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slow advance toward me with his fists clenched at his sides. "What about the
game and my plan to steal souls?"
With surprising speed, Morningstar got his hands on my biceps, holding me
tightly, crushingly. I could almost feel the hellfire in his gaze. "Jesus had
a temple. Gandhi beat his wife. Nobody's perfect, sweetheart."
FRANCE TO VOTE FOR SECULARISM
Agnostic Press (December 2095)
Paris, France President Henri LeFue announced this afternoon that he would be
asking French citizens to vote on a proposal to limit Inquisitorial powers
within their country's borders. If this new law were to pass, the Order of the
Inquisition would have to answer to secular law enforcement before
prosecuting, sentencing, or extraditing prisoners. The proposal also sets up
general standards for police and Inquisitor cooperation, in which local
authorities are given precedence over international ones.
Archbishop of Paris Jean-Pierre Boudreaux is not pleased with LeFue's
proposal. "It's bad enough that this country has a president who is not
clergy," Boudreaux said, referencing the landmark victory of LeFue's Humanist
Party, in which LeFue became the first secular president in France since the
Medusa war. "We simply cannot tolerate this. It spells doom for theocracies
everywhere."
Other countries do seem to be taking notice of the changes in France. Italy,
where Christendom's Inquisition is headquartered, has staged similar protests.
As one of the rally cries says, Romans feel they've "had enough of the
terrorists in black. We want our country back."
Grand Inquisitor Joji Matsushita could not be reached for comment.
Chapter 34 Amariah
The guns made me even more nervous than the dead-eyed sentries. When
dandelion-head pulled one out of his jacket and shot at the ceiling to the
beat of the music, and two other boys joined in with their own pistols, I
called Mom ASAP. I didn't tell Adram I was bailing, of course. He thought the
whole thing was funny. He would. I mean, the guy was one of the Fallen. I
still thought he was way cute, but his sense of right and wrong was a bit
askew. Meanwhile, the sound of the shots was still ringing in my head.
I tried to play it cool, keeping one eye on the guys I knew had guns and the
other on my internal clock. The idea was to come up with an excuse, maybe a
bathroom run, so that I could meet Mom outside the ramp. The way she exuded
copness, I didn't think it was a good idea for her and these trigger-happy
boys to mix.
"You want to go sit in the backseat?" Adram asked, jutting his chin in the
direction of the van. "It's quiet in there, and it looks like you could use a
rest."
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I liked the idea of quiet and alone. As long as I could extricate myself for
my "bathroom" run, it should be okay. "Yeah," I said.
The door slid open on creaky hinges. He held the door for me like a gentleman.
"Your carriage, madam."
I giggled as I made my way inside to a cushiony seat. It was much warmer
inside the van, and it smelled of something smoky and spicy. Pulling himself
into the space beside me, Adram closed the door.
The windows of the van were propped slightly open, but thanks to the heavy
curtains that surrounded us, the light was murky at best. When I felt Adram's
arm slip around my shoulders, I jumped. He laughed softly and nuzzled my ear.
"We should celebrate," he said.
"What?"
"Me, getting deeper into the game. My last day on earth!" With that, his lips
pressed against mine, hard. His tongue forced my lips to part. I was being
kissed. I wasn't exactly sure what to do, but I held my breath. His tongue
tasted weird, kind of sour and like fried onions. Oh, and suddenly his hand
was on my breast.
"Hey, wait," I said, pulling away. "I've never& this is really sudden."
"Okay," he said. In the darkness his voice sounded petulant. "We can go slow."
Mom wasn't due for another few minutes, but I said, anyway, "I have to go to
the bathroom."
"Aw, come on," he said. Adram sounded really disappointed now. "I said I was
sorry. Can't we just mess around a little?"
I had no idea what that involved, but he was between me and the door. What
could happen in such a short time, anyway? Certainly, it behooved me to make
nice.
"Sure," I said. "Okay, I guess."
Adram scooted closer. His hip touched mine. It was, despite my nervousness, a
nice sensation. He slipped his other arm around my waist, and, cautiously, I
sneaked mine onto the fabric of his shirt, under the heavy leather jacket.
Through the cotton, I could feel the bony ridges of his ribs and the heat of
the sweat on his back.
His lips touched my nose, softly, teasingly. I laughed again in a kind of
breathless anticipation. But he continued to play the gentleman, kissing first
my right cheek, then my left. I let my hand drop to the waist of his jeans. I
wedged my fingers under his belt.
"Tsk, tsk," he said, his breath skipping across the contours of my earlobe,
tickling the hairs there, making me jump. "We're going slow, remember?"
I decided I liked slow. My fear transformed into a different kind of
anxiousness. I wondered what he would do next.
While his tongue lapped at my ear, his fingers pulled through my hair. I
forgot to move my hands. I forgot to breathe.
The sound of a gun going off outside made me flinch. Adram was only
momentarily deterred. "There, there," he murmured, then returned his attention
to nibbling my earlobe.
Then, through the cracked window, I heard Papa's commanding voice. "Drop it.
Police!"
"Oh, shit," Adram swore, sounding more disappointed than scared. "Stupid cops.
They always wreck everything."
I scrambled over his body for the door. "That's my dad. He's probably looking
for me."
"Why would your dad be looking for you here?"
"Um." I pulled at the door, but there seemed to be a trick to opening it. I
glanced back at Adram. I didn't want to confess I'd felt nervous about his
friends. I wanted to be ace, not skid. "I'm supposed to be in school?"
"Shit," Adram said again, then putting his arms on my waist, he pulled me back
down. "Maybe we should just hide out here until things blow over."
What an extremely bad idea that was. "Oh, okay," I told him. Meanwhile, I sent
Mom a LINK message. "I'm here. I'm in the van. Don't let Papa shoot anybody,
okay?"
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"Let's hope nobody shoots anybody" Mom sent back. "We've got us a Mexican
standoff out here."
I pulled myself up to look out a window. Mom was right. Both she and Papa had
their guns out, pointed calmly at two boys, each with a gun in his own shaking
fist. Mom raised one hand. Her voice was steady, as she pleaded, "Now,
everybody just needs to calm down."
"Drop your weapons, boys," Papa agreed.
A strange part of me enjoyed seeing them working together like that, like two
old police partners. But that was not the part where my heart was in my
throat.
Adram squeezed up beside me. "Michael," he said. "He's come to stop me, to
stop my ascension."
I did not like the tone in Adram's voice. It was the same as when he'd said he
could take Papa in a fight. "It's not like that," I said. "I'm sure he's come
for me."
"I'm not going to let him stop me," Adram said, as if he hadn't heard a word.
"Nobody is going to stop me."
I did try. But he was out the door much faster than a human, even a cyborg,
could possibly move. I stumbled out after him just in time to see him jump to
the roof of the van and slide in behind dandelion-top. His arms covered the
boy's, taking hold of the shaking gun, steadying it.
"Michael," Adram said, in a voice I'd never heard him use before.
Michael squinted for a moment at Adram. "I thought I recognized you the other
night, Adramelech." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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