housing issues every binal?” Another chuckle wanted to escape, and I bit my tongue, faking a cough when it slipped out, anyway.
“Well, no, he doesn't. But that's what they say.”
“That old son of a scratcher would kill someone before he listened to complaints about loud neighbors,” Axton added.
“Look, I'm not perfect. I skirt the rules.” Trace coughed, and I shot a glare his way before turning back to Grace. “Ignore him. Master Akai adopted me when my mother vanished. She disappeared with the rest. Apparently, he was an old friend of my grandparents, so he felt obligated to take me in. I was an Elite Grim before this so-called promotion, and now I'm the youngest Master of Masters probably ever. Certainly in my lifetime. I don't like assholes, except for that one over there.” I pointed towards Trace. “And that's only sometimes. I hate how the Soulless are treated. And the souls on Earth don't deserve to be pawns in a political game. That's me.”
“What about what happened earlier? Does that happen a lot?” Her question was rather brave for her character, and it birthed suspicion once again.
I didn't have a lot of time to think about how much I should reveal. If I waited too long, anything would seem suspect.
So, I blurted out, “It happens occasionally. I have ways to control it, but those were recently removed, so I didn't have anything to prevent it earlier. And, before you ask, no, I don't know why it happens.”
“I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked. It's just the healer part of me worries.” She ducked her head, peering up at me through her lashes. When I grinned and patted her hands, she gave me a small smile. “Well, I'm an Angel, obviously. My father is a Major Power. That's why I'm still alive. My mother wouldn't allow him to kill me, and he gave her pretty much whatever she wanted.”
A Power's kid? That explained a lot. And made her far more dangerous.
“See, the problem isn't that I don't have a second form. It's that I can't insert, so I'm forbidden to take that form. I'm sure you know what it's like, Zella, to live up to a legacy. We learned early on that I just can't do it. The process goes well until… Do any of you know how the insertion process works?”
I did, but I shook my head along with the rest of them, wanting to hear her version. It would also be a test. An easy one, but at least I would know if she lied.
“Well, we take possession of the scrubbed soul, enter the portal, and arrive at the location we are directed to. The new life glows brightly to us when we use our Sight. The essence is shaped, and we place it inside the new life. Once the attachments are tethered in the appropriate places, we must send a burst of our energy into it, fusing the two together. Without that energy, the essence slips free and wanders. Well, I cannot send energy. I've tried, of course. But once they tested me, they discovered something wrong. Without it, I'm not very useful, especially for who my family is. My father wanted to kill me like they usually do, but Mother wouldn't have it. So, here I am, trying to make up for my malfunction.”
She finished her story with a bright smile, a curve of her lips that shrieked with falseness. It was the kind that you put on, so you didn't cry. We had Reapers that couldn't take possession, but we didn't murder them for it. Just shoved them into awful jobs. Angels were a bunch of elitist fuckers that couldn't stand a perceived imperfection. Despite my mind telling me I should maintain a wall between us, I felt a little tug on my heart and sighed. Distance.
I stood and floated over to the window that looked out onto the small patch of dirt that separated our unit from the next. “Grace, I believe it'll be good for you to attend the meeting with Corin tomorrow.”
“What?”
Her pitch hurt my ears, and I turned.
“I'll write out the letter. Technically, I no longer need to announce myself, but I do need Corin to be present, so it's best to give him instructions. And, yes, as a representative of the Angels, I'll need your input. Besides, Grouping Mannix will be busy working on a few other things that need to be completed before our first official binal as an Office.”