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"Who are you?" he asked, and she ale he spoke as Chiue

Who was she? "Don’t you usually find that out before you try to kill someone?"

At her back, a renewed pressure at the door If it wasn’t Issa, she was finished

The angel came a step closer, and Karou moved aside so the door burst open

"Karou!" Issa’s voice, sharp

And she spun and leapt through the portal, pulling it shut behind her

Akiva lunged after her and yanked it back open, only to co woirl was already gone

He stood there a hts were spinning The girl would warn Brimstone He should have stopped her, could easily have killed her Instead he’d struck slowly, giving her time to spin clear, dance free Why?

It was simple He’d wanted to look at her

Fool

And what had he seen, or thought he’d seen? Soain--the phantoo, only to have her own fate undo all her gentle teaching? He’d thought every spark of mercy was dead in hiirl And then, the unexpected: the hamsas

A human marked with the devil’s eyes! Why?

There was only one possible answer, as plain as it was disturbing

That she was not, in fact, human

15

THE OTHER DOOR

In the vestibule, Karou fell to her knees Breathing hard, she leaned into the coil of Issa’s serpent body

"Karou!" Issa gathered her into an embrace that left them both sticky with blood "What happened? Who did this to you?"

"You didn’t see hiel…"

Issa’s reaction was profound She reared back like a serpent ready to strike and hissed, "Angel?"All her snakes--in her hair, around her waist and shoulders--writhed along with her, hissing Karou cried out, her wounds wrenched by the violent iveKarou like a child "What do you el? Surely not--"

Karou blinked up at her Shadoere closing in "Why did he want to kill ," Issa fretted She pulled away Karou’s sword-slashed coat and scarf to see her wounds, but the blood was heavy and still flowing, and the light in the vestibule was di in a slow arc around her She aiting for the inner door to unseal, but it didn’t "Can’t we go in?" Her voice was faint "I want Brimstone" She remembered how he’d picked her up and held her when she ca How she’d felt perfect trust and calain…

Issa bunched up Karou’s blood-soaked scarf and tried to stanch her wounds "He’s not here right noeet girl"

"Where is he?"

"He… he can’t be disturbed"

Karou whimpered She wanted Brimstone Needed hi herself, drifting

Falling

Issa’s voice, far away

And then nothing

By and by, flickering ies like badly spliced film: Issa’s eyes and Yasri’s, close, anxious Soft hands, cool water Drea on his back, its bloated face the brown-purple of bruised fruit, and the angel staring straight at Karou like he could ignite her with his eyes

Issa’s voice, hushed and secretive "What can it mean, that they are in the human world?"

Yasri "They h, for all their high opinion of themselves"

This was not part of the drea to a distant shore--effortfully--and she lay silent, listening She was on her childhood cot in the back of the shop; she knew that without opening her eyes Her wounds stung, and the sent in the air The two chi

"But why attack Karou?" Issa hissed

Yasri "You don’t think…? They couldn’t know about her"

Issa "Of course not Don’t be ridiculous"

"No, no, of course not" Yasri sighed "Oh, I wish Briet him?"

"You know he can’t be interrupted But it shouldn’t be long now"

"No"

After a fraught pause, Issa ventured, "He’ll be very angry"

"Yes," agreed Yasri, a tremor of fear in her voice "Oh, yes"

Karou felt the two chi at her and tried her best to appear unconscious It wasn’t hard She felt sluggish, and pain blossomed across her chest, arm, and collarbone Slash wounds to keep her bullet scars company She was thirsty, and knew she had only to let out a mur hand, but she kept silent There was too much to think about