Ukiah stuck to an "uh-huh."

"So it's reasonable to correlate that humans are in essence all members of an ьber-being that we can't perceive, yet is immanently in us. Just as flocks of birds fly together because of the ьber-being of birds, and schools of fish swim together because of the ьber-being of fish, so do humans follow lines of thinking when there is no apparent means of communication. The same idea occurs to individuals who aren't exposed to the same materials or line of thought—as if there's an ether-space that we share."

Mouse said this with the fire of someone who considered himself correct, but then squelched the fire with, "Right?"

"I suppose that's how it would seem," Ukiah said carefully.

"Well, it would explain why the Fallen all seem to be one creature. They are, in essence, evil intersecting our plane of existence—one creature, appearing as many—yet, when you look closely, you can recognize each piece as part of the same whole."

Since Mouse was right and wrong, Ukiah decided to stick with saying he was completely right. "Yeah."

"Wow," Mouse whispered. "Can you touch me?"

From his scent, Ukiah recognized him now as one of the cultists on the boat. Surely they'd come in contact several times, but apparently Mouse wanted something much more focused.

Why was it that as individuals the cultists seemed, by and large, good people, yet as a whole the cult was ruthless and deadly? Was there something to this ьber-being theory, where the cultists had been massed together into something more dangerous than any one alone would have been? Ukiah extended his fingers into the slot and touched Mouse's hand resting on the sill beyond.

"Thank you," Mouse breathed. He eased the slot closed with obvious reluctance and scurried away.

***

Mouse proved to be the first in a series of odd conversations. A pale-eyed woman by the name of Ether came whispering questions about string theory, offering up a sausage wrapped in a pancake. Luckily ancient memories from the Pack held information of how the universe worked from civilizations that had greater knowledge than Earth.

The third cultist was a green-eyed man called Link, who wanted to know if his father, a soldier, was in heaven. The light dawned on Ukiah: The cultists, suddenly finding themselves in possession of an angel, wanted to tap his holy knowledge.

"Yes" seemed the best answer to give Link.

"Even though the commandment is: 'Thou shalt not kill'?"

"A father gives his children rules, so they can know 'good' from 'bad,' but he also forgives them when they do wrong, because he knows that it's part of growing up. What child can be perfect?"

Link gave him a pack of gum as a treat. Ukiah rationed himself to one, crinkling up the silver wrapper to make a cat toy for Schrцdinger.

***

Ukiah recognized Ice's stride when he returned. He got to his feet, wondering what would happen now.

Ice opened the door this time and gazed at Ukiah with an odd, uncertain look. While Ice didn't point it at Ukiah, he carried a stun baton. The kitten, Schrцdinger Five, darted about their feet, blissfully unaware.

"We only suspected that you were an angel, but you know, you don't really look . . . holy." Ice swept his gaze down over Ukiah, and shrugged. "Perhaps the Mormons are right."

"How do you know . . ." It felt wrong to claim he was angelic, so Ukiah let the question trail off.

"Demons are usually easy to spot," Ice explained. "They all hold their bodies the same. It's like one person wearing different skins. They shuffle around like automatons." Ice slowly circled Ukiah. "But you . . . you've got that wild-animal grace, so we didn't spot you. And then there's the matter of the Blissfire—you could pour a bag over a demon and it might as well be water. You reacted."

"No, it doesn't work on them," Ukiah observed truthfully.

"And when you capture a demon, it's like a rabid dog. There's no reasoning with a demon, and certainly you can't intimidate it."

And the cult had done both with him.

"So when we caught you and took you to Eden Court, we thought you were just a human, guarding over the nephilim." Ice shook his head. "We'd only dug into your past deep enough to find your name and address. Something made me double-check our information, and there it was, like handwriting on the wall—in June you'd been shot dead."

"You didn't sound sure that I was an angel before."

"The cat was the last test."

"Schrцdinger?" Ukiah glanced down at the small tuft of fur currently chewing on Ice's shoelaces.

"You put a living animal in with a demon, and it's dead in minutes." Ice picked up the kitten and examined it. "Demons can't stand to have life near them." Ice handed Ukiah the kitten. "Usually they'll eat the cat."

Schrцdinger Five, as in, numbers one through four had already been killed.

"Come," Ice said. "We'll find you something to eat."

Ice led Ukiah down a hallway lined with steel doors. Ukiah eyed them, wondering what else the cult had hidden behind them. The Ae? If nothing good came of this mess, then at least he had a much better chance of finding and destroying the Ae before the cult could use them.

"Where are we?" Ukiah asked.

"This is our ultimate haven," Ice said. "We call it Sanctuary."

They went up a flight of stairs and through another steel door into a large and surprisingly elegant kitchen. Natural stones formed the exterior walls. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out over roiling surf, revealing that the building sat on a bluff next to the Atlantic. A dozen cultists were gathered in the kitchen, working on a meal. Ukiah recognized Mouse and Link from talking to them. Some of the cultists he recognized from Eden Court, their names gleaned from conversations there: Meta, Ray, Cursor, Qwerty, and Boolean. The other five Ukiah didn't know.

Ether entered the room carrying a bright yellow bottle of laundry detergent and a stack of folded clothing. "Link, you said you needed a buoy for the new lobster pot? I emptied the last of this out into a quart jar and"—she saw Ukiah and went shy—"rinsed it well."

"Thank you." Link took the empty bottle. "Cool, neon yellow. That will be easy to see."

"Here." Ether held out the clothing to Ukiah, blushing.

"Thank you," Ukiah said out of habit, and found that while the clothes were his, they no longer felt right; the seawater and harsh detergent had washed away everything familiar.

"You can . . ." Ether started to say something but then, glancing to Ice, fell silent.

She had been about to offer him privacy, Ukiah guessed, but Ice had stopped her. Angel or not, Ice still wasn't about to trust him. Putting the kitten down, Ukiah dressed, aware that the cultists watched him, some with awe, others with guarded suspicion. He had the package of gum tucked into his waistband. As he took the pack out, Ice stopped him long enough to see what he had in his hand. The cult leader gave Link a hard look, but let Ukiah pocket the gum.

Like Atticus's beach house, Sanctuary was an open, sprawling home. From where Ukiah stood, he could see into a living room with a vaulted, rough-timbered ceiling and a dining room that could seat twelve people without squeezing. Like the kitchen, the windows of both rooms looked out over the ocean.

He was zipping up his pants when the realization hit him. "We're on an island!"

"Yes." Ice watched him with the cold blue eyes.