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theoretically penned by Dante himself.  They’d authenticated it
with lasers and Raman spectroscopy, and the starting bid was set at $15
million.”
    “What did that have to do with your dream?”
    “The man who owned the manuscript was named Feigling.”
    “I don’t follow.”
    “It means ‘coward’ in German.”
    He felt the blood drain from his cheeks.  “You’re
kidding.”
    “I never kid about medieval poetry.  Beth raised hell
at Sotheby’s, telling them they had a forgery on their hands.  They asked
the seller for another round of tests and he cracked.  He said he’d paid a
forger in Berlin.”
    “Christ, I remember that case.  The forger was a former
East German.  We flagged him when he faked exit visas for several members
of the Bolshoi.”  He shook his head, staring at her with begrudging respect. 
“He got caught because of you ?  How did you know the manuscript was
a fake?”
    “I didn’t.”
    “You must have known something about it.  Something
that triggered your dream.”
    “I didn’t know the fucking thing existed.  Did your
file say anything about me?”
    “Just that Elizabeth Brandon has a sister who’d been in and
out of sanitariums as a child.  How did this all start?”
    “Belial showed up and put me in a coma when I was
nine.  When I came out of it, I asked the doctors if I could see him on
the x-ray.  That’s when they shipped me off to the funny farm for
kids.  Someone decided I was schizophrenic and it stuck.”
    “Did they give you any medication?”
    “They gave me all of it.  I barely knew my own name for
five years.”
    “What happened?”
    Her features relaxed into the purest smile he’d ever
seen.  “Beth.  She saved me.”
    “What does she think about all this?  Does she think
you’re schizophrenic?”
    “She thinks I’m like Joan of Arc, visions and all. 
Maybe it’s the same thing.”
    “What do you think?”
    She shrugged and twisted away from him.  “It’s bigger
than me.  I’m just the puppet.”
    “Who’s the puppeteer?  God?”
    “Fuck if I know.  If I think about it too much, it
makes me hate everything.  You know what happened to Joan of Arc, don’t
you?”
    “Yes, I know.”  He recognized the bitterness in her
tone and knew just where it came from.  Lana believed that what happened
to her was her fault, too—that she deserved to be beaten and raped and left for
dead, even though he was the one Lazovsky wanted.  “It’s not your
fault.  You know that, right?” 
    Her smile was like a jack-o-lantern, scooped out and
hollow.  “I know lots of things.”
    “How do you deal with it?”
    “I don’t.”
    “You’re still alive, aren’t you?”
    She shrugged and shifted position on the bed. 
“Sometimes I burn myself with a cigarette lighter.”
    “To be like Joan?”
    “To see if I can feel it.”
    “What if you can’t?”
    “Then I do other things.”  She dropped his gaze and
picked at the decaying chenille bedspread.  “I just wish I knew why Belial
picked me.  Beth thinks I’m so smart, but she’s a million times what I’ll
ever be.  Maybe it had to be this way so she could be who she is. 
That’s okay.”  She blinked rapidly and sniffed.  “I would do anything
for her.  But I still want to know, you know?”
    Her words hit him in the gut like a punch.  She’d
accepted what had happened to her as a trade for her sister’s more successful
life.  “Jesus,” he said, “Natalie, look at me.”  He put two fingers
under her chin and tilted her head back up towards him.  “None of this
happened as some sort of cosmic trade for your sister’s success.  It’s not
your fault.  Believe me, sometimes things happen for no reason.” 
    “Not this.”
    “It’s not your fault.”
    “You don’t know anything.”
    She tried to pull away but he held her face in his grasp,
brushing her cheekbones with his thumbs.  “It’s not your fault.” 
    “But how do you know that?”