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I decided on a different approach. If I was truly to become the messenger myself someday, then Oriax would become my problem to deal with.

And curiosity has always been my strength as well as my weakness.

“What do you get out of this, Oriax?” I demanded.

She smiled at me, parting her mauve lips to reveal white teeth that looked a bit sharper than teeth should be. “Excellent question, mini-Messenger. I will answer it if you’ll agree to answer one of mine.”

Messenger’s eyes flicked a warning, but I took Oriax’s challenge. “Okay. I agree.”

“Excellent,” she purred. “What I get out of this is the pleasure of seeing and helping to inflict pain. I savor human despair. I revel in human weakness. But equally, I take enjoyment from offering its opposite: pleasure.” She made a sort of philosophical sound, a worldly sigh, a commentary on life’s interesting vagaries. “It’s fortunate, really, because in a way it’s also my . . . job.” She spoke that word with evident distaste. “I am what I am, and I am what I do, and I enjoy what I do.”

She leaned toward me, very close, and I felt my heart race. It was not a rational thing, nor even strictly a sexual thing, it was something almost like gravity—invisible, inescapable, inevitable. When Oriax did that, I could no more ignore it than I could ignore the heat of the sun or the pull of the earth’s core.

“And now, my question for you, mini-Messenger. It is this: Have you fantasized about our lovely, handsome Messenger? Have you imagined yourself in his arms? In his bed?”

I started to blurt an answer, but Oriax held up a cautioning hand. “If you lie, I will know it. And so will Messenger.”

My mind went instantly to a dream I’d had, one of my more unsettling, though not at all terrifying, dreams.

No one should be held responsible for their dreams.

“I never imagined Messenger having a bed,” I managed to say as a blush rose up my neck to burn my cheeks.

“Hah!” She seemed delighted with my pathetic evasion. She knew she had landed a blow. She knew she had made things awkward between Messenger and me. Awkward to say the least.

She was, as she’d said, reveling in human weakness.

Darkness had fallen completely by the time the car pulled into a cemetery that was much more opulent than the one we’d visited so far away. The car crept along manicured paths between stark marble testimonials to lost love. There were impressive marble crypts and small granite crosses. Here and there a Star of David.

“There!” a slurring Pete said, and pointed.

Trent stopped the car and the two boys stumbled out. The sun had gone down and the shadows were growing long.

We followed them onto the springy grass to a modest granite headstone. It read Mohammed Marwat, beloved husband, father, brother. And a fairly recent date of death. It was decorated with an engraved crescent and star.

“Yeah. Raghead,” Trent said.

Pete offered some expletives of support.

Then Trent kicked the headstone. His reward was pain that had him hopping and cursing. He limped back to Pete’s car and rummaged in the trunk until he found a tire iron and a can of red spray paint.

With the tire iron he began digging at the foundation of the stone, wedging the crowbar end beneath it and, finally, toppling it onto its back while Pete kept watch.

More loud cursing.

“And now, the paint,” Oriax said with a wink.

Trent shook the paint can, musing about his message. In the end he decided on his favorite word, Raghead, which he misspelled as Rag-hed. Then added an expletive. And finally the words, Go home.

“And there we have your basic grave desecration,” Oriax said with satisfaction. “Are we really all here for a little grave desecration? This is your mission, Messenger? Trivial.”

And then Trent urinated on the stone and Pete did likewise.

“Okay,” Oriax said with tolerant humor, “now, it’

s an enhanced grave desecration. But really, Messenger, are you going to subject these two cretins to the full-on Messenger treatment? I’m surprised you’d want to show mini-Messenger the true pitiless savagery of your absurd goddess’s so-called justice.”

I expected Messenger to ignore her. But instead I found him looking at her very thoughtfully. And Oriax didn’t like it. She seemed to blanch, although that’s too strong an image for the very slight, barely noticeable pullback.