“Ian! Quit fucking around.” I gave him an awkward shake. It felt like tackling a mannequin. He rotated under me, and I caught a glimpse of wide, unblinking eyes and a rigid jawline. The same expression the Morai had worn when Ian cast a lockdown spell on him.
Then his head slipped through my arms, and he dropped like a bowling ball straight toward a fast and messy demise.
I must have screamed. Rushing air snatched the sound away, and all I heard was a thin whistling above the Niagara Falls roar of the wind. For a minute I considered flapping my arms like Wile E. Coyote, but a regrettably strong awareness of the laws of gravity stopped me. I had to try something, though. Ian might survive the fall, but my human ass would be on the next slingshot to hell in about two minutes—maybe sooner, if the shock stopped my heart before the ground splattered my flesh.
Ian’s stiff form flipped wildly through the air, a good four feet from me and getting farther away. I had to reach him. Didn’t want to find out what happened when a basically immortal being got torn to bits and lived through it, assuming I somehow survived to witness it. I decided to try air swimming. Dog-paddling wouldn’t work, so I straightened my limbs as far as they’d go and headed in Ian’s direction with a series of awkward flaps and spirited grunts, like a constipated angel.
I’d never been in a hurricane before, but the air slapping my face felt like at least category 4. The blinding wind made it almost impossible to get my bearings. Just keeping my eyes open was a challenge. I knew the big light blur was the sky, and the big dark blur was the ground. And the fluttering thing just ahead of my outstretched arm had to be the corner of Ian’s coat. I executed a desperate, clumsy lunge and grabbed for him. My fingers closed around a fistful of hair.
That probably hurt like hell, but I figured he’d forgive me. Eventually.
I managed to drag him partway under me and wrapped both arms around his torso. Now all I had to do was stop us from hitting the ground. No problem. My frantic brain disgorged a handful of typically stupid ideas. I’d just turn those boulders rushing toward us into a giant trampoline, or transmute our flesh into feathers, or repeal the law of gravity. Maybe some passing astronaut would toss us a jet pack in the next five seconds or so.
Or maybe I should get serious and try to stop us from becoming hamburger.
I couldn’t fly, and I couldn’t release Ian from his frozen state. No time to consider who or what might’ve put him there. There was no handy lake or ocean to steer toward and hope for a soft landing that would only break every bone in our bodies. But I needed to survive—and the only thing in my favor was that djinn magic worked on the strength of need and the will of the user. No living being in that moment wanted to avoid hitting the ground more than me.
I closed my eyes, figuring I’d at least spare myself the anticipation and die fast if this didn’t work, and concentrated.
I need to slow down. I need to keep all of my limbs attached to my body. I need to not land on those rocks.
I need a miracle.
Familiar pain balled in the center of my chest and surged hot through my torso. I welcomed the feel of the magic, let it take the lead and hoped it did something useful. For an instant I thought the descent slowed—but then pain eclipsed my awareness of everything except my own screaming nerves.
It had never hurt this much before. I couldn’t even tell if I still had hold of Ian. Time suspended itself while the world vanished behind a solid wall of anguish. I stayed in tortured limbo for what seemed like both minutes and hours, and finally caught a single glimpse of fragmented green. My mind registered tree a split second after the image imprinted on my eyeballs.
My leg hit first, wrenched hard. The back of my head whacked something solid and produced definite nonmagical pain. I decided I’d failed, that the fluid trickling down my neck was my brains oozing from my shattered skull. My last thought before blackness took me was that Jazz would be pissed because I’d forgotten to put the laundry in the dryer before I died.
“… caught us a couple of ugly-ass birds.”
A round of disjointed laughter chased words that felt like spikes in my ears. I assumed I wasn’t dead, because even purgatory couldn’t hurt this much. Besides, I refused to believe demons talked like Boss Hogg from The Dukes of Hazzard.
“He dead?”
“Probably not this’n. See those tats on him? He’s pure blood.”
A cautious relief stole over me. They were talking about Ian, about the raised armband tattoos most of the djinn seemed to have. He’d lived too. But he was likely just as broken as I felt, and definitely unconscious, or he would’ve addressed these morons by now.
Still, the fact that they knew how to recognize and bring down a djinn suggested they weren’t as dumb as they sounded. Young, low-level Morai, I thought. And more than one of them in the same place was never good news.
“What about that one up there? Want me to roust him down?”
I stopped breathing. Their attention would be on me now, and I suspected playing dead was my best bet at the moment. I wasn’t in any shape to take on a djinn alone, much less two of them. I did have to wonder why he’d said up there, though. Where the hell was I?
“Leave him be.” A third voice issued the command, and my gut clenched. Since when did the Morai travel in packs? This one had to be the leader. The steel in his drawl had instantly silenced the other two. “If he ain’t dead, he’s close,” the leader continued. “And I want them both alive for a while.”
“Think they got to the cave before we did?”
“That’s what I aim to find out.”
Crud. They must’ve come here to fetch the djinn we’d just killed. What beautiful timing we had. Even if both of us were completely fresh and unhurt, it’d be almost impossible to destroy three Morai at once—and that was assuming they had their tethers on them. Since we were dead anyway, I decided to risk opening my eyes.
They didn’t notice. Probably because I’d landed in a tree, and the tops of their heads were ten feet below me.
Ian lay facedown on a flat slab of rock speckled with his blood. They’d stripped off his coat and tossed it at the base of my perch. The three of them stood around him and stared like they’d just brought down a gryphon. They were brown haired and muscled, sported deep sunburns, and wore similar clothing: nondescript T-shirts, well-worn jeans, and battered work boots. Slap cowboy hats on them and they could’ve stepped straight off some Texas dude ranch.
These assholes looked human. Had some of the Morai actually gotten smart and learned how to blend in?
One of them prodded Ian’s shoulder with a boot. The motion shook the other two loose from their trances. Another lit a cigarette, and the third wandered over to the tree and hefted Ian’s coat. “Hey, Lynus,” he said. “Mind if I keep his duster? He ain’t gonna need it.”
The shoulder prodder shrugged. “Suit yourself.” His gaze didn’t leave Ian.
“Better be careful, Davie,” the smoker said. “You don’t know where he’s been.”
The remark produced a burst of yuk-yuk laughter from Davie. He gave the coat a shake, grabbed an arm, and yanked his hand back. “Aw, shit. He done got blood all over it.”
Lynus looked up. “Then Val’s gonna want it. Leave it be.”
Davie dropped the coat and wiped his palm on his jeans. I closed my eyes and tried to silence my thudding heart, convinced they could hear it. Lynus’s simple, sharp command had told me enough to kindle real fear. I’d taken him for the leader, but they were working for someone else. Someone who’d want the blood of a djinn. Definitely not good.
“Kit. Help me flip the sumbitch. I want a look at his face.”
“Probably all smashed up now,” the smoker grumbled. But he pitched the cigarette and crouched next to Lynus, and together they heaved Ian into a boneless roll that flopped him faceup. His open eyes stared directly up at me without seeing. A fat gash across the bridge of his nose leaked crimson down his face, so he appeared to be crying blood. His chest
heaved once, then settled. He didn’t move again.
“I’ll be …” Lynus knelt and leaned over Ian. His breath left in a low whistle. “He’s Dehbei,” he said with something approaching awe.
“Damn. Ain’t they all dead?” Davie shuffled over, but stopped when Lynus shot a hand out palm first.
Lynus tilted his head up to flash a grin that held more ice than Alaska. “All but one,” he said. “We hit the jackpot, boys. This here’s the prince himself.” His gaze returned to Ian, and his voice dropped into a soft and lethal cadence. “Hey there … Gahiji-an.”
Shit. Whoever these guys were, they knew too much. The one they worked for, Val, had to be a Morai too. They had themselves a nice little nest. Usually they kept to themselves, so they wouldn’t have to share whatever power they managed to grab. Their clan wasn’t exactly close-knit—they hated each other almost as much as they hated the other clans, and humans. If the Morai were banding together, the whole world was in serious trouble.
Lynus got to his feet and squinted up at me. “So that must be the thief. Not sure if Val wants him or not. I’m gonna ring in real quick.” He pulled a cell phone from a back pocket and paced a few steps away to dial.
Now or never. If I could get near Ian, I might be able to get him moving again. He could amplify his power through direct contact with his descendants—namely, me. I held my breath, made a quick assessment of the biggest branches on the tree to use for bumpers, and rolled out.
My trip down was loud, fast, and punctuated with pain. I heard a few shouts from the thugs over cracking wood and the consuming agony of my right leg, which was almost certainly broken. One shoulder rammed the crotch of a thick branch near the bottom and flipped me wrong side up. I landed side first on solid rock, and something inside my rib cage snapped with an audible crack. My busted leg thumped to a rest on Ian’s splayed arm.
The instant we made contact, he glowed. Just like I’d planned. Kind of.
All three Morai stood transfixed as the bright Ian shape changed—his body lengthened and thickened, his legs and arms thinned, his chest barreled, and his head elongated and flattened. Within seconds an oversize wolf stood where Ian had lain. His muzzle wrinkled in a threatening snarl. Black lips parted to bare huge, curved ivory fangs. I damn near laughed, mostly from relief. My, what big teeth you have, Grandpa.
Lynus rammed the phone in his pocket, stepped back. I got a good look at his face—and my worry about facing three evil djinn became shock. His eyes were human. No slitted pupils, no oversize irises. Just regular brown eyes, full of fury. Now I was really confused.
And then Lynus vanished.
I gasped aloud and tried to right myself. He shouldn’t have been able to do that—unless he really was a djinn. Could they change their eyes if they wanted to? No time for that discussion with Ian now. He couldn’t answer me anyway. Wolves didn’t talk.
I managed to prop myself up against the tree. Davie and Kit had disappeared too. Terrific.
Undaunted by the lack of visual direction, Ian the wolf raised his head and sniffed the air. A low, constant growl issued from his throat. He tensed, drew back a bit, and lunged forward.
The sound of boots slapping rock rose just ahead, and a man-shaped ripple in the air moved to one side. Ian’s leap missed by scant inches. “Davie!” Lynus’s disembodied voice called. “Take the thief out.”
I clenched my jaw and tried to think invisible thoughts. Nothing happened. Whatever I’d done in the air had drained me. My hands skimmed the ground, searching for a loose rock or branch to defend myself with. But without the senses of a wolf, my chances of deflecting an unseen attack were approximately none.
My search yielded nothing. I would have panicked, but a murmur of djinn words informed me that a weapon wouldn’t have helped anyway—seconds before a flame curse hit me in the chest.
Ian whirled around at the sound of my scream. He bounded toward me, leapt past, and tackled a hunk of air that flickered into Davie. The fire in my flesh sizzled out and left me with only the throb of broken bones and massive bruising. I grabbed a low-hanging branch, hoisted myself up on my good leg, and pulled my short blade. Useless, but I felt better armed. Maybe I could carve a spear or something.
A horrible gurgling cry came from behind the tree. I swung around, suspecting the worst, and proved myself right. Ian had torn Davie’s throat out. Blood stained his muzzle and sprayed across his heaving chest. Davie’s open, glassy eyes—as human as Lynus’s—stared at the sky, his expression frozen in eternal terror. Deader than Al Capone.
But Davie had used magic. And there was no tether. How could he be dead?
“Jesus Christ. Jesus fucking Christ, Lynus, he killed Davie. Lynus! You hear me? He ripped his fucking throat out. Jesus Christ …”
Kit’s pitched babble came from somewhere to my right. A responding, inarticulate roar erupted behind me. I didn’t need a wolf’s senses to catch the grief in that cry, or the killing rage.
Ian shook his head. Droplets of blood flew from his snout in a fine mist. He bunched, turned, reached me in a single bound. He caught my shirt in his teeth and yanked hard.
My busted leg folded. I swore and stumbled, but Ian pushed under me and I landed draped over him like a hunted buck. He gave a rough bark, twisted, and snapped at me, missing my ass by half an inch.
Somehow, I understood what he wanted—but I sure as hell didn’t like it.
The struggle to mount him lasted only seconds, though it seemed much longer. I managed to swing a leg over. My ribs howled as I pressed my body flat along his back and buried my free hand in the thick fur of his shoulder. I kept the blade handy, instinctively guessing I’d need it.
Harsh breathing arose to my right. The first words of a spell I didn’t recognize slipped out between heaves. I listened hard, drew back, and threw the knife with all the strength I could muster.
The blade found its mark. A strangled yell interrupted Lynus mid-djinn. I couldn’t tell whether I’d stuck him or just clocked him with the handle, and I didn’t care. I thrust my fingers into Ian’s fur. Muscles bunched and rippled beneath me, and then we were bounding across boulders at bone-knocking speed while Lynus’s parting promise thundered through the crisp mountain air.
“Gahiji-an! I’ll take my brother’s blood from your worthless hide. You will die!”
Chapter 4
If my injuries didn’t kill me, Ian would.
Every leap threatened to spill me off, and every landing sent new waves of pain through my body. The ground below raced by in a steady blur. Ian seemed to pick the most awkward patches of terrain he could find—sharp crags with mere inches of purchase, patches of loose rock that shifted and skidded under his paws, ledges so narrow they wouldn’t hold a pencil. At one point he soared headlong across a five-foot gap, and I glanced down while we sailed over a yawning abyss that seemed to drop straight to Africa. After that, I kept my eyes closed.
I didn’t dare look behind us. The two remaining thugs probably couldn’t match Ian’s speed, but I didn’t want to find out I was wrong.
We finally reached the border of the thick forest I’d seen from the air. Ian raced into the fold without hesitation. His breathing came hard and fast under me, the human equivalent of an asthma attack. The third time he almost bashed into a tree, I decided we’d put enough distance between us and them—whether he liked it or not.
“Stop. We’re clear now.”
If he heard me, he showed no sign of slowing down.
“Damn it, Ian, stop! I can’t hold on anymore.”
A prolonged growl vibrated through him, but his ground-eating pace geared down to a jog, then a lope. Finally, he came to rest at the edge of a needle-strewn clearing and offered an impatient snort. I let go, thumped to the ground, and arched up with a yelp when my back collided with a softball-size rock concealed under the forest carpet. I spit out a curse and curled on my side, hoping nature didn’t have any more surprises for me. Why couldn’t any of the Morai hole up in a mall or
something?
“Are you injured?”
I flopped faceup and glared at Ian, who’d returned to his natural state of asshole. “Are you stupid?”
“Where?”
“Leg, ribs, head, back. Pick a body part. It’s probably broken.”
Ian frowned. He knelt next to me, one hand hovering over the base of my throat like a priest about to push a baptism candidate underwater. “I’ve not much power left, but I may be able to heal your leg. Then, at least, you can walk.”
“Terrific.” I really looked forward to dragging through miles of woods with shattered ribs and a lump on my head the size of a small city. I exhaled, closed my eyes, and waited. The sharpest pain dissipated from my leg, but a bone-deep ache remained.
Ian gasped. I glanced at him. His skin had gone a ghostly sweat-slicked gray, and his eyes fluttered back in his head. “I cannot continue,” he whispered. “My apologies, thief.”
“Hey, it’s okay. Think I can walk.” Concern and urgency kicked my adrenaline into overdrive. I pushed up on my elbows, and finally noticed that Ian’s neck and chest beneath the open vest he wore were splashed with blood. “What the hell happened? I thought transformation healed you.”
He wiped absently at the mess. “It is not mine.”
“Oh.” An image of dead, mutilated Davie seared my brain. With it came the certainty that we needed to move before his brothers tried to claim their revenge. I had to assume Kit was related. “Any idea who those guys are? Because they can’t be djinn,” I said as I hauled myself off the ground.
Ian didn’t answer for way too long. At last, he stood and stared back toward the edge of the woods. “Yes.”
I waited. No explanation arrived. “Care to share with me?”
“They are …” He looked at me with unease stamped on his features. “Descendants. Like you.”
“Excuse me?” The Morai had spent the last four hundred years hunting down and killing every last one of Ian’s descendants. I’d been informed that my son and I were the sole survivors. And all djinn were magically infertile in the human realm—except for Ian, who had a little help from his wife. “You’re telling me those bastards are related to you?”
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