The old woman paused. “Who is there?”
Sweet goddess in a basket, would he never get a break? He was not about to answer her, but if she felt his presence then . . .
“Arin,” Marsum said. “It’s been a long while.”
“Jinn! What. . . how are you here?”
She could see Marsum? Or just hear him?
“That was my son that leapt from the castle,” he said. “I seem to be stuck here now.”
Arin snorted. “You be stuck wherever you want to be stuck. That’s how it is with a pure-blooded Jinn. Just like Dani. She chooses this place and this life.”
The old woman walked away from the shelving unit and Maks dared to peek out a little as her back was turned. She went to the worktable. “She is blind. Just like you.”
“I was captive to my ancestors,” Marsum said. “A little different—”
“She is captive too, just with a responsibility that she wishes to see through. But she cannot find a black unicorn. That would bring her a step closer to fulfilling the prophecy. Of ending Asag and his reign so she could be queen of the east, as she was born to be. This mess of wanting a child is a fool’s hope. That will come later. If she survives. Right now, she needs a strong Jinn with her to face Asag. If I can convince her that is.”
Maks couldn’t believe she spoke so freely, but then she thought Marsum dead, and no other to listen.
Or did she? She came back to the shelving unit and crouched down. Her hand shot toward him and dragged him out from his hiding place. He shifted and stood in front of her, his hands going around her neck. Could he kill her?
She smiled up at him. “You want to get out of here alive, you’re going to need to work with me, boy.”
“I won’t fuck her.”
Her smile widened. “Do as I say, and I’ll help you survive Dani and her whims. And maybe, just maybe, you’ll get to keep your life after too.”
15
Zam
With my eyes closed I let myself feel the movement of the dragon under me, and the way that Vahab’s hands clung to my body. Lilith raged from her place on my back and yet that rage was distant.
In the quiet of my mind, I knew only one thing.
Vahab was a dead Jinn the second I had the chance.
I had no doubt that Lila would be chasing after us, but she was also carrying Reyhan and that extra weight would slow my friend down. Which meant for the moment, I was on my own.
I sunk deeper and deeper into that state of quiet, feeling it cover me like a wave through the river. I found myself holding my breath for long periods of time as if I were indeed swimming, as if I were once more in the river below the Nasnas monster.
And I waited for my moment. Patience was not a virtue of mine, but the injuries from the Ijiraq were not small. The poison from the beast was burning through me still, more like an infection. Nothing like the bite of the rabisu.
Patience. That’s all I needed.
“There, Fen,” Vahab hollered. “Between those two valleys looks fine by me. A lovely place for a union of souls, don’t you think?”
If I could have gagged, I would have. Union of souls my lily-white ass. I was going to show him a union between my fist and his face.
“Are you sure?” Fen’s muscles tightened below me, the uncertainty in his voice clearly audible. “I’m not sure that she wants this.”
“Why?” That Vahab even asked the question was interesting.
“I think she has a mate, Vahab. And I can sense her small dragon still following us despite the child she is carrying. Which means that she will not be alone . . ."
“Are you saying that you can’t kill that five-pound dragon?” Vahab laughed. “Wait . . . do you like her? Please tell me you are not so foolish as to get your heart involved. Again. You do recall how that went for you the last time you let your emotions lead.”
Fen flinched and I rolled my wrist so that I could put my palm against his hide. Because the energy he was throwing off, I knew it well and it struck a chord with me.
Shame.
Shame that he’d made a wrong choice in a mate. Shame that he’d not been able to see that his choice would never have worked no matter how hard he’d tried. I pressed a little harder with my hand because while I couldn’t quite find my voice, I did understand what Fen was going through.
Vahab laughed. “You have the worst instincts in a dragon I have ever met, do you know that? That pipsqueak of a dragon back there is nothing more than a runt. She is no dragon even! A lizard at best! A snake with legs!”
Fen was quiet as we descended out of the clouds.
I kept my hand against his scales and felt him calm a little.
We dropped to the ground, and I kept my eyes closed. The infection was raging—the fever running through me was climbing rapidly—but that didn’t mean I couldn’t fight.
We will kill him. I will run him through. Cut him into pieces, bleed him dry!
Lilith was only a little pissed, by the sound of it. Though at that moment I wasn’t all that bothered by her murderous rhetoric.
I breathed through the growing rage, pushing it aside as best I could. Rage had a place, I knew that. But I also knew that I would have limited energy to deal with Vahab. And he was the first Jinn. No matter what he’d said so far about his abilities, I didn’t quite believe him. Which meant that I had to be smart about this.
Smart and fast.
A pang around my heart and there was a moment in my mind where I saw Maks, curled up as a caracal in a small rock crevice, the water of a wrathful ocean blasting around him. His eyes were closed as if he were asleep. Ears pinned back to his head.
Next to him stood a man I knew all too well. Marsum. He lifted a hand to me and waved. Then winked as if . . . as if all were well.
Shit, what was happening if Marsum had shown back up in Maks’s life?
The moment slid away as Vahab pulled me off Fen’s back, slung me over his shoulder and started walking, my head lolling and bouncing against his upper thigh. Where the hell did he think he was taking me exactly?
“I know you won’t understand,” he said as he adjusted his hold so that his hand was gripping my ass cheek, massaging it. “But this is how it must be. You are the only Jinn woman I’ve seen so much of a whisper of since I’ve been free, and I’ve been searching the dreamscape at night. And it is the union of the strongest male Jinn and the strongest female Jinn that is needed to stop Asag.” He dumped me off his shoulder and I hit the ground hard, knocking what was left of my air out of me.
Blinking, I stared up at him. “What?”
He shrugged out of his shirt and tossed it on the ground. His ribs were clearly visible and not in a trim, I’ve got all these muscles kind of way. More in a I’ve been starving for years kind of way. Scrawny, he was damn scrawny.
“I’m not overly happy about it either,” he said, and that was evidenced by the lack of arousal in his loose pants. He put his hands on his hips and shook his head at me, as I were the problem. “You want to stop Asag? We need to get flouncing.”
I managed to hold a hand up as the screaming banshee that was Lila came in like a goddess-damned tornado. She dropped Reyhan onto my belly and shot up between me and Vahab.
“One more step toward her and you’ll be picking up your face in pieces!” she screamed.
Vahab rolled his eyes. “Fen. Remove her.”
I turned to see Fen hesitate. More than hesitate, he didn’t move. “I . . .”
“FEN!” Vahab twisted around and glared at his dragon, hands on his bony hips. “Remove her now! We are wasting time and Asag will figure out that I am free soon!”
Fen was shaking and I could see the war in his face. Lila didn’t even look at him.
How much hurt had happened between the two of them in their combined pasts? Too much.
“He cares for her,” I said. “You can’t force him any more than you can force me into your bed. At least not without a fight that will leave you bleeding ou
t on the ground.”
Vahab threw his hands in the air. “Save me from dragons who can’t control their hearts!”
“Never,” I whispered.
Lila shot a look at Fen. “I won’t give up my sister for you.”
He shook his head, took a breath and moved to stand behind us. “I . . . I am with you, Lila. I am with you.” The hesitancy, and the bravery it took for him to utter those words, I could only imagine.
But they were the words that she and I spoke to one another. I am here. I am with you. They almost meant more than I love you, at least to me. Love could be fickle. It could lie and tell you that someone like Steve was amazing. It could make you believe in a person who wasn’t worth believing in.
To stand with the person you cared for? To hold their hand in their darkest hours? That was strength. That is the power of a bond that goes beyond love and beyond fear. It is true magic.
And it was there, growing between them—Lila and Fen. I let my eyes drift shut to see the bonds that tied me to my lion pride, something I’d not done in a long time. That magic hadn’t been taken from me, at least.
Bright lines connected Lila and Reyhan to me. But a faint line also connected Fen to Lila, shimmery and hesitant, but very much there. He was growing on her.
I turned my head to follow the gold line that stretched from my heart to the south. Toward Maks.
Why had I not thought to use this sooner? Because I’d been relying on bigger magic, on bigger power to get me through. The smaller things, and the things that mattered had slipped away.
Maks was alive and well. I could feel him through that cord connecting us, so maybe that vision of him and Marsum had been a glimpse of the truth. I wobbled to my feet, clutching Reyhan. She turned herself toward Vahab and hissed. “You are outnumbered,” I said.
Vahab put his hands to his head. “And just how would you like to stop Asag then? The prophecy calls for a rider on a black horse, a union of the strongest Jinn, and a dragon! All the pieces are here!”
I took some pity on him. “You aren’t even attracted to me, are you?”
“Of course I’m not! You . . . you’re a mess! You have no power that I can see and that is incredibly unattractive to me. And you’re all muscle! Your curves are nonexistent! I like some shape on my woman!”
I could have laughed at him.
If he wanted a strong female Jinn, then I would give him one. I glanced at Lila. She was fighting a smirk and I could almost see her thinking. Give him what he wanted then, see if the fool liked his other option.
I was rapidly losing energy, so I gave him the carrot that I suspected if I dangled it in front of him, he’d take. “And if I said there was a stronger female Jinn? One who has power that you’ve even tasted but maybe didn’t recognize?”
He twisted around and frowned at me. “What kind of power?”
“The Storm Queen,” I said. “She is Jinn. She made that ice storm that sent Fen to us, and had us cowering in a cave for hours. She controls the rhuk.”
Vahab held his discarded shirt in one hand, but I could see by the tension in his body that he was considering what I was saying.
“How can you be sure?”
I let out a breath, feeling the danger of the moment slipping by. He would not try and flounce me. Hell, he didn’t even want to, despite what Lilith had predicted. Then again, that was likely her game. To set me on edge, to make me think that he would kill me if I didn’t fuck him.
“Because her power feels like mine, or at least part of mine,” I said. “And I’m just . . . well, I’m a mutt. I am part Jinn, but I’m part shifter too, a little bit of fairy, and apparently the heart of a dragon.” I lifted my hand to Lila and pulled her to me.
She flipped off Vahab as she wrapped herself around my shoulder. “Remember when I said you should kick Fen out of the cave, and you felt sorry for him?”
I wasn’t going to argue with her that if I hadn’t done that, Fen wouldn’t be standing with us, against Vahab right then.
“You were right to bring him in,” she said. Fen brightened at her words, his scales actually shimmering a deeper green.
It was so cute it was gag worthy.
Vahab kicked at a few rocks. “What are you suggesting then?”
For the first time I felt like I was seeing the real Vahab. A man desperate enough to stop Asag that he would do the things he didn’t want to. Despite the fact that I was that thing he didn’t want to do, I could see that he was serious.
“A partnership in truth from here on out. No more lies. No more games. No more tactics. We both have the same goal—to bring Asag down. The Storm Queen has my mate. He is also half Jinn.” I thought about what she wanted from him, and for a moment I could almost feel the story come together. The heat from my fever spiked and I knew I had to focus on the first step. “Help me take down Asag. Not by fucking me, but by getting me to my mate.”
“Flouncing each other, that is the only way.” The frustration in his voice was obvious.
“Unless you bang the Storm Queen,” Lila said. “I do believe that’s what Zam is getting at. If you want a powerhouse of a Jinn woman, the Storm Queen is your girl.”
I nodded and went to my knees, then back onto my butt. My throat was tight and hot, as if I’d been sucking in fumes from a fire. Lila kept talking.
“You get the Storm Queen, and we get Maks back.” Lila stayed close to my face. “Then we move on Asag together. A team.”
Vahab was quiet. “That . . . makes sense. No more games. I will be true to this pact. We will go to the Storm Queen, and I will have her in my bed. Then we will deal with the demon.”
“You do whatever you want to her,” Lila muttered, “long as we get Maks.”
I smiled and closed my eyes. This was good. We were going to work together finally. Maybe I’d forgive Vahab at some point for the bullshit he’d put me through and the ass grabbing.
I will never forgive him! Lilith’s scream was there, and I cringed, unable to fight it off.
Lila’s claws slid over my face, poking at me. “But first we have to take care of Zam. She’s running a high fever. That venom is really doing a bang-up job on her.”
After that, things got . . . blurry is the best word. Hot and cold at turns, I know I thrashed and flopped on the ground like a fish out of water. Hands covered me with blankets or doused me with cold cloths depending on my temperature.
Lila was a constant presence. Reyhan was a constant presence, and for the first time in a long, long time, I let the bonds to my family pride open. That opening allowed me to feel their emotions and their worry, but also allowed me to pull a little strength from them to boost my healing.
Not once since Asag had taken my power had I thought to reach back to my roots, and yet they were still there. I could feel my brother Bryce, Shem, Kiara . . . I could feel Maks and his frustration, I could even feel the Emperor—my grandfather—distantly. They were there and as I fought against the infection their strength flowed to me. A trickle from each of them that maybe none would notice.
No, that wasn’t true. Bryce noticed. In the fog of my mind I saw him as he lifted his head and turned his golden eyes my way. My brother knew I was in trouble. I don’t know how much he saw, if he saw only the infection or more. If he knew that I was facing a demon.
“Zamira.” He growled my name. “We will come. We are family and we stand together.”
“No!” I lifted my hand to stop him. Not because I didn’t want his help. But because I could not bear to see his peace shattered once more. “No, stay! I can’t . . . I don’t want you in danger again!”
But he was gone, determination set into his face.
Damn him.
I did not want to bring my brother or our family into this any more than I already had. And yet . . . I could already feel the shifting of the desert sands, swirling as change settled in on my life once more.
My family was coming to me.
Whether I liked it or not.
&nbs
p; 16
I woke up, fever free, in the early hours of the morning when the night still reigned but the sun was peeking up at the edge of the horizon. Reyhan was curled up in her cub form in the crook of my arm, sound asleep. Lila was in the crook of my neck and Fen . . . Fen was wrapped around all of us.
“I see you are finally awake,” Vahab said. “Which is good because I think we need to get moving.” He handed me a flask and something that I assumed was food. I took a swig of the drink.
Tepid water, but there was some sort of herb in it giving it a good tang.
“Drink it all,” Vahab said. “You need it. You sweated out most of your water.”
He was being . . . normal. Was this the real Vahab? I hoped so, because I needed someone to work with me, not someone I had to ass kick every five minutes.
“What’s this?” I motioned with my hand holding the jerky.
“Camel, I think.” He shrugged. “We took it off some scavengers while you were out. Or more accurately, your Lila took it.”
I took a bite and chewed it a minute before shaking my head. “Not camel.” There was a gamey flavor that hung in the meat that was barely covered up by the serious amount of salt that had been used in preparing it. But I didn’t care what it was made from at that point. My belly was happy to have something in it, even if it was a mystery meat.
I sat up slowly, felt a wash of dizziness but it fled as I got my bearings. “How long was I out?” I drank down the last of the water and handed it back to Vahab.
“Not as long as I thought you’d be. You drew off your people.”
I was on my feet in a flash. “How did you know that?”
“Lila said she could feel you taking a little from all of your family,” Fen said as he lifted his head. “I think that’s why she and the child are still asleep.”
I scooped up Lila and Reyhan. They were out cold. “I took too much.”
“You are alive.” Vahab straightened his ragged shirt as if it were a much nicer outfit. “If the cost is they sleep the day away, it is a rather small price to pay.”
Kingdom of Storms (The Desert Cursed Series Book 8) Page 10
