by E. M. Moore
Liam turned his phone off and slipped it back into his pocket. “I’m sure someone has a reason.”
This djinn was truly like an actual stalker. Someone was breaking into my house and stealing my shit. Not to mention following me around to places I went. To top it all off, this one couldn’t be detoured with magic, not when it was being controlled by someone.
“We can’t stay here,” Travis said.
Liam threaded his fingers through mine. “The safest place is The Order. Order magic has to be even more powerful than the djinn’s.”
I swallowed. Displaced again. When would this stop?
Travis took my other hand and led me up the stairs to my room. He stood there as I grabbed a bag and put a few things into it. I may not have had much back home, but at least I was able to sleep in peace. I was able to live in my house without threat. I turned, feeling down, but saw Travis standing there just looking at me. My heart immediately expanded. Yes, this wasn’t the best of times. We’d look back at all this and shudder, but when we got through this, we’d be so happy that we were all still together as one. That’s what I had to keep in mind.
“What?” he asked.
I shook my head. “Nothing.”
“You were looking at me…funny.”
I grinned. “I was just thinking about how all sorts of crazy this is.”
He moved forward, his thumb brushing my cheek as he wrapped his fingers around the back of my neck. “The crazy is worth it as long as we all still have each other. It’s not going to be like this forever, Norah. If you really want to stay here, we—”
“It’s not that. Not really. I love it here, but I’m not about to sacrifice any of you just so we can sleep in a nice house. Our safety is more important than anything else. We’re just going to have to work harder and faster to find out what’s up with this djinn so we can kick its ass and send it packing.”
The corner of his mouth tipped up. “You always have a way of saying things.”
I pulled the bag up onto my shoulder. “A blessing, I guess.”
He held his hand out, and we left my room and went into his. He dumped his college bag out, textbooks and paper falling onto his comforter and then started stuffing it with clothes. There were so many things we had to put on hold when things got like this. Jobs, school, relationships… It would all be worth it as long as everything worked out in the end, but what if it didn’t? What if this was the time that something bad happened? A memory of the familiar-controlled Liam popped into my head and I shuddered. I didn’t want anything like that happening again.
Travis and I walked back down the steps and huddled in the entryway. Randy was already down there and soon, Gabe and Liam joined us. The ride back into Salem to Headquarters was somber. No one really spoke, and I wondered if they were all thinking the same things I was thinking in my head. Thank goodness we had each other. Going through this without my coven would’ve driven me batty already.
The Jeep rocked as we made our way down the back road. When we finally pulled to a stop, we got out. The magic pricked the hair on my arms and led me right toward the entryway. I hoped they were right that the Order magic was more powerful than the djinn’s. No doubt both were old. From what we’d been able to find out about the djinn, they’d been around for a long time and in many cultures. Each people had their own name for them, yet here we were in Salem where families decided to take their future into their own hands. I couldn’t really fault them for that, but when things started to go downhill, why keep the djinn? Why even risk it?
From watching Mr. Reid, I knew what the answer would be. They were so caught up in their own greed they didn’t want to get rid of the one thing that was giving them all they ever wanted. I hoped if anything like that came to me, I would have the mind enough to realize that the one thing I wanted was hurting me and was hurting everyone around me too.
A hand moved across my shoulders and I was pulled back into a solid body. I laid my head against Gabe’s shoulders and he kissed my temple as the door opened in front of us. We walked down the stone steps. Around the cavernous room, fire lit in the torches, sending an eerie glow over everything.
“Okay,” Travis said as we all moved inside. “When we don’t have to leave this room, we’re here. And if we do have to leave, someone else goes with. Especially you, Norah. The djinn doesn’t seem to be preoccupied with us. There were plenty of times it could have come to us, but it chose to come to you instead. There has to be something there.”
“If it’s not the Reid’s dicking around, it’s whoever this Jay person is,” Randy said, throwing his bag down near his stone seat.
“The problem with that,” Gabe said, “Is that we have no idea who Jay is or what he wants with Norah. At least Dupre was pretty up front about what he wanted.”
I would never make a freaking voodoo doll again. Seriously. Who knew such a little thing would cause so much drama?
“I don’t know if you guys have noticed, but there’s a very real problem with this place.” I waited until they were all looking at me. “There're no showers, no running water, in fact. There’s no internet and no TV.”
“But most of all no ocean view?” Liam asked, his lip curling up, understanding that I was just trying to infuse a bit of humor into such a sucky situation.
“Yes, that too. I don’t know what the original Order was thinking. We should most definitely rebuild Headquarters closer to the ocean. I mean, this is ridiculous.”
“Priorities,” Gabe said, smirking.
“Exactly. I want my view and the sound of the ocean.”
It only took a few minutes in the space before Randy got stir crazy. Liam was looking at old texts while the rest of us tried to find something to do, but he just couldn’t take it. Finally, after pacing for several minutes, he said, “I have to get to work at the parlor.”
Travis stood. “You take someone with you.”
“Fine,” Randy sighed. “Who wants to see me put tattoos on people?”
I was about ready to stand when everyone looked at me and shook their head. “Not a good idea for you, Love,” Gabe said. “I’ll go.”
I grumbled but sat down, anyway. The last thing Randy needed was the djinn showing up when he was putting a tattoo on someone. Yikes. That could go very wrong. We were talking about needles here, and permanent ink.
Randy and Gabe left soon after. Liam still had his nose stuck in a book and Travis just gave me a small smile before laying down and staring up at the ceiling. From my perch on the stone bench, I walked over to Liam and sat down next to him. “How’ve you been?” I asked.
He looked up at me, his eyebrows furrowing. “What do you mean?”
“You know, with finding out about all the big names in Salem, your family being one of them… You must have some thoughts about that.”
“I do,” he said.
He pushed his glasses up his nose and didn’t say anything. I felt like I was going to crawl right out of my skin. “And?”
“I’m surprised,” he said finally. “I spent so long thinking they didn’t love me and that was the reason why they gave me up. I’m still not sure if that’s true. I mean, why give me up? Why not drop the djinn and then leave Salem with me? Make a run for it?”
I ground the toe of my shoe into the stone beneath us. “You’ve seen Mr. Reid. I guess that’s what getting all you ever wanted does to you.”
“It kind of scares me,” he said, dropping his voice low. “That maybe I could be like that, too. I’m happy that I know what happened, and that it wasn’t just because my parents didn’t care about me. I’d already come to terms with that but to be proven wrong—sort of—is nice. But that said, I’m glad I wasn’t just a hindrance they decided to get rid of. I’m sad for my family, in a way, too. That they stooped to getting a djinn to bring about all they ever wanted was low. I mean, we’re magic, Norah. We can do pretty much whatever we want unless we’re trying to harm someone. What more could we ask for? We’re blessed in so many
ways over and above those with no magical abilities whatsoever. I don’t know,” he said, still thinking out the scenario in his head. “I just hope I never end up like that. I don’t want to be the person who keeps striving for something, and everything I have is never good enough. It’s tough because I think I have that in me. Sometimes I’m not satisfied with just an answer, I have to figure out everything behind it and then some. What if my obsession was power and money and not just being good at something? I could turn out like them.”
I shook my head. “Not even remotely possible, Liam. You are so far from them it’s not even funny.”
“No, I’m not. I can see it. I can see that I’m hardwired toward the same thing. Just luckily, I’m not obsessed with power or anything else, yet.” He scooted closer. “That familiar…he brought out my deepest desires in me. You heard him say those things. About not wanting to just be Liam anymore, the smart one. About wanting other things… I never would’ve said it, but he got those thoughts from deep inside of me. If they weren’t in there to begin with, he never would’ve been able to use them against me.”
I reached up to move his chin to face me. “Look at me. All of us have things inside they’re not so proud of. It’s whether we can keep that thing inside us under control is what really matters. You have yours under control, and you’ll never be like your parents. You wouldn’t give us up just so you could get something. I know it.”
“I’d like to say I wouldn’t, but I don’t know. What if it was your life on the line?”
“Don’t think like that. I can take care of myself.”
“I’m just saying…” He took another stab at it. “When you start to love things so much, you would do anything for them. With that comes a bunch more complications about what you’re willing to do and what you’re willing to sacrifice.”
“That’s not going to happen to us.”
“It already did,” he said, face matter-of-fact. “Look what you guys did for me when we were in the other headquarters. You wouldn’t hurt me, even when I had that thing on me. If that’s not falling into the same trap as Mr. Reid, I don’t know what is…”
16
I’d been staring at the ceiling for far too long when the cavern started to shake. I turned my head just slightly and saw Randy and Gabe returning, fast food bags in hand. I leaned up on one arm, staring at the bags and trying not to drool. “You guys are lifesavers.”
“I can’t believe you guys can eat this shit,” Randy snarled.
I gave him a warning look. I’d been cooped up inside fucking headquarters all day, so if I wanted to have a fucking greasy ass cheeseburger that would go straight to my thighs, he could eat a dick. Yep. That’s how bored/angry/emotional—did I say bored? B. O. R. E. D. Bored.
He stepped forward, giving me a slight grin as he dropped the bags at our feet. I stared up at him, incredulous once more. “You better not have spilled fries all over the place.”
“I was supposed to buy fries?”
My eyes widened, and I glared at him with what I hoped was the ferocity of a thousand suns. When he still looked unperturbed, I glanced at Gabe. Gabe gave a quick nod, and I instantly relaxed. They were lucky. Right now, I would probably blast them with some of my cool ass purple magic just to see what would happen. It would definitely liven the place up a bit.
We’d found nothing more useful on djinns than what Mr. Reid had already told us. They were so rare that the Order didn’t have great information on their kind. Liam was already writing up his thoughts to add to the journals. He was also muttering about doing something called a field report and sending it to the superiors after all this was said and done. When I asked him what that was about, he said it was something they did where they gave their observations on every case to their superiors. They were helpful especially in cases like this where we dealt with something that was not so normal.
This damn djinn. I swear to God, it was going down.
“In other news,” Randy said, still completely ignoring my shock of horror about the supposed lack of fries. “Dean Reid called me.”
Liam looked up and blinked. His nose had been stuck in books all day that he probably saw words scrolling across Randy as he spoke. “He did?”
“Yeah, I tried to call you guys, but cell phone reception in this hole isn’t so great. He says he’s okay and that he was just out trying to find the djinn.”
Travis scooted forward and grabbed at a bag as soon as I got my cheeseburger and fries in front of me. “Do you believe him?”
Randy shrugged. “He seemed sincere. He said he and his father got in a fight again. His father was being fucking greedy again and he wanted to do something about it, so he left the house in search of the djinn. He said he used some of the ways his father taught him to call the djinn. Even though it wouldn’t come to him, he thought he could get a fix on where the djinn was only it didn’t work.”
“No shit,” Travis muttered.
“Did you tell him what the djinn did to us?”
“Yes, even though I hate telling that fucker anything. I told him the djinn showed itself to Norah again, almost taking a swipe at her and then it showed up at our house and stole the book he gave us and one of Norah’s sweaters. He’s at a loss and he doesn’t think it’s his dad either. He wouldn’t care about those things. He said his father would ask to win the lottery or for more money in his hedge fund but wouldn’t give a shit about Norah’s sweater.”
“There has to be a reason for the sweater,” I agreed. “What kind of spells use a person’s personal objects?”
“Locator spells, for one,” Liam said. We all looked at him and he shrugged. “It would make sense why the djinn would want one since he keeps showing up wherever Norah is. Maybe he wanted to be able to track her down more easily.”
“Or whoever is controlling it wants him to be able to track her down more easily,” Travis said.
“Or wants to be able track her down himself,” Gabe suggested. He took a bite out of a chicken nugget, then stopped chewing. His lip curled up in disgust. “Bugger. This is rubbery. Anyone want these? I think I’d rather have a burger.”
“They’re rubbery because it’s all artificial,” Randy said. “You’re literally poisoning your bodies by eating that shit.”
“Poison doesn’t taste this good,” I said, taking a big bite and gnawing it down.
“I’ll give you something that tastes good,” Randy offered.
Gabe sputtered out an objection. “I suddenly have no more appetite.”
“I never thought I’d say this,” Liam said, “But I miss my parents’ house. This floor is hard, and the lighting in here sucks for reading.”
“When all this is over,” I said, looking around at our primitive surroundings, “…we should probably modernize this place a little in case something like this happens again.”
“You want to modernize headquarters?” Travis asked, his eyebrows moving up.
I closed my eyes, picturing my ideal space. “I’m thinking electricity. Maybe a refrigerator.”
“A hot tub,” Gabe suggested.
I burst out a laugh. “I don’t think it would go with the decor, but maybe we could get a hot tub at the house…” I said, turning toward Liam.
Liam shrugged. “I don’t see why not.”
“Norah in a bathing suit all the time?” Travis put out there. “We’ll never get any work done again.”
“I’ll call around as soon as this is over,” Liam said, eyeing me with a special twinkle in his eye. “I also want to get another car. We need more than one because sharing the Jeep is getting old.”
“Yeah,” I added. “Especially when you’re stuck underground for hours because someone has to go to work.”
Randy moved forward. “Aww, were you lonely?”
“Hey,” Travis said, “We were here.”
“I wasn’t lonely. I was bored out of my mind.”
We talked the rest of the evening. Since we had no outside light, we could on
ly tell what time it was by our watches and cell phones. We came up with ideas about what to do to headquarters and what we could do to the Pryor Estate once we could live there again. Dreams of the future helped fill the time. In every single picture, I had all four of them around me. All four of them in our supposed new hot tub. All four of them in the hammock that Gabe suggested. Travis brought up a dock and jet skis and I could see us out there bouncing over waves and laughing. It was nice to dream. Even if it never happened, it got us through that evening when there was literally nothing else to do. It helped me focus on the future instead of how bad my back ached from laying on the unforgiving stone.
Eventually, Gabe came over and used some of his extra clothes he packed as a makeshift mattress for us both. It reduced some of the hard impact. The last thing I remembered before drifting off to sleep was Liam talking about the kind of car we should get. With a smile on my face, I cuddled down into Gabe’s frame and dreamed.
17
I sat at the front desk at my shop, Travis behind me, his hands on my shoulders. We’d taken turns giving one another massages since we’d woken up with creaky, aching bodies. I’d slept more than I thought, but that still didn’t make up for the pain I felt after pulling myself up off the hard surface that morning. “I say before we head back tonight, we grab a few air mattresses.”
Travis circled his thumbs into my spine and I stiffened into his touch before relaxing again. “Amen,” he said.
He was on first watch over me since he didn’t have any classes until later in the day. Gabe and Liam were at class now while Randy was at the gym. He was probably the only one who’d been able to take a shower this morning and I was immensely jealous. Gabe may have had the opportunity too since he was an athlete. He could probably go into the locker rooms and do his thing. Me? I’d went into the back room and splashed water on my face and arms, trying to make myself act alive even if I barely passed for the living at the moment.
“My turn,” Travis said.
