himself in. Was he supposed to have hair in so many weird places? Why were his feet so big? If he hadn’t actually been born, which he hadn’t, why did he have a belly button? And nipples—sure they added visual interest to the male chest but what were they actually for?

“These things really ought to come with owner’s manuals,” he sighed, reaching down to turn off the water.

The tiny room didn’t seem significantly drier.

Shaking drips off the ends of his hair, he stepped out of the tub, slipped on the wet tiles, and suddenly found himself airborne.

Seventy-eight percent of all accidents happen in the bathroom, Higher Knowledge informed him as he landed.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Samuel? Samuel, how many fingers am I holding up?”

“Why?”

“I have no idea, but it’s what they always do in the movies when someone knocks themselves out.”

“I’m not out.” He blinked and tried to focus on what looked like three fat pink sausages. “I’m in the bathroom.”

“No, you’re not. I moved you to one of the beds.”

“You carried me?”

“As if. I just, you know, poof.”

“Oh. Poof. Was that the burst of light?”

The sausages disappeared and the edge of the bed dipped as Diana sat down.“No. I think that was when your head hit the edge of the tub.”

“My head…” Movement brought smaller bursts of light. Pain. He remembered pain. On the up side, it didn’t hurt as much as catching himself in the zipper.

“There’s a bump, but angels seem to be pretty tough.”

“Yeah, well, soldiers in the army of the Lord and all that.” He could feel her concern—her pain for his pain—and he kind of thought he ought to do something about it but he just couldn’t seem to muster the enthusiasm.

“Samuel, I don’t want to rush you or anything, but could you get over this a little faster. Checkout time is at noon, and I don’t have enough money for another day—which clearly means we’re not supposed to stay.”

We. He felt a vague nostalgia for the time he’d spent on his own. “Maybe it means you’re supposed to send me back to the light.”

“Maybe you should just stay out of this.”

“Sure.”

Her eyes narrowed.“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means my head hurts.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

The bed rocked as she threw herself off it. Samuel winced.“You want to hear the weird thought I had as I finished showering?”

“I guess.”

“That makes me feel more human.”

“What does?”

“The shower, I guess. It’s the thought I had: That makes me feel more human. And then…” He waved a hand in the general direction of his head. “…this. Pain.”

Diana snorted.“Got news for you, bucko. Pain is the general human condition.”

“Then send me back. I don’t think I want to be human anymore.”

“Well, that’s just too…” Her voice trailed off into thought. They couldn’t find the demon because she was the exact opposite of Samuel. The exact opposite. Throwing herself back onto the bed, she grabbed his shoulders hard enough to dimple the bare skin. “I’m an idiot!”

“Look, I know it’s unangelic of me, but I don’t really feel up to dealing with your lack of self-esteem right now.”

“What?”

“Stop shaking me!”

“Sorry.” She pulled her hands away but continued looming over him. “I’ve just solved the problem. If you don’t want to be in a human body, you don’thave to be.”

“I don’t?” Pushing back against the pillow accomplished nothing much, but he didn’t like the way her eyes were gleaming.

“No, you don’t. I helped make you. My, for lack of a better word, power signature is a part of you. That’s why I can unmake you, but it should also mean I can transform you.”

“Should?”

Ignoring him, she leaped up and spun around, arms outstretched.“You’ll still be you but different. The demon copied this body, so without it, we’ll be able to find her. It’s simple.”

“I won’t be human?”

The spinning stopped.“No.”

“But I’ll still be me.”

“Yes.”

“What will I be?”

“I don’t know. I’ll undo the human seeming and the light will rearrange. Without Lena and her father to interfere, you’ll self-define.” Suddenly serious, she sat down and pushed her hair off her forehead. “I don’t want to push you into this, Samuel, but it would solve all our problems.”

It took him a moment to figure out her expression. When he realized he was looking at hope, he couldn’t stop himself from smiling. Hope was, after all, one of the primary messages of the light. Maybe this was why he was here. “Would my head hurt?”

“Different body. No reason why it should.”

“Then let’s do it.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Claire and Dean had opened the way for the light, but her crepe-paper snowflake hanging from the ceiling in the gym had held it together. Standing at the foot of the bed, Diana closed her eyes and reached into the possibilities until she could see Samuel lying in front of her. Slowly and carefully, she detached the parameters Lena and her father had placed around him. She took him back to what he had been in the gym, then wrapped the part that was Samuel in the possibilities and pushed him forward.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

In the instant between Diana taking him back and shoving him forward again, Samuel thought he heard voices.

“So he’s off the duty roster?”

“Let’s just say he’s on an extended leave of absence.”

“Let’s just say?” The first voice snorted. “Oh, easy for you, Gabriel. You’re not the one who has to fill his post on the Perdition front.”

“Bitch, bitch, bitch.”

“Hey, there’s a war on, you know. Or maybe that’s something you guys in the band have forgotten.”

And then there was only light, and a question.

If he wasn’t an angel, and he wasn’t a human, what was he?

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Diana blinked away afterimages and stared down at the towel she’d thrown over Samuel’s crotch. Whatever he’d become fit under it with room to spare. Fingers crossed, she bent down and flicked it back.

The marmalade tabby sat up and looked around.

“You’re a cat.”

“Well, duh. Didn’t anyone ever tell you that angels were like cats only with…” He cocked his head, trying to remember just what it was Ilea had said. “…you know, differences.”

Staggering back, Diana went to sit down on one of the chairs but, at some time during the proceedings, it had self-defined as a plant stand, and she hit the floor instead. It suddenly became painfully clear who Samuel had reminded her of as he’d made his reproachful way to the bathroom.

Austin.

TWELVE

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_4]

SINCE DEAN HAD POLITELY but vehemently objected to her willing the truck faster, Claire let her head loll back against the headrest and closed her eyes. Extending her will toward Toronto, she slid past the permanently monitored sites, her passage noted only by the elderly Keeper at the site in Scarborough.

“Oh, sure, you can go by like a ship in the night, but you never write, you never call. A lousy birthday card would kill you? The best forty-two years of my life I give to you and you don’t even remember my birthday. You got a memory like a cantaloupe.”

“Excuse me?”

“Why? What did you do?”

Claire moved on into the possibilities a little faster. Keepers who essentially became the seal that stopped darkness from emerging out of an unclosable hole, became caricatures of their former selves. She’d narrowly missed becoming the youngest Keeper to ever hold such a position and shuddered at the sudden vision of herself at ninety-two in stretch capri pants and wedges, scarlet lips and crimson fingernails, badly dyed hair poofed out over way too much purple eye shadow—a cross between Nancy Reagan and Miss Piggy.

Didn’t happen, she reminded herself.Didn’t…

Wait.

Something was happening.

She heard voices…

“I’m warning you, Michael, don’t touch the horn.”

“Or you’ll what? Blow me?”

…then a sudden flash of light threw her back into her body. She stiffened and moaned. The Summons hit a heartbeat later.

“As much as I’m happy you two are back into it,” Austin muttered without opening his eye, “given that we’re speeding down a snowy highway with a bunch of lunatics who’ve forgotten how to drive since the last time the frozen white stuff fell, don’t you think Dean ought to keep both hands on the steering wheel?”

“I can feel the demon.”

“I thought you were calling it Floyd. Ow!” He turned his head and glared at her. “Don’t poke the cat, I’m old.”

“So Diana came through, then?” Dean asked, making a mental note to ask about this Floyd guy when the cat wasn’t around.

“I knew she would.”

Austin snorted.“You thought she was going to destroy the world as we know it, bringing upon us the Last Judgment and roller disco. Not that there’s a lot of difference,” he added.

Somewhat redundantly in Dean’s opinion. “Are we still after heading to Toronto, then?”

Claire checked the Summons.“So far.”

They drove in silence for a few moments.

“The angel’s gone, then?”

Curious about Dean’s tone, Claire turned to face him. “Yes.”

“And you can find the demon now?”

“Uh-huh.”

“And when you find the demon, you can get rid of it?”

“I’m a Keeper. Of course I can get rid of it.”

He glanced toward her and smiled suggestively.“No angel, no demon…”

“No problem.” Realizing where he was headed, she returned his smile and stroked one finger along the top of his thigh.

“Is it just me,” Austin asked, sitting up, “or are we suddenly moving a lot faster?”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

The angel had changed.

Feeling suddenly exposed, Byleth ran into the only room in the mission where she’d be left alone—unexpectedly finding three other girls already in there sharing a cigarette.

The dominant member of the trio slid off the sink and turned to face her.“You want something, new girl?”

The part of her that was a seventeen-year-old girl wanted to protest that she’d just come in to use the bathroom and she wasn’t looking for trouble. Then the rest of her pushed that part down and stole its lunch money. “I want you to leave.”

“What?”

“Leave.” Breathing heavily through her nose, barely holding all the parts together, Byleth reached into the darkness. “I want you to leave.”

“Yeah? Well, I don’t give a half-eaten rat’s ass for what you want. I…What’s that?” Pierced brows drew in and scowled at the dripping bit of flesh hanging from the tail in Byleth’s hand.

“It’s a half-eaten rat’s ass. Take it and go.”

Eyes locked on the partial rodent, the other two girls sidled by and out the door. In the complex hierarchy of adolescence, having a rat’s ass conveniently on hand clearly trumped a pack of smokes and an attitude.

“What kind of retarded shithole do you come from?” their abandoned leader asked, taking an unconcerned drag. “That is so totally not what I meant. Now, me, I’m going to finish my cigarette and…” Her gaze locked on Byleth’s nose. “I never saw you light up.”

“I didn’t.”

“But there’s smoke…”

“Get. Out.”

“Hey, you’re not the boss of me.” Bravado winning over common sense, she flicked her butt toward the sink…

“NOW!”

…and was out the door before it actually touched the porcelain.

Byleth tossed the rat in the garbage and stared at her reflection.“Why is it so damned foggy in…oh.” Like thousands before her, she found it a lot harder to stop smoking than to start, but, after an extended struggle, she managed it. Not that it mattered, her cover had been blown. She might as well walk around in a pair of horns, carrying a pitchfork—if that particular look wasn’tso yesterday’s demon. Without equal and opposite coverage by the light, she’d be easy to spot by any Keeper and probably most Cousins. Metaphysical alarms would be screaming, “Demon in the world!” and every Goody Two-shoes in the area not currently helping little old ladies across the street would be zeroing in.

She should have changed with the angel. He was as much tied by the stupid body he was wearing as she was. Therefore, he couldn’t have changed on his own. Heso cheated.

“Oh, yeah, he got a Keeper to change him so they could find me. Fine. You want to find me, Keeper, you’ll find me!” A light wisp of smoke drifted out of both nostrils. It felt great. “If I’m going out, I’m going out big. No more just hanging around and irritating people.” She spread her arms. “I’ll open a hole of darkness so big it’ll make the Home Shopping Channel seem like a cable network!”

Her reflection frowned.“It is a cable network.”

“Shut up!”

“And you can’t open a hole of darkness big enough to cause much trouble because the physicality of the body denies you access to that kind of power.”

“Iam that kind of power.”

“Then you’ll have to destroy the body. You’ll cease to exist. Gone. No more reality than you can find in that stupid television program about those people on the island.”

“What do you mean?”

“Read your lips. You’ll be absorbed back into the darkness. No more you.”

“Oh, like it’s such joy to be a teenager.” But it was better than being nothing at all, better than being a lesser part of a greater whole—actually it was remarkably similar to being a lesser part of a greater whole. Byleth chewed thoughtfully on the edge of a thumbnail, spitting bits of navy blue polish into the sink. If she could open a big enough hole, cause enough mayhem and destruction, she could maintain her identity even in the darkness where individuality depended on being more of a shit than the next guy—and not always metaphorically.

She’d have to open the hole quickly, before the Keepers found her, so she’d need a spot where at least part of the work had already been done.

“And I know just the place.”

Unfortunately, her evil chortle fell flat as her reflection ignored her, concentrating instead on the dorky little flip ruining the right side of her hair.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“One, two, three,four. One, two,three, four.”

“Are you all right down there?”

Samuel stopped counting and glared up at Diana, cream-colored whiskers bristling indignantly.“Why?”

“No reason,”

“I’m fine.”

“Okay.”

“This four legs walking stuff is a lot harder than it looks, you know.”

Diana bit back a snicker as she pushed the elevator call button.“It couldn’t possibly be. I think I should carry you,” she added as the elevator arrived. “I’ve set it up so people’s attention will slide right off you, but in an enclosed space you’d likely get stepped on.”

“Something tells me I didn’t think this transformation thing through,” Samuel muttered as she scooped him up. Still, it felt surprisingly pleasant to be held. He flicked his tail out into a more comfortable position as the door opened.

A small child stared up at them with widening eyes.“Kitty, Mama!”

“Yes, sweetheart,” his mother agreed, as Diana moved past her, “a stuffed kitty.”

“Who’s she calling stuffed?”

“Kitty talks, Mama!”

“Toy kitties don’t talk, sweetheart.”

A small hand closed around Samuel’s tail and pulled. “Ding dong!”

“OW!”

“Kitties don’t ding dong either, sweetheart.” Shooting Diana an apologetic smile, she grabbed her son’s wrist with one hand and pried his fingers free with the other. A bit of fur came free as well. “And it’s not polite to touch things that belong to other people.”

“Especially tails!” Hooking his claws in Diana’s jacket, Samuel swiveled around until he could stare down at the child, golden eyes narrowed to glimmering slits. “Listen to your mother, Ramji, because someday she’ll die and you’ll wish you had.”

Ramji wrapped his arms around his mother’s leg. “Kitty knows my name.”

He was still wrapped around her leg when the elevator reached the lobby, and she crossed to the hotel’s front door with a resigned shuffle.

“That’s a kid who’s going to need serious therapy down the road.” Diana shifted her grip. “What kind of an angel says something like that?”

“The kind that just got his tail pulled. Besides,” Samuel continued after a few quick licks at his shoulder, “it’s the truth and one day he’ll thank me for it.”

“One day he’ll spend thousands of dollars being convinced you were a metaphor for toilet training.”

“He grabbed my tail!”

“I know. I was there.”

“You said people wouldn’t be able to see me properly.”

“He was a proto-person.” She set him down in one of the lobby’s over stuffed chairs and stepped back. “I’m going to check out. Stay there.”

“Or what?”

“I haven’t got time to go into it right now, but why don’t you apply that Higher Knowledge thing to the joint concepts of can openers and opposable thumbs.” As she walked over to the counter, she considered all the things he could have become and asked the world at large, more in search of sympathy than enlightenment, “Why a cat?”

The world at large offered no answers.

Left to amuse himself, Samuel did a little kneading, claws moving rhythmically in and out of the corduroy cushion covers. Shoulders up, head down, his eyes began to close as he moved in a slow circle. He didn’t know what it was, but something about that yielding surface under his front paws created the most incredible feeling. Kneading harder, really putting his back into it, he heard a sudden loud noise and froze.

Two-stroke engine, single spark, gas and oil mix…oh, wait, it’s me.

Which was when he spotted the other cat.

A marmalade tabby, it had a cream-colored bib and the same color markings around both muzzle and eyes. The darker stripes down tail and legs made it look as if it was wearing footie pajamas—the effect emphasized by the way the legs were still a bit too long for the body.

Samuel stared at it.

It stared back.

Head cocked to one side, Samuel took a cautious step forward.

It took a cautious step forward.

Hoping he wasn’t rushing the introduction, Samuel leaned forward for a good long sniff.

The cinnamon triangle of his nose mashed flat against the mirror.

Leaping back, his back feet scrambled for purchase as he nearly went off the chair, only the barricade of Diana’s legs saving him from an embarrassing fall. Blinking rapidly, he leaned against her knees, looked up at her, and said in what he hoped was a convincing tone, “I meant to do that.”

“Okay.”

“I knew it was a mirror.”

“I believe you.”

“Right.” He took a few quick licks at the edge of a stripe. “So, where do we go from here?”

Diana sighed.“Home.”

“But what about the demon?” Samuel demanded. “I’m not blocking it now. We should go after it.”

“Yes, we should. But we can’t.” She dropped down onto the arm of the chair and scowled at her reflection, one hand absently rubbing the cat behind the ears. “I can feel that there’s a demon out there, but I still don’t know where she is. Which means some other Keeper has it sealed up. And, gee, I wonder which other Keeper?”

“Claire?”

“Good guess.”

Samuel could tell Diana was upset, although he wasn’t entirely certain why. “You don’t know that for sure,” he offered.

Diana snorted.“We—me and Claire—were responsible for you, which makesus responsible for the demon, which meanswe should have got the Summons, but sinceI didn’t,she must have.”

He frowned, ears saddling.“Then she must be able to handle the demon on her own.”

“Well, duh. What?” she demanded of an eavesdropping Bystander, shooting him the look that had made her the terror of intramural field hockey back before the school board decided it might not be the best idea to give hormonally hopped up adolescents weapons and carte blanche to break shins. “You’ve never seen anyone talk to a stuffed animal before?”

“Actually, no.”

Holding his gaze, she reached into the possibilities.“You still haven’t.” Scooping up Samuel, she stood and headed for the revolving door. Outside, on Carlton Street, she put the cat down on a cleared bit of sidewalk.

“Hey! I’m in bare feet here!”

“You’re a cat. That’s the only way your feet come.”

“Right. I knew that, but…”

As the pigeon back-flapped into a landing, Samuel whirled around and leaped. Had he been in the body longer, he would have had to have dealt with the small ethical dilemma of whether or not an angel could actually eat a pigeon he’d killed—not to mention the slightly larger health dilemma of whether or not anyoneshould eat a pigeon born and raised on the streets of Toronto. As it was, he hooked a tail feather, but the rest of the bird got away, dropping a large, white, hysterical opinion of the change on Diana’s shoulder as it passed.

“Go on, chicken, fly! There’s more where that came from!” He boxed the feather to the ground, flicked it up, and boxed it down again.

“Are you done?”

“One more time.” Both front paws finally holding the feather captive, he smiled up at her. “Okay, I’m done. Now what?”

“First, you can stop being so cute.”

“Actually, I don’t think I can,” Samuel admitted after a moment’s consideration.

Diana sighed.“Swell. Do me a favor; if I ever talk baby talk to you, claw my tongue out.”

“I don’t think I can do that either.”

“Not surprised.” Bending, she picked him up and settled him in the crook of her arm. “Come on, it’s the subway to the train station and the first train to London for us.”

“That’s it?” When she nodded, he looked thoughtful. “So essentially I became a cat in order to go home with you and live a pampered life devoid of responsibility while others take the risks and get the glory?”

“Looks like.”

“Kewl.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

The Bystander Diana’d adjusted in the hotel lobby never saw anyone speak to a stuffed animal again. Although his wife didn’t believe in the disability, his children learned to exploit it early on by muttering constantly into the ears of plush toys when struck with the need to do something like fit a frozen hamburger patty into the DVD player.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“Yes, I have a car.” Backed into a literal corner, panic rolling off him like smoke, Leslie/Deter saw no way out. “Why?”

Byleth smiled sweetly and moved a step closer.“Because I need a ride.”

“No.”

“If you give me a ride, I’ll have sex with you.” She probably wouldn’t, but it seemed to be the best currency this body offered.

He swallowed and ground his shoulder blades into the wall, feet pedaling uselessly against the gray industrial tile on the floor.“No. I took the ch…chastity oath.”

“The ch…chastity oath?” Her breasts flattened over a good portion of his chest. “Okay, if you give me a ride, Iwon’t have sex with you.”

“Deal!”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Nalo almost never went to Scarborough. As well as old Aunt Jen, it had another Keeper taking care of day-to-day metaphysical maintenance. Unfortunately, old Aunt Jen had taken a dislike to the man, and Nalo found herself in the unenviable position of comforter and confidante.

So here I am, back on the bus. Reaching into the possibilities, she adjusted the heat blasting out of the grille under the window—a minor technical infraction but preferable to dry roasting.I know what Jen’s thinking, calling me out here again. She’s thinking she’ll leave me that hole when she dies. Well, she can just think again. I don’t give a damn about what’s supposedto be, I’m not dropping my ass onto a hole in Scarborough for the next fifty years. The moment Jen passes, I’m hauling Diana out here and she can use that power of hers to slap the sucker closed and I don’t care if she’s got more important things to do because there isn’t anything more important than keeping me out of Scar…

Hellfire and damnation.

Her fingers closed around the cord, and she was up out of her seat before the sound of the bell reached the bus driver’s ear.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“That’s your car?” Pulling off a mitten, Byleth trailed her fingers along the gleaming black hood of the 1973 Firebird. “Who’d have thunk it—a God-pimp with a truly kewl set of wheels. Maybe Iwill have sex with you.”

Eyes wide, Leslie/Deter jerked back.“Hey! You promised!”

Taking a deep breath, she leaned in and rubbed against the passenger door.“I know. But that was before I saw this totally demonic car.”

“You want a ride or not?”

“Yessss.…”

“Then stop humping my car and get in.”

The hair lifted on the back of Byleth’s neck. She watched a city bus drive by, slow, and pull into a bus stop at the end of the block.

“Byleth?”

“In a minute. I’ve got to take care of something first.”

The back doors of the bus opened.

She had to distract the Keeper or they’d never get away. Grabbing the first bit of darkness that came to hand, she tossed it into the small clump of preteens waiting at the light where it erupted into a sudden slush ball fight of epic proportions. She saw the massive handful of filthy ice and snow launched; she didn’t wait to see it land.

“Let’s go, Leslie.” Dropping into the car, she slammed the door and reached for the seat belt. “Did I mention I was a demon?” she asked as they pulled into traffic.

His laugh carried distinctly nervous overtones.“I almost believe you.”

“Really?”

“You’re not like other girls. You’re not even like the other girls we help off the street. You’re not like any girl I’ve ever met. You’re not…”

“I get it. Jeez. And thank you.” She needed the reassurance as geeky as it might be.

It was getting harder and harder to touch the darkness.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

As Nalo stepped off the bus, time slowed. She saw the slush ball approaching, the bits of rock and mud and ice standing out with unnatural clarity against the tiny bit of actual snow holding the thing together. She saw past it to the expression on the kid’s face as he realized what was about to happen. She saw past him to a 1973 Firebird pulling away from the curb.

Then time sped up, and she didn’t see anything at all for a few minutes.

Staggering forward, she clawed the slush ball from her face, reaching into the possibilities, past the pain and anger and certain knowledge that she was going to need to have her coat dry-cleaned again. Nalo had been a Keeper long enough that it would take more to distract her than a face full of frozen crap and the prospect of a twenty-two-dollar dry-cleaning bill.

But by the time she could see again, the car was gone.

The young man who’d exited the bus behind her, touched her lightly on one shoulder. “You okay, lady?”

“No. I have a sense of foreboding that can only mean darkness has found a way to corrupt the world, bringing down upon us a future of pain and pestilence. And I seem to have a piece of gravel up my nose.”

“Bummer.”

“Indeed.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Taking her seat on the half-empty subway, Diana did nothing to keep the other passengers from noticing the cat. Given the invisible walls that Toronto subway passengers erected around them in order to avoid interaction with potential crazies, religious lunatics, and lost American tourists, she could have been carrying a platypus on her lap and no one would have said anything. In fact, it very much looked as if an elderly woman in the other end of the carwas carrying a…

“Hey, there’s Doug!”

A talking cat, however, attracted a little attention.

“Hair ball,” Diana announced, carefully tweaking reality. When everyone accepted the explanation—and no one took it as an instruction—she breathed a sigh of relief. “Keep it down,” she muttered into the plush orange fur between Samuel’s ears. “Unless you want to end up on late nightTV hawking kibble between the psychics and those live girl phone things.”

“1–800-U-CALL-ME,” Doug added as he sat down beside them, having left a trail of cheap wine fumes the length of the subway car. “How’s it going, Samuel?”

“Pretty good. Still haven’t figured out the tail, though.”

“It’ll come. I see you’re down to partial genitalia.”

Diana closed her teeth on the comment she was about to make and took a closer look.

“Hey!” Samuel spun around and glared at her. “If you don’t mind!”

“Sorry.”A self-neutering cat. Just what the world needs.“And keep your voice down.”

“No need, little lady. We’re in my cone of silence.” Doug stirred the surrounding miasma with expansive gestures, the cuffs of two jackets and three visible sweaters rising up on thin gray wrists.

Breathing shallowly through her mouth, Diana reached into the possibilities. They showed no cone of silence but, on the other hand, street people were ignored so completely by the rest of the city’s residents it amounted to the same thing.

“Any particular reason you decided to walk on the furry side, kid?”

“We needed to expose a demon.”

“A demon? In the world?”

While Diana rolled her eyes and wondered why it was taking so long to get from College Street to Union Station where they could lose Samuel’s fragrant buddy, Samuel explained the whole thing.

“A demon in the world,” Doug restated, frowning thoughtfully. “Well, now, that does explain things. And here I was blaming that bottle of aftershave I knocked back this morning. So you exposed a demon, and now you’re off after it, right?”

“Wrong,” Diana told him—or more precisely told the space next to him. She was finding it hard to focus on his face, but that could have been because of the pale green strand waving from his nose. “We’re off home. Someone else is off after the demon.”

“Her older sister,” Samuel added.

“And you got a few younger sibling issues with that sister of yours, don’t you? No need to deny it, it’s dripping from your voice. Well, you know what I think?” He leaned conspiratorially forward. “I think that TV dinners go best with a nice Chardonnay.”

“What?”

He blinked.“What did I say?” Diana repeated it and he sighed. “Whoa, train of thought got derailed. Toxic spills. Evacuate the women and children.” He drew in a deep breath and released it slowly. Samuel flattened on Diana’s lap, and it passed harmlessly over his head. “Okay. Let’s try that again: I think you should go after that demon yourself. You have to save her.”

“I what?”

“Save her. From your sister.”

“It doesn’t work that way. First of all, we don’t interfere. Second, you seem to be a little confused about the good guys and the bad guys. And third, I don’t even know why I’m talking to you about this.”

“Because he’s an angel,” Samuel pointed out.

“Yeah, right, and I’m a model for Victoria’s Secret.”

Doug’s eyes widened and he cupped both hands in front of his chest. “Hubba hubba!”

“Okay, that’s it.” Diana grabbed the cat and stood as the subway pulled into the King Street station. “I’m gone. We can walk from here.”

“If the demon is an exact opposite of the young man Samuel was, then isn’t she as much of a person?”

Doug’s quiet question stopped her at the door. Diana sighed and let it close in her face before returning to her seat which was, not surprisingly, still empty. “Yes, she is.”

“And is your sister likely to take that into account?”

“No, she isn’t.” If not for an angel, then definitely not for a demon. “I think she’s taking this whole thing personally. But Claire’s being led to her, and I don’t know where she is.”

“Does she know she’s being hunted?”

“She should.”

“So, a demon in the body of a teenage girl knows she’s being hunted; what would she do?” He leaned forward, eyes narrowed. “You’re a teenage girl, think like a demon.”

My cover’s been blown, I know I’m being hunted, I know I don’t stand much of a chance but I’ve been backed into a corner…

As though he were reading her mind, Doug nodded, the green strand bobbing emphatically.“You’ll never take me alive, copper.”

“If she’s got to go,” Diana said slowly, “she’s going to flip Claire the finger on the way out, leaving behind the biggest possible mess for Claire to clean up.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

The constant pound of the Summons changed tone and timbre. Claire shifted under her seat belt and brought both hands up to rub at her temples. There were times when being a Keeper resembled sitting next to the drum kit at a Moby concert.“It’s moving east.”

Glancing across the cab, Dean made a deductive leap.“The demon?”

Claire nodded.

“We aren’t after heading for Toronto, then?”

“It doesn’t feel like it.”

“Nice to get some good news.” He turned his attention back to the highway. “Goingthrough Toronto’s insanity enough.”

“I never noticed any insanity.”

“You’re not driving.” After his first trip through Toronto, Dean had decided that the Montreal reputation for having the worst drivers in Canada was undeserved. Sure, Montreal drivers all drove like maniacs, but at least they drove like maniacs who knew what they were doing. As near as he could figure, Toronto drivers had their heads so far up their collective arse they had to make it up as they went along.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“The biggest possible mess,” Diana repeated as the subway pulled into Union Station. “Oh, my God! She’s going to Kingston!” Grabbing up Samuel, she ran for the doors, paused, turned, and said, “Are you really an angel?”

Doug smiled.“Can’t you tell?”

“No.” The first whistle blew and she stepped out onto the platform. Sheshould have been able to tell. Behind the closing doors, Doug spread his hands and bowed. Diana could see his lips move, but the roar of the old Red Rocket drowned him out.

He turned and waved as the subway headed north up the University line.

“I wonder what he said,” she murmured, hurrying toward the escalators.

“Lex clavatoris designati rescindenda est.”

“Good ears.”

“I’m a cat.”

“Only recently, so you can cut back on the attitude.” Diana shifted the cat to her other arm, cut off an elderly Asian man, and raced up the narrow stairs, boots pounding against the metal treads. “And while I agree that the designated hitter rule has got to go, what does that have to do withhim being, or not being, an angel?”

Samuel hooked his claws through her jacket.“Don’t angels play baseball?”

“The Anaheim Angels. It’s just the name of a team—I like so truly doubt there are actual metaphysical players on it.”

“You sure?”

“No. And you know what? I don’t care.”

“Qui tacet consentit,” Samuel muttered, as she stepped out onto the tiles and headed for the train station at a fast trot.

“Fac ut vivas! And stop showing off, I can’t think of anything more annoying than a cat who criticizes in Latin.”

“A cat who horks up a hair ball in a hundred-and-forty-dollar-pair of sneakers?”

“Tres gross. You win.”

Leaning into the turn leading to a well-worn flight of limestone stairs, he smiled.“Of course.”

“That was cutting back on the attitude?”

“What attitude?”

Taking the stairs two at a time, Diana realized why so many of Claire’s conversations with Austin ended in unanswered questions.

“So why is the demon going to Kingston?” Samuel asked as they leveled out and headed across the polished marble floor toward the line for train tickets.

“She’s going to reopen a hole to Hell. OW!”

“Sorry.” Samuel fought his claws free of jacket, sweater, shirt, and flesh. “Are you serious?”

“No, I’m bleeding!”

“Hey, I said I was sorry, but you can’t just mention Hell to an angel and expect no reaction.”

“Fair enough.” Diana slid in between the velvet ropes and prepared to wait for the first available sales agent. At the moment, all three of them appeared to be on break. “That’s one powerful union,” she muttered when reaching into the possibilities produced no visible results.

“Hell?” the cat prodded.

“Okay, short version of a long story: My sister and I closed this really old hole to Hell in the basement of a sort of hotel in Kingston before Christmas. Sealed the site, saved the world—yadda, yadda, yadda—but the place will still remember the hole, so reopening it will give the demon the biggest bang for the least buck. If she gets past the Cousin monitoring the site fast enough—and from what Claire told me about the dirty old man, she shouldn’t have much trouble if she came fully outfitted—she’ll have time to get the hole open before Claire catches up. We may not have to worry about Claire erasing her personhood because the rising darkness will completely overwhelm it.”

“Not to mention overwhelm the world with pure unadulterated evil insuring that everyone on it lives short miserable lives of pain and desperation.”

“Well, yeah. That, too.”

THIRTEEN

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_4]

“NOW BOARDING AT GATE RORG, VIA Rail train number gonta sev to Nootival, with stops at Gaplerg, Corbillslag, Pevilg, and Binkstain.”

“That’s us,” Diana declared, scooping the cat up off the bench as the station loudspeakers repeated the announcement in French.

“Hey, watch the whiskers,” Samuel protested as she stuffed him into the backpack she’d bought at the station shop, heaved him up onto one shoulder, and hurried toward the gate. He peered out through the open zipper at the back of her ear. “And I thought we were going to Kingston on the train to Montreal.”

“That’s right: Binkstain on the train to Nootival.”

“You’re kidding?”

“Just try to look like luggage, would you.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

The sudden blip of a police siren woke Austin out of a sound sleep. One moment he was lying between Claire and Dean with a paw thrown over his eyes, the next he was up over the seat back and into the depths of his cat carrier muttering,“You can’t prove it was me, anyone could have left that spleen on the carpet.”

“You’ve got to admire his reflexes,” Claire allowed, waving one hand through the contrail of cat hair.

“Do I, then?” Dean asked, gearing down and maneuvering the truck carefully to the narrow shoulder winter had left bracketing highway seven. “Sure. Okay, I guess.”

Claire shot him a questioning glance, noted the muscle jumping along his jaw, and the distinct“man about to face a firing squad” angle to his profile. “You’ve never been pulled over before, have you?”

“No.” He sighed and laid his forehead on the steering wheel.

It was a vaguely embarrassed no, but whether he was embarrassed because he’d been pulled over now or because he’d never been pulled over before, Claire couldn’t tell. Some guys might be bothered by reaching twenty-one without a speeding ticket—or more precisely the story of how they got the ticket—but would they be the same guys who were bothered by un-ironed underwear? “Don’t worry, I’ll deal with it.” She twisted around within the confines of the seat belt. “There’s a demon out there; we haven’t time to jump through hoops for the OPP.”

“No.”

This, however, was a definite no. An inarguable no. She watched Dean’s chin rise as he rolled down the window and recognized his “taking responsibility” look.

“You don’t do the crime,” he announced, “if you can’t do the time.”

“What?”

“It’s the theme song from a seventies’ cop show.”

“You weren’t around in the seventies.”

“I saw it at my cousin’s. In Halifax. On the Seventies’ Cop Show Network. He has a satellite dish,” Dean added as Claire’s brows drew so far in they met over her nose. “Look, it’s not important, I just don’t want you messing with the cop’s head. I broke the law, so I’m after facing the consequences.”

“You were doing one hundred ten in an eighty. It’s not like you’ve been out robbing banks or clogging Internet access to I’ve-got-more-money-than-brains. com.” Over the years, Claire had fixed a number of tickets while catching rides with Bystanders. Once, she’d attempted to convince a Michigan State Trooper that ninety-seven miles an hour on I-90 through Detroit was a perfectly reasonable speed. Poking around in his head, she discovered she hadn’t been the first—or even the most convincing. “Dean, I’m sorry, but, as a Keeper, I have to say that getting rid of this demon has to be right at the top of our to-do list.”

“It is.”

“Good.”

“Right after this.”

“But…”

“Keepers police metaphysical crimes, right?” He caught up her hand and stared earnestly at her over her fingertips.

“Essentially, but…”

“How can I help you do your job, if I blow off this guy doing his?”

Her eyes widened.

“That’snot what I meant.” His glasses steamed up in the heat rising off his face. “It’s not. It wasn’t. Look, just let me deal with this. And then you can do what you want to make up the time.” The sound of heavy footsteps drew closer. “Claire?”

“Okay,” she muttered reluctantly. “But make it…”

“A quickie,” Austin snickered from the depths of the cat carrier.

As he turned toward the looming figure of the OPP constable, Dean shot a glance behind the seat that promised a discussion with the cat in the near future. Claire didn’t know why he bothered since Austin usually went to sleep right around the time Dean started talking about mutual respect, but she admired his persistence—futile though it might be. A cat’s idea of mutual respect had nothing about it any other species would recognize as mutual.

“License and registration, sir.”

The constable’s accent was pure Ontario and Claire felt some of the tension leave her shoulders. Maybe itwould be possible to get back on the road with a minimum of delay.

Dean struggled to get his wallet out of his back pocket, realized he was strapped in, and jammed his seat belt trying to open it. Pounding the release catch with one hand and yanking at the lap belt with the other, he flopped about, making it worse. With the theme song to“C*O*P*S” running through his head, he fought to keep from hyperventilating as he alternately pounded and yanked. He’d watched enough television to know that when the police thought they were being dicked around life got unpleasant for the perp.

“If you’d just relax…”

“Not now, Claire.” Just relax and it’ll happen. Just relax and don’t think so much. Just relax and let nature take its course. After two nights of Claire telling him to relax, that word in her voice got him so anxious he wanted to scream at her to shut up.

“I think your lady’s trying to say that the tension against the belt is causing the problem.”

“Oh.” He sagged back against the seat, pressed the release with his thumb, and pulled the belt free. Fully aware of Claire’s pointed stare, he got out his license and registration and handed them over.

“Newfoundland, eh?”

“I meant to get my plates switched—and my license,” he explained hurriedly, hoping it didn’t sound like he was making feeble excuses for breaking the law, “but I wasn’t certain I was staying.”

The constable bent down and peered at Claire.“I see. You know a Hugh McIssac?” he asked as he straightened.

“Oh, no…”

He bent again.“Ma’am?”

Claire reached into the possibilities.

Five minutes later, they were driving east at a careful eighty kilometers an hour having received a stern although truncated warning that had included no references to hockey.

“Is it warm in here, or is it me?” Austin asked, dropping down onto the seat.

Claire gathered him up onto her lap and shot a worried glance at Dean. He looked as though he’d been carved from flesh-colored marble, the only indication of his mood a certain flare to the one nostril she could actually see.If he doesn’t say something before we reach that pine tree, I’ll speak first.

The pine tree passed.

Okay, if he doesn’t say something between now and when we reach those blackthorn bushes by the side of the road, I’ll explain.

A lunantishee looked out of the bushes as they went by and stuck a long, mocking tongue out at Claire.

Fine, if he won’t talk to me by that next crossroad, he can just sit there. There’s no reason I should have to say anything. I was right. Because, after all, we’re just on our way to catch a demon and that’s so less important than a forty-five-minute discussion of a peewee game played back in 1979.

They crossed the crossroad.

Austin sighed.“So,” he said, squirming around to face Dean, “who was Hugh McIssac?”

“A guy.” Dean’s teeth were locked so tightly together the words barely emerged, but innate politeness forced him to answer a direct question.

“A guy you knew back in St. John’s?”

“Yes.”

“Play hockey with him?”

“No.”

Claire felt the burn rush up her cheeks at the clipped negative.Oops. There’d be no way to make this up to him. A sound caught somewhere between an apology and a whimper forced its way past her teeth.

Dean glanced at her and sighed.

“Against,” he added grudgingly.

“Aha!”

“Oh, nice way to smooth things over,” Austin muttered.

“So, if I hadn’t stepped in, wewould have been there another half an hour!”

Dean shook his head.“You don’t know that.”

“Because this would have been the time you cut the conversation short?”

“Yes!”

Claire folded her arms.

“Well, maybe.”

She snorted.

“Okay, probably not. But that’s not the point,” he told her indignantly, slowing slightly to let a minivan pass. “You said you’d let me deal with it.”

“I didn’t change any of the police stuff. He had no intention of giving you a ticket.”

“I’ll never know that for sure, will I?”

“And there’s nothing worse than girding your loins for a battle you don’t need to fight,” Austin interjected, climbing off Claire’s lap and stretching out on the seat.

“You girded your loins?” Claire stared across the cat at Dean.

“No.”

“No?”

“I don’t even know what that means!” He sighed hard enough to momentarily frost the inside of the windshield. “I just wanted to handle it myself.”

“You don’t trust me?”

“Yes, I trust you. But you’re some high-handed at times!”

“I’m a Keeper! And I’ll have you know I’m no more high-handed than it takes to do my job. If you’d rather talk hockey than make love…”

“What?”

“We find the demon, I banish the demon, we find a private corner; isn’t that the plan? Unless you don’t want…Why are you pulling over? Dean?”

He put the truck into neutral, stepped down the parking brake, and pulled on the hazards. Then he turned to face her, one hand braced on her headrest, the other on the dash.“I want to make love to you. I want to make love to you so badly it’s all I can think about. When I’m eating, when I’m driving, when I’m looking at you, when I’m not looking at you, when I’m talking about demons, when I’m talking about hockey—I’m still thinking about making loveto you.”

“And this is what you’re thinking about when you’re talking to me?” Austin demanded, rising up into the space between them. When Dean answered in the affirmative, he sighed and dropped back down again. “Well, that’s really going to put a damper on future conversations.”

Reaching out, Dean stroked the back of his fingers over Claire’s cheek. “But I’m only thinking about making love to you because I can’t actually make love to you. If I could, I certainly wouldn’t be talking about hockey, I’d be…”

“Okay, that’s enough. The cat does not need to know the details.”

Without taking her eyes off Dean, Claire picked Austin up and dropped him behind the seat. Then she snapped off her belt and slid forward. After a moment she sucked Dean’s lower lip away from his teeth and, when the suction finally broke, murmured into the swollen flesh, “Shall we find that demon, then?”

Dean’s answer was essentially inarticulate.

Austin opted to stay out of the discussion entirely.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Would you please stop doing that.”

“Doing what?”

“Rubbing my car. It’s…”

“Turning you on?”

“…distracting me. I keep seeing peripheral movement, I think someone’s about to make a lane change, and it’s always you. It isn’t easy driving this car in this weather in this traffic, and I’d appreciate just a little…HEY! YOU WANNA STOP VISUALIZING WORLD PEACE AND START VISUALIZING YOUR TURN SIGNALS!…consideration.”

Byleth blinked, looked from Leslie/Deter to the SUV that had just drifted across three lanes of fast-moving traffic and back to Leslie/Deter again.“He didn’t hear you.”

“I know. But it makes me feel better. Helps me drive.”

“Oh.”

“It’s just a way of releasing…TRY LEASING A CAR YOU KNOW HOW TO DRIVE, MORON!”

The car in question braked hard, swerved left, then right, then hit a patch of ice, turned a complete three hundred and sixty degrees and settled safely on the shoulder. A half a kilometer of brakes squealed, dozens of steering wheels were cranked, sudden moisture caused two seat warmers to short out, and then it was over.

Byleth smiled.“He heard you that time.”

Fingers white around the steering wheel, Leslie/Deter stared wide-eyed out at the surrounding traffic still moving miraculously to the east and beginning to pick up speed.“God saved us all.”

“You think?”

“He reached down His hand to keep His children safe.”

“No.” Byleth frowned and shook her head. “I’d have noticed that.”

“You can’t deny that was a miracle.”

“Hey! I can deny anything I want,” she snarled, folding her arms and slumping down in the seat.

They drove in silence for a few minutes, then Leslie/ Deter sighed and squared his shoulders.“You know, you’re not as tough as you think you are.”

Byleth glared at him past the lock of hair bisecting her face, her expression as much disbelief as anger.“You have no idea how tough I am.”

“You think you’re bad.”

“Iam bad!”

“You think it’s cool to be all dark and dangerous.”

“Hello? Hell to Leslie!” One navy-tipped fingernail poked him hard in the shoulder. “Iam dark and dangerous.”

“I know why you do it.”

“Oh, please…”

“It keeps people from getting close to you. Keeps you from getting hurt.”

“I don’t get hurt. I do the hurting.”

“Essentially the same thing.”

“If you think that having red hot pokers stuffed up your ass is the same as stuffing those same pokers up someone else’s ass, you’re dopier than I thought. And that’s almost scary.” Beginning to wonder why she hadn’t considered the implications of being stuck in a car with a God-pimp for three hours, Byleth unhooked her seat belt and twisted around until she faced the driver, her eyes onyx from lid to lid. “Leslie, look at me.”

“Not now, Byleth. I’m trying to keep the car on the road.”

“I said,look at me.”

“And I said, not now!” A glance in the rearview mirror showed the front grille of a transport and not much else. “Unless you really want to end this little journey upside down in the ditch.”

She thought about that for a moment, her eyes lightening.“Well, no.”

“Good.” He leaned back, downshifted, pulled into the passing lane, and, engine roaring, shifted back into overdrive. They screamed past traffic and dropped speed only when they’d cleared the clump and had moved back into the right-hand lane.

Byleth closed her mouth with a snap.“That wasso kewl.”

Bright spots of color appeared on pale cheeks.“Thanks.”

“Do it again!”

“Sure, next time I have to pass something.”

“What? Like a kidney stone? Do it now!”

“No.” Glancing over at her, his eyes widened. “Byleth! Do up your seatbelt!”

“Because you’ll get a ninety-six-dollar fine and lose three points if the cops pull us over?” she sneered, her hands as far away from the belt as possible while still attached to her body.

“Because you’ll get hurt if anything happens.”

“Won’t your god protect me?”

“It doesn’t work like that.”

“Tell me about it,” she snorted.

He sighed and shook his head.“I’ve been trying to.”

“I want you to know I’m only doing this up because I have to get to Kingston in one piece,” Byleth told him as she dragged the shoulder belt down over her jacket, and shoved the clasp together as hard as she could. “I’m sure not doing it because you told me to. And I so totally don’t believe you care if I get hurt.”

“I do care.”

“Why?”

“Damned if I know.”

“Probably,” she snapped, sinking down into the depths of the bucket seat, knees braced against the dash.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Samuel poked a paw out through the top of the backpack and tapped Diana lightly on the chin.“What’s wrong?”

“Summons,” she whispered. Although the train was crowded with post-Christmas travelers, they had a double seat to themselves—mostly because of the disgustingly realistic stain the possibilities had provided. She’d draped her jacket strategically, but talking to luggage would still attract Bystander attention.

“Okay.” A quick shoulder lick to gather his thoughts and he had a plan. “Here’s what we’ll do: you deal with the Summons, and I’ll go to Kingston and save the demon from your sister.”

He looked perfectly serious. Or at least as serious as an orange cat in a green backpack could look.

“And just supposing I was insane enough to agree to that—how?”

“I’ll think of something. I’m a cat.”

“You’re an angel shaped like a cat,” Diana reminded him pointedly.

“That’s what I meant, I’m an angel.”

“Right. Fortunately, the Summons is on the train. I can deal.” She stood, left her jacket lying where it fell and, turning reluctantly in place, attempted to pin down the feeling. It wasn’t that she minded being Summoned, it was what Keepers did, after all, but since her wallet had been distinctly short of lineage money, and she’d had to spend her Christmas money to buy the train ticket, it didn’t seem exactly fair. Either she was saving the demon on her own time, or she was working—which was it to be? “There! Is that the washroom,” she added, smiling broadly down at the middle-aged man whose attention had been jerked away from his paper.

He shot her the look those over forty reserved for those under twenty and returned to a review ofArchie and Jughead, the holiday’s breakout movie. Diana hadn’t seen it, but she strongly suspected George Clooney had been miscast.

The sound of claws in upholstery brought her shuffle toward the aisle to a sudden stop.

“Where are you going?” she muttered, bending so that her face was millimeters from the angel’s, pushing him back under her jacket.

“With you.”

“Why? You won’t be able to do anything. I won’t be long. Just stay here.”

Samuel thought about it for a moment.“No.”

“Why not?”

He seemed surprised by the question.“I don’t want to.”

“Fine.” Grabbing the straps, Diana swung cat and carrier up onto her shoulder, enjoying the muffled, “Oof!” rather more than she should have.

As it turned out, the accident sitewas in the washroom. Unfortunately, so was someone else. There were four people already waiting in line and judging by their expressions, not to mention the fidgeting, they’d been waiting for a while. Hoping she wasn’t too late, that seeping darkness hadn’t claimed a victim, Diana reached into the possibilities just far enough for safety—not quite far enough for voyeurism.

She couldn’t quite prevent the astounded sputter.

The motherly woman in line in front of her half turned.“Are you all right?”

“Choked on spit. Hate it when that happens.”

“I see.” Still looking concerned, although her focus had shifted from concern for to concern about, she turned away.

The possibilities had shown two people in the bathroom. They’d already been there longer than they’d intended, and it seemed like they were going to be there for quite a while yet. Darkness had no intention of allowing a quickie, not when a delay would leave everyone involved so frustrated. Few things resembled a lynch mob quite as much as people waiting for a toilet.

As though Diana’s thoughts had been her cue, the first person in line, an elderly woman with deep angry lines dragging down the corners of her mouth, stepped forward and banged impatiently on the door.

Which broke the rhythm and looked to delay things even further.

There seemed to be only one logical thing to do.

A few moments later, the couple emerged looking too totally satiated to be embarrassed by the amount of noise the finale had generated. Muttering in disgust, the elderly woman pushed past them, slammed the door, and shot the“occupied” slide home with such force it echoed throughout the car like a gunshot.

Moving Samuel to her other shoulder, Diana followed the line forward, jerking to a stop at the sound of a happy moan from inside the bathroom, closely followed by a muffled“Oh, yes. Yes! YES!” from the cubicle in the next car. Blushing scarlet, she reached back into the possibilities. She’d only intended to bring the original couple to a conjugal conclusion, not everyone who had to relieve themselves between Toronto and Montreal.

Although VIAwas trying to get more people to ride the train.…

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

Diana caught herself on the edge of the toilet as the train lurched around a corner, barely managing to keep her head from cracking against the outer wall.

“Better wash your hands when you finish,” Samuel observed from the sink. “You wouldn’t believe what this place is covered with.”

“I can guess.”

Hooking a paw around a tap, he braced himself as the car rocked from side to side.“No surprise really, I mean, how can a guy aim when he’s being flung around the room.”

“How about sitting down?”

“Not manly. Don’t put your hand there!”

“Eww. You’re not helping.” She erased the signature a Cousin had left behind and straightened. “It’s not a big hole, but it’s been here for so long it may take a while to close it down. I’ll have to keep coming back—do it a bit at a time.”

“You’re going to attract attention,” he pointed out, climbing into the backpack so she could wash her hands.

“As if. People don’t watch other people heading for the bathroom.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“You think she’d try adult diapers or something.”

“Yeah. Adult diapers.”

Just past Coburg, heading into the bathroom for the seventh and hopefully final trip, Diana leaned down and smiled sweetly at the two young men who’d made their observation about adult diapers in carrying voices. “I’m on my period,” she purred for their ears only.

They leaned away from her, appalled.

“Lots of heavy bleeding.”

The blond turned green, his gold eyebrow piercing standing out in stark contrast to his new skin tone.