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Phil kicked the angel off the table, sending hiered cluht"

"He has the halo--" Luce started

But Phil’s attention jerked back to the sickly s, where a portly Scale with hair like a monk had risen and now advanced on Daedalus fro over the Outcast’s head, ready to drop

"I will be right back, Lucinda Price" Phil left Luce in her binds on the table and nocked a starshot in his bow

In an instant, he had shoved hiel

"Drop the cloak, Zaban" Phil looked as fierce as he had when he’d first appeared in Luce’s parents’ backyard Luce was surprised to realize they knew each other by naether That was hard to iine now

Zaban had watery blue eyes and bluish lips He looked al the cloak over his shoulder and turned to face Phil, freeing Daedalus to pick up a spindly Scale angel by the feet He swung the old angel around in a circle three tih the eastern , out into a tower of scaffolding below

"Threatening to shoot me, are you, Phillip?" Zaban’s eyes were on the starshot "You want to tip the balance toward Lucifer? Why doesn’t that surprise h for your death to tip the balance"

"At least we count for soether, our lives make a difference in the balance Justice always makes a difference You Outcasts"--he s That is what h for Phil There was sorunt he loosed the arroard Zaban’s heart

"I stand opposed to you," he eezer to vanish

Luce waited for the vanishing, too She’d seen it happen before But the arrow glanced off Zaban’s cloak and clattered to the floor

"How did you--?" Phil asked

Zaban laughed and pulled so out from a hidden breast pocket in his cloak Luce leaned forward, eager to see how Zaban had protected himself But she leaned too far and slid off the table She landed on the floor on her face

No one noticed They were staring at the s herself up slightly, Luce saas bound in leather, the sas It was bound with a knotted golden cord It looked like a Bible, the kind Civil War soldiers used to stuff in their breast pockets in hopes the books would protect their hearts

This book had done just that

Luce squinted to read its title, squir a few inches closer on the floor She was still too far away

In a single movement, Phil retrieved his starshot and swatted the book out of Zaban’s hand By a stroke of luck, it landed a few feet away fro she couldn’t pick it up, not the way the cloak was binding her Still, she had to knohat its pages contained It see before She read the golden letters on its spine

A Record of the Fallen

Now Zaban ran for it, stopping short of Luce, who lay exposed in the center of the floor He glared at her and pocketed the book

"No, no," he said "You don’t get to look at this You don’t get to see all that’s been accos Nor what’s left to do to achieve the ultimate harmonious balance Not when you’ve spent all this time too busy to take note of us, to take note of justice, selfishly falling in and out of love"