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cull the population of winged rats, the flying nuisances infested Venice in fewer numbers than before. However, plenty of them remained.
    Where this particular feather had come from was a mystery to her.
    The window was closed, and the workroom remained sealed.
    How very curious, she thought. But no matter.
    Taking the feather between her thumb and forefinger, she tossed it in the garbage. Along with the vague feeling that it might be connected with the man in her dream.
    Who cares, she thought. How many thousands of men’s dreams had she invaded in the past? She did not even know. She was a virtuoso at this type of manipulation. An expert at navigating their desires. One more man would be as easy to discard as the rest of them.
    She went downstairs to find her head Gatekeeper.
    “Prepare the boat,” she told him. “It is time to begin the hunt.”
    As the boat cleaved its way up the Grand Canal and out into St. Mark’s Basin, the salt-tinged breeze off the Adriatic whipped through Luciana’s hair. She closed her eyes, and the image of that single feather floated in her mind’s eye again.
    “Just there,” she said to Massimo, pointing to a mooring post near the church.
    She stepped up to the fondamenta beside the canal, tilting her head to look up at the imposing marble facade of the church, at the monumental classical Roman pillars combined with the round lines of a Christian cathedral. People filed through the large open doors. Inside, hundreds of humans were gathering for the opening ceremony of the festival.
    Eyeing the crowd funneling into the church, she wished she could cull the whole lot of them. Just get rid of them, like the city had done with the pigeons. Instead, she would have to choose just one, a single victim. It should not be a problem. These witless humans never seemed to suspect what was coming for them.
    “Wait here for me,” she instructed Massimo. “This shouldn’t take long.”

Chapter Three
     
    B randon felt his lost humanity weighing on him as he entered the place he knew he would find her. Looking up at the marble facade of the Chiesa del Santissimo Redentore, he scanned the huge white building, looked at the figures decorating it.
    Why here, of all the sacred places in Venice?
    Why not St. Mark’s, the massive basilica across the canal?
    Why not Carnival, the most famous of Venice’s festivals?
    The questions flickered in his mind as he walked through the open doorsand into the church. Inside, he slipped quietly into the back, blending into the congregation of humans come to pay homage to their God. Humans who brought their hopes, their fears, their dreams to this place of worship. His heart ached for them, for the suffering that humankind underwent.
    No, he himself was no longer human.
    The faint scent of incense drifted from the priest’s censer, chants in Latin drifting with it: et ideo cum Angelis et omnibus Sanctis gloriam tuam praedicamus… The vague meaning of the phrase echoed in his mind despite the foreignness of the words…. Something about saints and angels, and the glory of the divine.
    As he stood there in the church, images from his most recent dream drifted into his head. Images of her face, her body, her voice. And his body reacted, sensing her nearness. But he knew that he must fight against the failings, the desires, the weaknesses of the physical body.
    She is here.
    He heard the commotion when it began, the shouts of “Demonessa!” He saw the man drag his elderly mother out of the church. In the resulting scuffle, Brandon sneaked up the side of the congregation, moving toward the source of the conflict.
    And he became all too conscious of his human desires.
    He was still close enough to his lost humanity that he could not control the twitch of his cock in the moment he first saw her.
    Dark hair tumbled down her back in a loose fall of curls. Green eyes the color of pale emeralds, of new grass, of springtime. Skin so fair it was almost translucent, glowing in