Company of Angels 02 - The Demoness of Waking Dreams

reality of his present situation.
    Back to a city where there were no cars.
    Only water, and the endlessly curving pedestrian walkways.
    And a demoness who’s driving me completely crazy.
    He got up and paced around the perimeter of the room, trying to shake off the feeling of her hand on his thigh. Luciana was an enigma, a contradiction of elements combined within an elusive package. Her face could range from purely innocent to worldly wise in a fraction of a second. To him, she seemed both vulnerable and dangerous at once.
    For a woman who had killed so many people, he had never expected such breathtaking charm. She had a strong personality, certainly. But there was also the element of the chameleon about her. She would become what a man wanted. His waking dream.
    He had to remind himself, for the hundredth time since his arrival, of what she was.
    Not a waking dream, but a walking nightmare.
    * * *
     
    When Luciana arrived home, she returned to her workroom, settling down to once again dedicate herself to her formula. Late in the afternoon, she heard a faint sound of a woman’s singing coming from the ground floor of Ca’ Rossetti. It sounded like opera.
    Tosca, if I’m not mistaken, she thought.
    The Gatekeepers lived in an area of their own, on the third floor of the house, which had always been used as the servants’ quarters. However as the head Gatekeeper, Massimo had his own converted apartment below, in a space that the Rossetti family had once used as warehouse space for their silk trade.
    She never ventured into any of the servants’ quarters, letting the Gatekeepers run themselves. Massimo kept them in line, and kept the house running smoothly. The work that traditionally fell to women, the cooking and the laundry, the polishing of the silver, the cleaning of the floors…the staff performed it all with surprisingly little complaint.
    The only thing she asked was that the Gatekeepers practice discretion when it came to their carnal activities.
    Out of sight, out of mind.
    Even after the debacle with Violetta…. Well, she had let that slide. She had not disciplined the Gatekeepers after all, as she had originally intended.
    However, tonight when Luciana went to investigate, she regretted that decision.
    She held her ear to the heavy wooden door, listening to the soft sound of singing there.
    And then Massimo opened the door.
    Behind him stood Violetta. The girl drifted behind Massimo, indistinct and translucent, a disembodied spirit who glared at Luciana with large, otherworldly eyes. The demoness did not bother to ask why Violetta had come back to Ca’ Rossetti. The reason was obvious.
    “What are you doing, harboring her here in your rooms?” Luciana asked.
    Massimo pushed Violetta behind him, placing himself between the two women. “Don’t hurt her.”
    “What am I going to do to her now? She’s already dead,” Luciana said flatly, “and the devil wouldn’t accept her soul as a sacrifice.”
    “I wanted to find some way to help her,” he admitted. “If the sacrifice had gone according to plan, her soul would have been stuck in hell. But since the devil didn’t take her, at least she was able to return to earth as a ghost. She deserves our help.”
    “Nobody benefits from pity, Massimo,” Luciana said, shaking her head. “Really, you should have come to me once you realized she was here. There are some things that refuse to remain hidden. Well, Violetta, what do you have to say for yourself? Not so brave now that you realize what it’s like to be dead, I see.”
    “I thought this would end and I would be able to leave this place,” the girl gritted out. “I saw a light when I died. I tried to go into it, but I could not. Am I going to become a demon?”
    “That’s quite unlikely,” said Luciana, sighing. “You must be able to guess that not every human becomes a demon or an angel when they pass over. There are exceptional circumstances.”
    Circumstances that this child would neither be able to fathom nor endure.
    Luciana knew that instantly by looking at her. Had known it when they had sacrificed the girl. Violetta was too fragile. And altogether too good.
    “You need to move on. Just let go,” Luciana told her. “There’s nothing holding you here.”
    “I’m not going anywhere. Not just yet,” said the girl, a fraction more solid than she had been an instant ago.
    “If you still had a body, I would give you a good shake,” said Luciana. She had never