Exquisite Captive

by Heather Demetrios

  “We?” she asked. Nalia had never heard him speak about anyone else in his life: family, friends, lovers. It was as if Malek operated in a universe of his own, disproving the human expression no man is an island.

  A shadow crossed over Malek’s face. “My mother,” he said, his voice soft. He clutched at the armrest for a moment, his long fingers gripping the old wood. “She decided we’d go to Hollywood because she loved the movies, couldn’t get enough of them. She used to tell me this city was the only place on Earth where there was any magic worth caring about.”

  Nalia wanted to know more about her. She couldn’t imagine Malek actually having a mother or being a child like Bashil. But there were more pressing questions.

  “Haven’t your clients ever wondered why you don’t age?”

  Malek shrugged. “People see what they want to. Move every few decades, do business over the phone, avoid personal relationships . . . you’d be surprised how easy it is to fool an entire planet.” He grabbed a handful of popcorn and grinned as he threw a kernel into his mouth. “And if someone asks too many questions, I have ways of dealing with that, too.”

  Typical, Nalia thought. If someone gave you too much trouble, all you had to do was kill them. It was the same thing the Ifrit were doing in Arjinna, just on a larger scale.

  “So how old are you, really?”

  “Older than you, hayati.”

  She had so many questions, a million little mysteries about Malek left to solve, but he’d turned away from her, his eyes on the movie. The trills and bass tones of the piano filled in the silence as a short man with a black mustache and a strange, waddling walk began moving across the screen.

  “That’s Charlie Chaplin,” Malek said, pointing at the man. “I used to love going to see his films, though my favorite actor was Rudolph Valentino.”

  “Where’s the color?” she asked.

  “The first films were in black and white.”

  “Oh.”

  At first it was strange without all the vibrant color most films had, but gradually Nalia came to appreciate the contrast of the rich black and soft gray on the screen. Somehow, it made the faces more interesting. If she ever returned to Arjinna, Nalia wanted to ask the mages how to make film magic.

  A soft laugh escaped Nalia as the funny man stumbled through the opening scenes. Malek’s eyes met hers and he smiled, then held the popcorn out to her, laughing a little as she wrinkled her nose. She’d never wanted to try the strange food—it was too yellow and strong-smelling.

  “Open your mouth,” he said.

  And she did. Because it was a command, however light and fun he intended it to be. Like his summons, Nalia’s body would obey, whether or not she wanted to. He was her master, and even a date at the movies wouldn’t change that. Malek’s fingers grazed her lips as he placed a kernel of popcorn on her tongue, his eyes holding hers in the silver-kissed darkness. She shivered, no longer able to concentrate on the funny little man on the screen or the pianist’s music. Malek’s lips turned up in a lazy, sun-drunk kind of smile.

  “Like it?”

  She nodded, not sure if he was talking about the popcorn or his touch. She wanted to be repelled—she was repelled. And yet it felt as though she were forcing herself not to touch him. Though there wasn’t a bit of fire in the room, her chiaan heated up, as if she’d put her hand on an open flame.

  Malek set down the tub of popcorn, satisfied.

  “I chose this one because it’s about a man who can’t adjust to the modern world. I thought you’d feel some kinship with him. I know I certainly do.” He shook his head, rueful, his hand reaching for hers. Nalia turned her eyes back to the screen, heart thudding against her chest as Malek’s fingers intertwined with her own.

  Charlie Chaplin seemed to be stuck in a factory machine, and he gripped the wheels as they spun around, his face pulled into exaggerated emotion. Nalia could barely see him. It was as if Malek’s hand were calling every bit of her awareness to him. She could smell the faint clove scent of his cigarettes, the muskiness of the cologne he’d worn since the night he bought her. As Chaplin’s character fumbled from one mishap to another, the heat from Malek’s hand increased, her chiaan responding to him in ways it never had before. When Nalia finally looked over at her master, his eyes were already on her. Without a word, he pulled her onto his lap, his mouth closing over hers before she could even register her surprise. He tasted like cinnamon and butter.

  For a moment—maybe longer, she couldn’t be sure—Nalia lost herself, learning this new language punctuated with sighs and nips and low, soft laughter. Nothing mattered but the taste and feel of the man who held her in his arms, the spiciness of his tongue, the heat, so much heat. Her hand slid from his shoulder to his chest; over the rich fabric of his shirt she could feel the rope of chain holding her bottle and it was a knife in her gut, twisting. Nalia’s eyes snapped open, the mood Malek had conjured spinning away like the ashes of a fire. The disorienting sensation of being outside of time and space sliced through her; returning to herself felt like evanescing for the first time. How could she have forgotten about the bottle? How could she have forgotten about him?

  Nalia kissed Malek harder, her lips punishing, furious at how close the bottle was and how powerless she was to get it. Enraged that it hadn’t been the only thing on her mind. Malek’s hands moved from her tangled hair to her shoulders and he pushed her back, staring down at her, his eyes narrowed.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, his voice suddenly hard.

  She stared at him, unable to hide her revulsion. Words tumbled up her throat, pushed against her clenched teeth, but she stayed silent, caught between the illusion she wanted him to see and the fierce hatred in her heart. Malek lifted Nalia off his lap and dumped her into the chair next to him, then stood. His silhouette covered the movie screen so that he was larger than life. Adrenaline surged through Nalia. He couldn’t put her in the bottle, not now. Not when she was so close to going home.

  Think, godsdammit, think. But her mind went blank, all her training forgotten in this one frantic moment.

  “Piano player,” Malek bellowed across the theater. The small man immediately stopped playing and turned around. “Leave us.”

  Nalia shivered as the pianist quickly slipped off his stool and hurried out a back door marked Exit. Malek towered over her, the light from the projector casting sharp shadows across his face. All the gentleness he’d showered her with had vanished, replaced with a cold fury she knew all too well. She clutched at her chair’s armrest as her hatred gave way to fear.

  “Malek, please. Wait. I—”

  He grabbed her wrist and pulled her up, dragging her away from the light and the eyes of the technician in the projector room. She stifled a moan as her head slammed against the wall. The room swooped and swayed as pain bloomed across the back of her skull. For a second, bright spots of color danced in her vision, like a swarm of fireflies. Malek’s onyx eyes seemed to pulse with a dull red flame, but when she blinked they were black again, the red gone.

  “Is this a new game you’re playing, Nalia? Because you know how much I love games.” He pressed himself against her, his words hot and low in her ear. “I could have had you any time I wanted, but, fool that I am, I waited.” His hands pushed her dress up. “Told myself I could get you to love me.”

  Nalia’s chiaan beat against her, a butterfly trapped in a jar. He gripped her thighs, his fingers digging into her skin. Nalia’s lips formed a silent plea; she couldn’t let him do it, not even for Bashil. Her arms lashed out and delivered a blow to Malek’s chest. He had stumbled halfway down the aisle before she realized her Sha’a Rho had taken over. Pose 637: Storm Tamer.

  Malek laughed, the sound a chilling slap at the air. Chaplin’s antics on the movie screen were a macabre background to her master’s carefully contained rage. He started up the aisle, slow. Steady.

  “Do not do that again, Nalia.”

  The command settled on her like a cloak of chains.
“You almost had me believing you,” he said. “But that kiss . . .” He shook his head. “You tipped your hand on that one, didn’t you? What’s the game, Nalia? I want to play too.”

  In the darkness, his eyes glowed. Faint red flames danced around the edges of his pupils. The flames were real, not a product of the huge, painful bump on the back of her head. Nalia stared. He wasn’t Malek anymore—it was as if an Ifrit monster had come to take his place.

  An Ifrit monster.

  “Oh, gods,” she whispered.

  The mood swings. The way he always had to have fire and heat around him, his incessant smoking. The burn of his lips. How could she not have seen it before? Malek was aging so slowly because he was half jinn. And so obviously half Ifrit. The Malek who was cruel and cunning and liked to hurt her wasn’t the human Malek—it was the jinn Malek, the side of his nature that was the embodiment of evil.

  “Malek—” she whispered, as he reached her. He grabbed her wrists and pushed her back up against the wall. “This isn’t you.” She hated the pleading tone of her voice, the tears she had to produce to soften him. “Come back to me.” She called for the Malek who had given her a piece of her homeland, the Malek who said he liked to see her happy. “This isn’t you.”

  His grip on her wrists tightened, his voice sharp. “Don’t.”

  But she could see something in him give way. His eyes followed the tears as they flowed down her cheeks. She had never let him see her cry before. This was her chance—maybe the only one she would have before the assassins found her.

  “When you were away for those two weeks, I missed you,” she said, her voice soft. She wrapped the lie in clouds and silk and fragrant smoke. She could feel the bruises form under her shackles as he pressed the gold into her skin. It wasn’t enough.

  “The necklace . . . it was like a sign from the gods. It made me realize you were right. We do belong together.” She cringed inwardly, hating the sound of those words coming from her lips.

  He stared at her and she met his gaze, her face flooding with shame and something she couldn’t name as she watched the battle he was fighting inside himself, played out in the red in his eyes that flickered in and out, like a candle set before an open window. She could see how much he wanted to believe her, the need plainly written on his face. Guilt pricked her heart, but the painful throbbing in the back of her head and the raw skin on her wrists pushed it away.

  Malek quickly rearranged his features, his well-worn mask of composure slipping over his face. “Lying doesn’t become you,” he said. But his voice was tight, betraying his uncertainty.

  “I’m not lying to you.”

  Clouds. Silk. Fragrant smoke.

  The red disappeared from his eyes until all she could see was the familiar dark liquid pools. He looked down at her, breathing hard, searching her eyes as if they were an oracle. Emotions flitted across his face, too fast for her to catch them. He let go of her and stepped back, running his hands through his hair. She’d never seen him undone. The only sound in the theater was the soft whir of the projector and the faint hint of traffic outside. The film played on in total silence, bathing them in liquid gray light. In the space between them, Nalia saw the opening he’d left for her, no bigger that a hairline crack on a wall.

  Ignoring her dizziness, she stepped forward. Malek reached up to his neck and gripped the bottle. Panic raged through her, but Nalia forced herself to move slowly, praying to the gods that he wouldn’t try to put her in it.

  Malek didn’t move when she reached her hand up to his face.

  “Come back to me,” she whispered, drawing closer to him. She ran her hands through his hair and he closed his eyes and let go of the bottle. She imagined it straining toward her, begging her to steal it back. If only she could. But this step was the first in dozens of similar steps, a dance leading Malek deeper into the confusion of his feelings until he could finally, finally trust her enough to take the bottle off. Want her enough to take the bottle off.

  “Come back to me.”

  Nalia tilted her head up and pressed her mouth to his. The fire in her called to the fire in him, the powerful element igniting from the spark of their kiss. Warmth flooded Nalia, stealing through the cold terror that had invaded her. She made her kiss a beacon in the dark, a light at the end of the tunnel where the human part of Malek hid from his jinn self. She felt the tumbling, scorching, roiling river of his chiaan as it flowed from his lips and seeped into her skin, dangerous and thundering, an untapped magic that she hoped he’d never understand. Her lips beckoned him closer, closer . . . Malek’s lips pressed more firmly against her own and he caught her face with his hands, gently, like she was made of glass. The fear inside her shattered. The Ifrit in him had retreated, slumbering like unstirred coals in a fire.

  “Nalia.” He said her name as though he’d just woken from a trance. He stared at her for a long moment, then he stepped away, a look of horror washing over his face. “I don’t know what came over me.” His eyes were pleading, frantic. “Hayati, I’m so sorry.”

  Nalia looked at him, waiting for the right words to come. Gently, she thought. Gently.

  “You scared me,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. Nalia reached up a hand and felt the bump on the back of her head. She could feel his misery at the pain he’d caused her; the energy in the room grew heavy, leaden, and she let a few more tears drop. “How can you call me hayati when you do things like this, Malek? How can we be together if . . . ?”

  He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I know. Fuck. I know.”

  Everything in her line of sight seemed to jump up a few feet and wobble in the air. She reached out for one of the seats to steady herself, no longer playing the damsel. She needed to get away and replenish her chiaan. Malek made a move toward her, but she put up her hand. Now that the Ifrit side of him had died down, she didn’t want to be any closer to him than she had to be. It occurred to Nalia that she had Malek right where she wanted him. But it didn’t feel like a victory, and the bottle was still around his neck.

  “Did you know your father was a jinni?” she asked.

  It had to be the father—from the way he’d spoken about his mother in the past tense, Nalia assumed she was dead. If she’d been a jinni, his mother would most likely be alive for several more centuries.

  Malek turned to the screen just as the words The End dissolved into nothingness.

  “Yes, I’ve known my whole life,” he said quietly. “How did you figure it out?”

  “Your eyes. They . . . changed color.” They’d never done that before—so why now? She frowned. Maybe it was strong emotion that brought the jinn side of him out. He was usually so good at keeping himself in check.

  His answering sigh was weary. “I’ve spent my life trying to control it—no, me. I’ve spent my life trying to control me. My father left before I was born, so I don’t even know who he is. There was no one to teach me or help when I . . .” He pressed his lips close together and looked away, his eyes searching the darkness, as if his Ifrit father were hiding in the folds of the velvet curtain. “I don’t want to be like this, Nalia. The anger and the rest of it just . . . happens.” He looked at her, and in the fraction of a second before he shuttered his eyes, she saw the depth of the despair he’d been carrying with him for decades. “I know what the jinn think of people like me.”

  The pardjinn—children of Arjinna and Earth. She knew what the jinn considered them: abominations. Horrors.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. The words were out of her mouth before she could take them back.

  Malek shrugged. “I’ve made the most of it.”

  There was nothing else to say. Nalia went back to her seat to gather her sweater and purse. The carton of popcorn Malek had purchased littered the floor—she didn’t remember it spilling, but then, everything had happened so fast.

  Malek walked up the aisle. “We can watch the Valentino another time,” he said.

  He helped her into her sweater an
d she let him, though she didn’t trust herself when he was so close. His hands, too warm. Too familiar.

  He tilted her chin up and she met his anxious eyes. Yet another side of her master she’d never seen before. “Nalia, I would never hurt you. Not on purpose. Do you believe me?”

  Not on purpose. That’s comforting.

  She closed her eyes as images from the coup ran across her mind, unbidden. The palace, crawling with the Ifrit. Vile, vile creatures. Bashil’s cries as a soldier whipped him. The human weapons that tore holes through her mother. Maybe the old peasant tales were right, that the Ifrit were the spawn of demons. So what did that make Malek?

  “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

  PUSHKAR, INDIA

  THE SHAITAN JINNI STANDS ON A ROOFTOP, GAZING OUT at the scene below her. The dusty street teems with throngs of human travelers who are visiting the small desert town for the annual camel fair. Elaborately costumed camels amble by, pulled by men in colorful turbans and drooping mustaches. Women encased in vibrant yards of silk call out to one another in a lilting, musical language. She eyes the ropes of yellow marigolds that crisscross the street, strung between the compact cement buildings. She remembers the day the humans put them up, not long ago. There were shouts and laughter. When the job was finished, they all sat around and ate plates heaped with rice and dhal.

  Beyond the bustling street, the late-afternoon sun glimmers on a turquoise lake and paints the picturesque hill behind it a burnished gold. The jinni smiles at its loveliness. It’s nothing like Arjinna’s Infinite Lake, but it reminds her of those healing waters and gives her hope that she may see them again someday. It makes the jinni thankful her master in the dark caravan has decided to spend the autumn here, even though the air lies over the town like a thick, wet blanket. Monkeys chatter as they swing from electrical wires, and everywhere there is dust and heat, sound and color.