The Secret of Ka

by Christopher Pike

  "Pray tell me what you need. I am sure I can get it for you."

  "My Majesty loves to jest. Surely you know I must make a formal wish for each item." I paused. "Tell me how I should phrase my requests."

  "Tell me your first wish and I will teach you how to phrase it."

  "You would grant my wish without a formal request?"

  Again, he moved three more feet to my right. I found my feet locked to the floor. I had to twist my upper body to keep him squarely in view.

  "For a female as beautiful as you, I would do this," he said.

  "You flatter me! But I'm afraid neither of us will get what we want if we don't follow the rules." I hardened my tone. "I can't make a wish unless I know your name."

  He hesitated. "You may call me Trakur."

  The name of Amesh's djinn had been Darbar Aloya Ta.

  Trakur could not be his full djinn name.

  "The name Trakur does not tell me much about Your Majesty. Where you are from, your lineage. It does not even tell me the name of your father."

  "My father is no more. He perished in the great war."

  "A pity. What was his name?"

  Again, he moved to the right and leaned close. I smelled the breath from his beak—an odor of fresh blood.

  "He's famous among the djinn. You must know his name."

  "I'm sure I do. Tell me anyway," I said.

  "Why should I?"

  I played another ace, sighing loudly. "Your Majesty, with all respect, I tire of this charade. I've come to you for help, but how can I trust you'll get what I need when you won't answer my simplest questions?"

  "Tell me what you want and you shall have it."

  "Tell me your name and I'll tell you what I need!" I shot back.

  The djinn moved almost behind me. Still, my feet remained rooted to the floor. I had to twist far to the right to keep it in view. Finally, however, it seemed to tire of the taunting. It wanted to trap me. It wanted me to start making wishes.

  "My father was Trakae Analova Ta," he said.

  I smiled. "Of course, a great djinn. Then you must be..." To sort out the pattern, I had to assume that he had given me his first name first. I figured Analova stayed in the middle, especially since Amesh's djinn's name had also ended in Ta. "Why, you're the great Trakur Analova Ta!"

  The djinn nodded. "I am well known in these parts."

  "I apologize, Your Majesty. Never again will I forget such a worthy title."

  He showed impatience. "Tell me your name and your first wish."

  I continued to smile, although I was getting more and more worried about how I was going to free my fingers from the hilt. "But King Analova, now that I know who you are, we have so much else to discuss. Why, I have not even asked about your wife. How is she?"

  Trakur drew himself up high. I had to bend my head back to follow. Again, he made that sickening sound with his beak, but this time a clot of blood spilled out and stained the altar. If his eyes had been cold before, they were now ice. Crystal shards from an arctic cave, they looked like they could slice me open.

  "You lie," he said. "You are the one who plays the charades. You have been interested in my wife from the start. It is she you want, not I." He added in a deadly tone, "You must know the penalty of lying to a djinn such as me."

  "But Your Majesty! When did I lie? I was merely trying to ... AHH!"

  A burning pain erupted in my right side. It was so intense that I feared to lower my eyes and see what was causing it. But then I saw the invisible blade was no longer invisible. The carpet's warning had come back to me too late.

  A silver sword had punched out of the hilt like a switch blade loaded on a spring. It had pierced my side, and I was bleeding badly. Yet the blood was not going to waste. The blade's shiny surface somehow absorbed it by the mouthful.

  With the amount of blood I was losing, the knife had probably pierced an organ. If I tried to pull it out, my wound would change into a red geyser, and I would die in seconds.

  "I want to make my first wish now, Trakur Analova Ta!" I cried.

  He stood in front of me and clapped his talons in anticipation. I saw then how he had tricked me. He had kept pulling my attention farther to the side to force my torso closer to the tip of his hidden blade.

  "Tell me what it is and I will grant it for you," he said.

  "Remove this blade from my side and stop..." I stopped. I did not complete the wish because I realized I was making two at once.

  "You wish me to remove the blade and stop the bleeding?"

  "That's not my wish," I gasped. "You did not hear me say that."

  "Your wish then. Speak it aloud!"

  "Trakur Analova Ta, I wish for you to heal this wound."

  He shook his head. "Impossible. The blade has impaled your side. You will continue to bleed until it is removed."

  "I'll handle that. You just fulfill my wish."

  "It is a deep wound. It may take time to heal."

  "You're to heal it as fast as you can!"

  Trakur considered. "What is your name?"

  "None of your damn business."

  "Without your name, I cannot grant your wish."

  I dropped to my knees on the hard marble floor, sweat dripping into my eyes. Still, I kept my gaze focused on him. "You lie. You lie because you think I lied to you—and that you are free to do what you wish. But that is not true because you have failed to catch me in a lie. You are a djinn, and you must obey the Laws of the Djinn, Trakur Analova Ta. Fulfill my wish immediately!"

  With that, I yanked the blade from my side.

  Blood gushed from my side. The pain was so great that I almost blacked out.

  Amazingly, the hilt released my fingers.

  Trakur went very still. He closed his wicked eyes. I noticed the blood that only seconds ago had been swelling inside his beak had stopped. His mouth went dry. When I looked down, I saw that my blood was no longer pouring out. The pain in my side lessened but did not stop altogether.

  Trakur opened his eyes. "Your first wish has been granted. What is your second wish?"

  I set the artifact back on the altar.

  The blade had disappeared.

  "There will be no second wish. Carpet, come to me, please."

  The carpet flew to where I knelt. It took all of my strength to turn so that when I let go and fell, I landed on my back on the carpet.

  I couldn't reach for the tassels. It was okay; the carpet was an old friend. It would obey my commands and ask for nothing in return. Trakur appeared surprised by how quickly it responded to my orders.

  "Take me out of here," I gasped, and felt myself rising upward. We moved fast, toward the ceiling. The carpet was in a hurry, and so was I. The djinn screamed beneath me, and I felt a wave of air as Trakur tried with all of his talons to knock me down. But either he was too far below or else he was not deep enough in our dimension to harm me.

  As we cleared the roof and the stars became visible, I blacked out.

  When I came to I was in my room, lying on the bed. The house was asleep. The majority of my pain was gone but I still would have appreciated a modern hospital with doctors and nurses and an IV drip loaded with morphine.

  At least I had the carpet, my dear Carpet of Ka. It lay near me, on the floor. The window was open and the stars shone on its starry center.

  "I thought I was so clever," I mumbled. "But he tricked me."

  "You tricked him as well," the carpet replied.

  "For all the good it did."

  "You learned his name."

  "I had to ask him for a wish! If I ask for another, I'll be in his debt."

  "Perhaps one day you will be forced to ask. He is a very powerful djinn. Life is in the blood, and he feeds his power with blood. That is why he is the ruler of the djinn on this island."

  I sighed. "I went there hoping to get his wife's name so I could invoke her into the pot I'm making. Now that hope's gone."

  "Is it?"

  I tried to sit up. "Isn't
it?"

  "The Ta at the end of the name is the same as your mister. Otherwise, when a female djinn marries, she takes on the name of the husband."

  I had to laugh, although it hurt my side.

  "What is the word for Mrs.?" I asked.

  "La"

  "So his wife's name is Trakur Analova La?"

  "Yes."

  "Why didn't you tell me that in the first place?"

  "I wanted to surprise you."

  I fell back on the bed, exhausted. "Cool," I said.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE CARPET HAD ESSENTIALLY ordered me to remain on the island and complete an introductory course on the djinn and the dangerous rules that surrounded them.

  But that brought up a disquieting question: Had the carpet purposely put Amesh in danger so I would have to save him? In other words, were the two of us mere puppets? I challenged the carpet on this point, and it replied that I had to have faith, that I had been led to the island and the carpet for a reason. Later, I asked the carpet about other people who had invoked djinn. Its answer was chilling.

  "Most of those humans are now thralls of those djinn."

  "Where are they now?" I asked.

  "You don't want to know."

  Frustrated with how slow I was learning to throw pots, I asked the carpet if Aleena could make one for me. But it said if I wished to attach a djinn to the pot, then it had to be an extension of who I was or I wouldn't be able to control the creature.

  What was the secret of throwing the perfect pot? It was fearlessness and confidence. Aleena taught me to approach the clay with a quiet mind, but with a firmly fixed vision of what I wanted to create. Then I would be able to mold the lump of clay into a thing of beauty.

  I cannot recall how many days it was after I faced the bloodthirsty djinn that I threw my first perfect pot. It could have been three or four days, it could have been a week. But when I did it, the result was exactly what I needed.

  I was no longer simply an apprentice. I was a real live potter.

  Yet the pot needed a lid; it needed handles. Those took another day to fashion. In the meantime the pot dried and I primed it with a white liquid and set about painting it according to the carpet's instructions. I had to create a specific star pattern, which the carpet said mirrored the djinn's character. In other words, I was recreating the djinn's astrological chart on the pot.

  And here I had always thought astrology was for the birds.

  I asked why the other artifacts did not have stars painted on them.

  The carpet's answer surprised me. "They do. You just can't see them."

  The carpet also had me paint and carve the name of the djinn into the pot. It explained that such a technique made it almost impossible for the djinn to disconnect itself from the artifact. Once I returned to Istanbul, it assured me, I would need such control.

  The carpet made it sound as if I was going to war.

  So be it, I thought. Bring them on; I felt ready.

  Or maybe I was just sick of the goats. Their smell, their brutal kicks and constant baying. I tried to convince Hara we should eat more goat meat and less lamb. I'm afraid to say that I never formed a warm and fuzzy relationship with the beasts.

  The day after I finished painting my pot, Aleena immersed it in the intense heat of the kiln. The process was fascinating to watch. The clay and paint fused to form a shiny surface that, color-wise, reminded me of the carpet as much as Aleena's finest work. When it was done, she set it out in the cool evening air.

  Then we shared a meal that we understood would be our last.

  They tried their best to get me to stay longer. I refused. Yet if I was honest with myself, I was pretty sure Amesh had already made his third wish. If that was the case, and he was a thrall, I was not sure how I could use my djinn to free him. The carpet did not answer when I asked such things. It never gave me much hope that he could be saved.

  "Act. Do the best you can do. But don't worry about the fruit of your actions. That is beyond your control."

  When I was ready to leave, Hara offered to help me carry my pot to the valley of the temples. I politely declined. I planned to fly there. But then the carpet said it wanted Hara to come. He was to fly on the carpet with me. I should have known something odd was up right then.

  Hara held my two-foot-tall pot. I carried a torch and the lid of the pot. Aleena stayed behind, but gave me a long lingering hug goodbye. She had tears in her eyes when she let go. We had become close, but I did not know we were that close. Perhaps I had misread her feelings from the start.

  We rode the carpet to the valley, but got a late start. The red star had already risen in the east and its sober light shone over the cold pools of water that separated the temples. I tried asking Hara about the star but he shook his head as if to say it was not something to talk about in the dark.

  We landed outside the triangular temple and entered through the front door. Approaching the altar, I feared that Trakur Analova Ta would put in an appearance, but the building felt oddly calm. I asked the carpet if Hara should be present while I invoked the djinn and it said no. It added:

  "But be grateful for his help. He will watch over the pot."

  "Watch over it?" I asked, shocked. "I'm taking it with me."

  "You cannot."

  "Amesh took his lamp with him when he left with his djinn."

  "His artifact is hard to destroy. Yours is easy. It must be guarded."

  "But doesn't my djinn go back inside my pot when I'm not using it?"

  "Your mind is stuck on cartoons about genies and their lamps. The djinn gets attached to your pot. It is through your pot that it gets attached to this world. But it does not have to stay inside the pot, not once you have bound it to you and to this world."

  "Won't the distance the djinn is from the pot affect the control I have over the djinn?"

  "No. Especially if she believes you're going to make three wishes."

  "That's my point!" I complained. "If I do make wishes, I'll need to destroy the pot to cancel out my contract with the djinn."

  "I'm aware of your plan and it is sound."

  "But if the pot's here and I'm in Istanbul, I won't be able to destroy it when I want to."

  "Do not worry about that."

  I shook my head. "This is insane. This is not what I planned."

  "You must learn that things do not always go according to your plans. To keep your djinn attached to your pot, and the pot safe, it must stay here."

  Hara saw that I was distraught, arguing with the carpet. I'm sure he felt helpless that he could not do more for me. He gave me a hug the same way Aleena had. He shed a few tears, too. Then he took the torch and left the temple. Yet he made sure the door remained propped open. He really was going to check on my pot.

  The carpet instructed me to set the pot in front of the altar, and to sit with the pot between me and the altar. I laid the carpet out nearby; I still had some last-minute questions.

  "Is Trakur Analova Ta's mate in the temple?" I asked.

  "She is near. Remember, she is free, unattached to an artifact. But she will be anxious to attach to your pot, especially after you defeated her mate."

  "Why?"

  "She seeks revenge."

  I shivered. "Her husband got at least four pints of blood out of me. I didn't even scratch him. He has nothing to complain about. Besides, my side's not totally healed. I still have pain there."

  "You may always have such pain. It's part of the price you pay to walk the path you have chosen."

  "I haven't chosen to walk any path. I'm just trying to save Amesh."

  "You have a great destiny set before you. You can try to achieve it, at great cost and sacrifice, or you can run from it and sink into mediocrity. The choice is yours."

  "Did I ever tell you that you need to lighten up?" I said.

  "Greatness requires commitment."

  "Each time I've faced a djinn, I've felt intuitively that I have to try to remain in charge. But it mak
es me wonder how to act with a djinn that's going to be following me around. Say I tell it to go away so I can sleep. The djinn can always say to me, 'Is that a wish?' You see what I'm getting at?"

  "The djinn will try to do that every chance it gets. You have to stop it from taking liberties. Make it clear that you're the master and your orders are not the same as your wishes."

  There was a rustle in the air.

  "Trakur Analova La comes. Quietly repeat her name. Guide her into the pot. When she is inside, put the top on. Then she will be bound to it."

  "Won't I have to let her back out when we head for Istanbul?"

  "A part of her will remain connected to this pot. Most of her will go with you to the city. But once she enters the pot, leave her inside."

  "I'm finally beginning to see how this works," I said.

  "Good. You fly the carpet, not the djinn. They have a tendency to abuse magic carpets and treat them as slaves."

  "Okay." Suddenly I could sense an invisible being in the area. She didn't feel as large as her husband, yet she felt more focused. Her energy was more concentrated.

  I began to recite her name. "Trakur Analova La. Trakur Analova La. Trakur Analova La." It wasn't long before a mist formed between me and the altar. Unlike the previous invocations I had been involved with, this djinn didn't quickly assume a form.

  I thought I understood why. Unlike the other djinn—who were attached to artifacts and accustomed to ensnaring unwary humans—this one had not put its foot into our realm in ages, if it had ever done so. I continued to chant its name for half an hour before it settled on a shape. I didn't get impatient. I could see it was making progress. Also, the form it chose was pleasant.

  She looked like a human queen, with long, black shiny hair, a veritable shawl made out of darkness. She wore a crown, a small gold one, and not much else. Her dress was mostly sheer and black. She was dark-skinned. If not for a wide silver belt around her waist and a similar necklace atop her breasts, she would have been exposed. The necklace and belt were draped in hair-like material and inlaid with precious stones, mostly rubies, which matched the creature's eyes. They were black and had fiery red pupils. The color reminded me of the blood her husband had stolen from my veins.