Tasìa grabbed the ladder and she began to sprint up it. A vibration shook through its hollowed iron rails and rungs.

Above her, a Hijos Lux cultist clinched the two curved supports of the ladder rails to begin his own descent.

He came down quickly.

As he neared, Tasìa found an eroded brick surface to use as a hold in the wall to her side. She switched over to the wall and climbed up once more.

She got a good look at the guard on his way down. Like Sinclair, the poverty tourist, he was not fully a ghoul.

Unfortunately, for him, he was much further down that path of monstrous transformation than that still pretty Canadian woman.

He stopped his descent a few yards down from her. He was bothered by something.

Her presence.

Bajamutté's Mesmer based illusion only affected the mind of the Hijos Lux cultist to the extent that he was a ghoul.

What remained of his humanity warned him of Tasìa's presence.

A quiet but high-pitched sound rippled out of his mouth like that of a skylark. Only after he repeated the sound could she translate it into words.

"The fuck! The fuck is that? The fuck! The fuck is that?"

There was something wrong with his throat. His neck was covered in scales of a chitinous green hew. It was not a condition that she had ever heard of a ghoul possessing.

Tasìa held her breath in place and she remained perfectly still.

He jerked his head several times as he glared in her direction. His movement became more smooth and rhythmic like the sway of a deer trying to focus its sight.

As he did this, he seemed to calm down.

He spoke again, his voice much more intelligible.

"So, I did not just imagine you, little one. You are still there."

A curious furrow formed like carved etchings in his forehead. He spoke again, but this time in an excited whisper.

"There is something wrong with you. Hold still, little one. I need to get a closer look."

Tasìa considered if she should free up a hand so she could shoot him, but she nixed the idea immediately. The cultist did nothing to threaten her so far.

"Your mouth changes. From a pretty little archer's bow to a dense Manifest's energia receptacle and back. It flickers to the latter every six seconds. Can you feel it?"

Tasìa pulled into the wall as she tightened her grip. She was trembling.

The adrenaline was trying to find her.

"No. My lips itch from time to time, though."

"Your eyes, too. They have that fixed look to them. La Mirada Exaltada."

The exalted gaze, like all the old paintings of The Virgin.

Tasìa's stomach quivered. She nearly wretched at the thought.

Becoming Manifest.

She must have grimaced something fierce at that moment for the demi-ghoul's eyes looked on, pityingly.

His voice now percolated through his odd throat in a soothing tone.

"You are not so far gone that your condition can't be reversed. Why haven't you renewed your inoculation?"

Tasìa decided it was for the best to be honest with this one.

"There is a bounty on me. I can't go to the clinic. I would rather not steal from one. The Salvage closes them up to collectively punish the local population when thefts are discovered. Sometimes for months."

The demi-ghoul shook his head.

"I know. They closed up mine over a mere paperwork discrepancy."

Tasìa thought of the ghoul whose head she had put a bullet through earlier in the evening. Were they all like this one?

Still fundamentally human?

"You were a doctor?"

"Anesthesiologist. Also, nurse when needed. That was a lifetime ago when the world was better comported and so was I." He scrutinized her for a moment and continued. "Little One, is that why you are creeping around on our walls? You need our LSD?"

"Yes. A lifetime ago, I was a nun. Now, I am a professional cat burglar."

His demeanor changed. The green scales on his neck flexed and tightened.

"What happened to Hector? It is not a coincidence you are here is it?"

Tasìa realized the demi-ghoul was growing agitated. Likely, it was he who was expected to provide medical treatment for Hector.

She answered quickly to get him back to their discussion.

"Actually, yes. A coincidence. I saw what happened to him. A rat swarm consumed him."

The demi-ghoul winced.

"That makes so little sense. It is she who controls the necrotic beasts. Why would she send the rats after one of our own?"

Tasìa felt her lips itch. At the same time, she also noticed, the demi-ghoul's eyes glanced her way. The nerves in her face grew numb.

Perhaps, if she provided him with more information, he would help her.

"There is something else I saw. Do you see the ram lying charred over there? Hector performed some kind of ceremony to the goddess Hecate.

"He transformed. Maybe, transfigured is a better word for what I saw. He became something more angelic than monstrous."

The demi-ghoul shook his head as he objected in a brusk tone.

"They are not supposed to be able to get to us. The Golden is a lie. I need to see him."

The itching on her lips continued. Her nerves pulsated beneath the skin of her face.

"Senor, I need your help," Tasìa pleaded.

"It flickers every four seconds now," the demi-ghoul stated in a matter-of-fact, clinical fashion.

It was difficult to affect a sympathetic appearing visage with her nerves pulsing from numb to hot, but Tasìa tried her damnedest.

"I was told that the Hijos Lux no longer provides for the outside world, but I can pay you. I can pay you in gold."

"In coin?"

She nodded.

"If you have it," he continued, "show me the coin."

Tasìa pulled out three Liberty gold coins and handed them to the demi-ghoul.

His brows raised, impressed.

"My name is Alex. Yours?"

She caught herself stating her alias, but decided everything needed to be out in the open for this one to trust her.

"Tasìa."

Alex, the demi-ghoul, grinned.

"I remember when you used to deliver to the clinic as a bike courier. I felt even then something was a little off with you. As if you were in disguise. You had a different name then."

She peered into the abyss of his transformed face. For the life of her, Tasìa did not recall him as a man.

Tasìa remembered nearly everything relevant to her. Had her memory grown weak through the infection? Or, was he merely unrecognizable?

"Avellana," she answered.

"Yes. Yes. That was it," he said. As he continued to speak, something stirred on the ledge of the roof above them. She glanced up, but saw no one. Perhaps, Mel still followed. "Tasìa, I am not greedy. I don't need the gold except to justify the loss of inventory with something even more useful to our purpose.

"My master is an alchemist of the old school. These coins will do fine.

"Follow me up to the rooftop, and wait there. I'll retrieve it for you."

Alex skirted up the ladder. Tasìa grabbed onto it, once more, and followed along.

Just like that.

Would the other ghouls be so receptive to her? Was she mistaken to go through so much trouble to get into the compound?

No, Sachmilli was correct about that.

Even in the past before Hijos Lux's current realignment, they would have defended against trespass with lethal force.

Of course, back then, you could show up at the front entrance and be well, even graciously, received. Not so, now.

Why was Alex different?

She shrugged at her good fortune as she rested her haunches on the ledge to make herself comfortable.

Alex had disappeared into the rooftop shack that enclosed the stairwell.

As Tasìa waited for the demi-ghoul to return she leaned over the adjoining brownstone wall to catch a glimpse into the center court of the complex of buildings.

The little jade palace stood in the middle of a well-groomed yard. It was designed to be a slightly scaled miniature of one that stood outside of Tokyo for the royal family.

It's luxuriant appearance tempted her to sideline her current mission in spite of all dire consequences and make a go at robbing it.

Along with her problem with intimacy and her youthful rebellion from her father's creed, kleptomania was the third reason she joined the seminary so long ago.

She felt the Old Church's structure provided a better foundation for addressing that problem in her moral make-up. At the very least, a rationale for confronting her compulsion to steal.

The Old Church had thou shalt not . . . Her father's creed of the Anewed had a motto of their own.

Not every person's property is of equal integrity.

The years in the convent living an ascetic existence did not turn out to her liking. Tasìa came full circle back to the old motto of the Anewed.

Now staring at the Jade Palace of Maestro Sol, Tasìa breathed controlled in-takes, ignoring the pulsing itch on her lips.

She quelled the desire to steal for the fuck's sake thrill of it. With melodramatic aplomb, Tasìa set for herself a vow.

Another time, I will return. Then your riches will be mine.

What Bajamutté promised was far greater than any shiny bauble. As Tasìa smiled wickedly at where this thought led, it occurred to her she let herself get into a bit of a bind.

How was she going to keep her promise to rescue the Black Eyed Ones, Geminetta and Geminiäs, now that she had struck another deal with Alex?

Simple enough, she rationalized. She would obtain the LSD and consume it.

Tasìa bit her lips to scratch at the itch. It now appeared her need to consume it was becoming an immediate one.

After some quiet time to adjust, she would continue into the compound. She had done LSD several times before. It was nothing like being drunk.

The impairment of her functionality would be minimal. She could still proceed.

A cry from below rose up through the shack door. It sounded like a scream from Alex.

Ah, shit. Never, never was it so easy.

Tasìa had to investigate. She pulled herself off the ledge and she entered the shack.

She walked quietly down the stairs. Fortunately, the lighting was minimal. Originating from small yellow LED bulbs lined on the slanted ceiling, the light spread out onto the walls.

She merely needed to crouch as she walked to stay below the line of shadow.

When she entered a hall on the floor below, the line separating shadow from light reversed. Gas lamps paced the walls and lit up the floorboards.

Shadows were thick and volumetric on the ceiling.

Tasìa heard some things walk in a slow scurry up the hallway. She climbed up to the ceiling and pressed her elbows against the wall and ceiling tiles while pushing forward with her knees.

It was a slow means of going forth, but proved to be an effective one.

From around the corner came two beasts. Four-legged, with dagger-like talons for claws. Leathered skin spread against jutting vertebrae and long triangular skeletal jaws revealed sharp canines.

They were once Dobermans.

The hellhounds stopped walking forward and started to pace near where she clung to the ceiling. They sniffed the air through contorted nostrils and whinnied a protesting moan to one another.

The hellhounds suddenly raced past her and darted up the stairs from whence she had descended.

A moaning noise similar to the unintelligible high-pitched skylark like sound Alex made earlier came from around the corner where the hellhounds had appeared. Without leaving the shadowed ceiling, Tasìa pressed forward with all due haste.

Within a dozen seconds, Tasìa made it to the T intersection. Alex lay on the floor. His legs twitched, and he bled from them profusely.

In spite of this, Tasìa was now feeling elated. A thrilling gasp rose from her breast when she caught sight of a glass vial clinched in Alex's hand.