Or, if Japh couldn't kill him, he might at least persuade the Devil to leave Eve alone. It was the least I could do for Doreen's daughter.

My daughter, too. If she could be believed.

I looked up again, at the god of Death's face. He deserved an offering, though I had precious little to give Him right at the moment. Everything I owned had gone up in flames, one way or another.

Including my relationship with Japhrimel. I love him, but how am I going to convince him to leave Eve alone? And how the hell am I going to get him to stop simply using his strength to force me to do anything he wants me to? He's apologized, but the precedent's been set.

I slid one of my main knives free, steel glittering in the light from the forest of novenas. Set the blade against my palm, worked it back and forth to penetrate tough golden skin. This earned me a handful of black demon blood I tipped carefully into a shallow bone dish full of strong red wine, someone else's offering. I used the knife to saw off a handful of my hair-longer now, since Japhrimel had brought me back after the hover incident. Shoulder-length instead of hacked around my ears-but it was still odd to walk around without a braid bumping my back whenever I turned my head.

I bowed again, the cut on my palm closing, black blood sealing away the hurt. "I wish I had more for You," I said quietly to the statue, knowing He would hear and understand. "My thanks, my Lord."

Did the shadows move to cloak Him? I blinked, the sense of being watched strong and inarguable. It wasn't like my sight to be clouded-I'd had excellent vision even before being gifted with demon-acute senses. I stared up at the dog's head above the narrow black chest, the crook and flail held in his long black hands, the kilt of gems running with reflected candlelight. Strong One, we who followed Anubis called him; Protector. And also, the most loving name-the Gentle One. The one who eased all hurts, the god who never left us, even at life's end.

"Anubis et'her ka," I repeated. "Thank you."

As I paced away, the statues didn't move. I wondered if I should offer to Sekhmet, discarded the notion. It was dangerous to attract Her attention-I had all the destruction I could handle in my life right now. I bowed one last time to Isis and Horus, made my way to the granite doors. They opened inward for me, Power sparking and spiraling through their cores, and when I stepped out into the entry hall Japhrimel still stood in the same spot, his hands clasned behind his back. examining the walls.

The doors swung closed behind me. Finally, his eyes returned to mine. "Did you find what you needed?"

The air between us was brittle and clear as thin crystal. He was trying so hard to be careful with me.

I'm trying too, Japhrimel. I love you, and I'm trying. I shrugged. "Gods." I gave him a smile that tried to be natural. "I'm hungry. Did you mention food?"

Chapter 2

The boarding house was a large sloping mudbrick building, stasis and containment fields glimmering over every window and door. The heat was almost as tremendous as the blowing sand. I spent a few moments on the sidewalk outside the building, basking in sunlight. Japhrimel, a blot on the tawny day with his long black coat, waited silently.

There were spots of green, of course. Water pumped up from the brown ribbon of the Nile and local areas of climate control made for gardens, plenty of date palms, an oasis tucked in every courtyard. The technology of watermakers was in its infancy, but here it was being used to its fullest extent which wasn't very far, but it was nice. There would at least be enough water to bathe with, a far cry from the recent thirty-year drought that had gripped the entire northern half of Hegemony Afrike. They were still hashing out the environmental consequences of the technology, but life was beginning to spread away from the river and into the desert. There was even talk of making the desert green again, but the environmental scientists were up in arms about that.

I'd run a few bounties down in Hegemony Afrike. There was the Magi-gone-bad I'd tracked through the back alleys of Nova Carthago and the Shaman I'd caught in Tanzania-thank the gods for antivenom and tazapram, that's the only time I've ever been poisoned so bad I thought I'd die. I had almost gone into Death's arms after being bitten six times by a collection of boomslangs the Shaman had tickled into regarding me as an enemy. I hadn't known he was secondarily talented as an Animone.

Then there was the gang of four normals, combat-augmented and hyped on thyoline-laced Clormen-13, who'd thought the Serengeti Historical Preserve would hide them. I'd had to dock my fee 50 percent for bringing in two of them dead and the other two in critical condition, but they shouldn't have shot me and beat me up. And they additionally shouldn't have left me tied up and gone to slam hypos of Chill cocktail.

They should have killed me when they had the chance.

My memories of Hegemony Afrike are all of heat, dust, danger, and heart-thumping adrenaline. Not to mention pain. If I got in a transport when we were finished here without getting into a fight, it would be the first damn time I ever lifted off from Hegemony Afrike soil without bleeding.

Well, a girl could hope, couldn't she?

One thing I'll say for being almost-demon, I don't mind hot weather the way I used to. I used to hate sweating, but nowadays I like heat-the more the better, like a cat in a square of sun.

When I followed Japhrimel in through the containment field, shuddering as it tickled and nipped at my skin, we found square brown Vann waiting for us in the cool, shaded lobby. The Hellesvront agent's face looked better; he was healing much faster than a human but not as quickly as with a heal-charm. The bruises Lucas had given him were going down and the bandage had come off his right eye, revealing a wicked slash down his forehead through his eyebrow. He was lucky he hadn't lost that eye, and I felt a little guilty. After all, I'd hired Lucas-but he'd been squeezing Vann for information on my whereabouts so he could show up just in time to save my life.

I was fairly sure Lucifer would have killed me if he could. Just one more time I'd tangled with the Prince of Hell and come away with my miserable life. I was beginning to feel lucky.

Not really.

Vann nodded at me, his brown eyes turning dark. I nodded back cautiously. The desk in the lobby was deserted, a holovid player glowing pink in the office behind it. I caught the sound of a human heartbeat, a cough, shuffling feet. The floor here was an intricate mosaic pattern in tiles of blue and yellow; a dracaena grew in a brass pot near the door, next to a rack of newspapers and cheap holomags.

"News." Vann's tone held uneasy respect, as if I was a poisonous animal he wanted to avoid offending. I looked longingly at the little café tucked into the boarding house's first floor. I was hungry.

"Go find a table, Dante," Japhrimel said quietly. "I will join you in a moment."

I weighed hanging around to hear what Vann would say, and decided I probably didn't want to know. I'd find out eventually, and if there was something Japhrimel didn't want me to be told Vann wouldn't say it anyway. I might as well get something to eat for my trouble. "Fine." I couldn't resist a bad-tempered little goose. "I suppose if there was something you didn't want me to know he would wait to mention it to you later anyway, right?"

With that, I turned on my heel and would have stalked away, but Japh caught my arm. I knew better than to struggle-he was far stronger than me. It would do no good.

"Stay, then. Hear everything." His eyebrows drew together as he examined Vann. "Well?"