Damien sets off at a pace that leaves me gasping after two blocks, and I lag behind. He notices and waits for me to catch up.

"Are you alright?" he asks.

"Can we walk a little slower? I'm low on energy."

"But you just consumed a dream. Shouldn't you be good for a while?"

I shake my head. "I don't know why, but that dream didn't give me anything."

He looks thoughtful. "The dead zone's about three miles inside the forest. Can you make it?"

It feels like I can't, but there's no use in saying so. "Sure. Just...not at a run. Weak lungs, remember?"

"That wasn't running," he says, but when he starts walking again it's at a speed I can keep up with.

We walk in silence, and the sun climbs slowly as the morning passes and the world gradually warms. We enter the forest, and Damien leads the way to a clearing ringed with trees. When we arrive, I freeze as I recognize the place from the dream.

Damien sees my reaction and looks around in alarm. "What is it?"

"This is where..." I swallow hard. "This is where they caught you."

Damien flinches. "So that's what you saw," he says. He looks around as though seeing a different scene than the one before us, and his eyes have a hollow, haunted look.

"Yes. We were betrayed, though by whom is something I've never been able to learn. The location of the dead zones was a closely guarded secret, known only to Sakariel's inner circle. Most of them are dead or banished now, but enough were able to weasel their way back into favor to make it difficult to know which was the worst traitor."

His hands are clenched into fists at his sides, and a deep anger radiates from him in waves. After a moment, he relaxes with a visible effort. "But that is the past. We must face the problems of the present."

He holds out his hand to me, and blue fire races over his skin.

"Is there a dead zone somewhere near the Riverfront District?" I ask, thinking that the faster I can get to Dante's and collapse, the better.

"No. But we're not going back there anyway."

"What?"

He grabs my hand, and the world dissolves in blue fire.

~xxx~

This time I land on my feet. I don't stay there for long, but I count it as a win anyway.

Collapsing to my hands and knees, I cough violently as Damien pats me unhelpfully on the back. When I can breathe normally again, he helps me up.

"Where the fuck are we now?" I demand, eyeing the surrounding greenery with suspicion. We're in another clearing, only this time the forest at its edges is a lot denser and a lot more...jungle-y.

We're definitely not in England anymore.

"Brazil. There's something I need to know, and the only person who can get the information I need lives here. Fortunately, I was able to send word ahead to him by more earthly means, and he should be waiting for us nearby."

At his words, a man with sienna skin and black hair steps from the forest, dressed in little but a loincloth and headband.

Damien raises his hand in greeting. "Olá, Tiago," he says.

"Damien," the man nods. "Is this the one?"

Damien nods.

"What's going on?" I ask, suddenly alarmed. I start to back away, but Damien catches my wrist and hold me fast.

"Be still, Alex. He won't hurt you."

The man approaches me, peering at me with deep black eyes. His face is neither young nor old, but his features have a pleasing cast.

"Bom dia, Alex," he says in greeting. "I am Tiago. I am Reader."

"Reader? What's that?" I ask.

"He reads people's souls," Damien says. "I need him to read yours."

"W--Why?" I stammer.

Damien's eyes are like lightless wells, and I try my best not to fall in.

"Because I have to know. I have to know if you're him. If you're...Sakariel."

"S--Sakariel? Are you out of your fucking mind!?" My voice goes breathy and weak as I struggle to process his words. "Of course I'm not him. I was human, and now I'm a...a low-level demon with shitty lungs. Why on earth would you think I'm him?"

Tiago looks at Damien like he's wondering the same thing.

Damien sighs but doesn't let go of my wrist. It's like he's afraid I'll bolt into the forest and disappear. As if I could outrun him.

"When my memories were suppressed," he says, "it was like I couldn't see you properly, Alex. And when they were lifted, and I really looked at you, it was like I was looking at him. At Sakariel when we first met. And there have been other things. Little things. Maybe they mean nothing, but I have to know. Did something of him survive after all? Could he have been reborn in another form? Did he--"

"Find his way back to you, like he promised he would?" I finish.

Damien stares.

I shake my head. "I saw it in the dream. He... It was the only shred of hope he had left, Damien," I say. "I'm sorry."

Something goes hard in Damien's face, and he pulls me towards him roughly and turns me to face Tiago.

"Read him," he orders. "I have to know."

Tiago looks like he's got more interesting things to do, but he shrugs and steps forward. I flinch away as he reaches for my face, but he draws back and meets my eyes.

"I not hurt. I only read," he says.

After a moment, I nod. If it will make Damien drop this weird idea and leave me alone, I guess I can put up with whatever this is.

Tiago tries again, and this time I hold still. He places the pads of his fingers on my face, Vulcan mind-meld style, and closes his eyes. I don't really feel anything, except a weird heat where he's touching me.

Less than a minute later, he lets me go.

Alarmingly, he collapses onto his back and goes into what looks like a seizure.

"Holy shit!" I exclaim, and move to help, but Damien grabs my arm.

"No--don't touch him," he says.

Tiago writhes, foaming at the mouth and showing the whites of his eyes.

Finally, he arches his back, a shudder convulses his whole body, and then he lies still.

All I can hear is the rasp of my own breath in my throat and the whisper of Damien's close to my ear.

Then, Tiago stirs, moans, and sits up. He shakes his head, wipes his face, and grins up at us.

"Well?" Damien urges.

"First, the payment," Tiago counters.

Damien scowls, but pulls something wrapped in a small square of cloth from his pocket and hands it over. Tiago opens it to reveal three wooden beads. I have no idea what they are, but the Reader seems pleased.

"Obrigado," he says, nodding his thanks.

"And? What did you read?"

Tiago's expression sobers. "Damien, Alex is not Sakariel. You know not enough was left of him for full reincarnation. He is gone. I am sorry."

The darkness in Damien's eyes deepens. I want to tell him I told him so, but I can't quite bring myself to be that mean.

"However," Tiago goes on, "it very hard to destroy celestial soul. Sakariel's was shattered, broken into many pieces. Most fell into darkness, forgotten. But one landed like seed in fertile soil. Alex is this one. He is not Sakariel, but is born of him--like tiny graft of great tree. So in that way, he is not your Sakariel, but he is also Sakariel nonetheless."

I'm stunned and confused. I look at Damien, but his expression is hard to read.

"He kept his promise then," he says at last. "In the only way he could."

Tiago nods.

Damien closes his eyes, and when he opens them, he fixes them on me. "Alex, I give you my word. I will protect you, at whatever cost. I won't make the same mistakes again. I promise."

"I don't know what you're talking about," I say. "I'm not him. I just want to go back to my life and forget all this ever happened."

A look of pain crosses Damien's face, like a cloud across the face of the sun. "You can't go back. I'm sorry. Maliel and Yakketh saw you with me, and by now Azael will know all there is to know about you. You're no longer safe. If they think they can use you against me, they will."

"What are you saying?" I ask.

He steps towards me and lays a hand on my shoulder. "I'm saying I made a mistake. I made a mistake asking you for help with my dreams, and you made a mistake answering me. I'm saying that whatever life you had before you met me, I messed it up, and now you can't go back. I'm saying...I'm sorry."

"No mistakes," Tiago interrupts, placing a hand on each of our shoulders. "Fate not always kind, but never mistaken. Beautiful flowers grow in cracks of ugly stones."

With these words, he claps us each on the arm, gives Damien a strange salute, and vanishes back into the forest.