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"Not until you're an angel. Perhaps, though..." He hefted the sword and looked at me. "I wonder if you could use mine."
"Sure--I mean, if you don't need it."
"Not anymore." His eyes clouded. "Not lately, at least."
He held it out. I lifted my hands, with every intention of casually reaching for it. Instead, I fairly snatched it from his hands. He chuckled. I gasped as the white-hot heat licked down my arms.
He grabbed for it. "I'm sorry. Here, let me--"
"No." I stepped back, hands still on the sword. "Hurts like hell, but I can handle it." I managed a wry smile. "Don't get much pain in this world anymore. Feels very strange. Is this what normally happens if a nonangel touches it? Or is it my demon blood?"
"I'm not sure. I've never had any reason to let anyone hold it before."
I lifted the sword, expecting to feel the strain on my wrist muscles, but it flung u
pward as if it was made of aluminum instead of steel.
"Wow."
Trsiel gave a soft laugh. "You like that, don't you?" He stepped back and looked at me, his lips curving in a mischievous smile. "It suits you."
I gripped the hilt tighter. In my hands, I held what might very well prove to be the answer to my problem with Savannah. If Trsiel was right, and I was being tested for angel-hood...
I rearranged my fingers, staring at the light filtering through them, almost hypnotized by the glow. There would be strings attached to this beautiful piece of weaponry. Responsibility, for one thing. Big responsibility. If I brought in the Nix, and the Fates offered to reward me with angel-hood, I couldn't just say "Thanks for the cosmic makeover" and run. To get those powers, I'd have to promise to use them for the purpose for which they were intended. I'd need to join the ranks of the celestial bounty-hunters.
A big price...for a big reward.
I tore my gaze from the sword. All hypothetical right now. Even if Trsiel was right about the Fates' plans, I still had the catch the damn Nix.
"If it hurts too much--" Trsiel began as my grip slackened.
"It's fine. But will it work for me?"
"Only one way to find out. Swing it at me."
"At you?"
"At me, through me, whatever. Slice away. Can't do any damage, but I'll be able to tell whether it's working as it should."
I stepped back and sized up Trsiel, then hefted the sword a few times, getting a feel for it. A practice swing, testing the arc. Then a readjustment and another trial run.
"You're not trying to decapitate me, Eve. Just take a swing."
I did, executing a samurai-worthy slash. The blade sliced through his torso and shot, bloodless, out the other side.
"Still a bit upset with me, I see," he said, rubbing the side of his abdomen.
"Did it hurt?"
"Will you be disappointed if I say no? I felt it, but, no, I don't think it hurt."
"You don't think it did?"
"Having never been human, I'd hardly recognize pain if I felt it. I can say, though, that it didn't work. In your hands, the sword won't incapacitate the Nix. Not until you become--"
"An angel, which I can't become until I finish this quest. Love those catch-22s." I glanced over at him. "Do you think that's really what they have in mind? Testing me for angel-hood?"
"Ah, so after she holds the really big sword, she begins to think ascension doesn't sound so bad after all." He smiled. "Yes, I'm ninety-nine percent sure that's what the Fates intend, and I'm holding back that final percent only to preserve my dignity, in the unthinkable event that I'm wrong." He reached out and touched the sword. It evaporated. "Best way to find out for sure? Complete this quest. First, we need to go back to that penitentiary. If the Nix intends to show you something, it'll be in the living world."
