Will Power: A Djinn Short

by Laura Catherine

  Three figures emerged from the darkness, their faces cast in harsh shadows from the car’s lights. They had wolfish grins and red eyes.

  “Blooders.” I kicked my door open. The night was chilly; autumn was here to stay, pine needles littering the road.

  There were two male Blooders and a female. The girl was lanky with curly, black hair and long nails. One Blooder stood near her, licking his lips like a hunter stalking prey. The third was shorter, with black hair blowing in his eyes. He seemed more composed than the other two.

  “What are three Djinn doing out here all alone?” the composed Blooder said. “Don’t you know it’s not safe? There are monsters in the woods.”

  The other two Blooders cackled. They seemed so unhinged, blood crazed.

  Pyke and Mia joined me on the road. The female Blooder stiffened and sniffed the air. It was Mia’s bleeding lip.

  The Blooder shuddered and clenched her fists into claws. “Aww, she smells so good. I want to rip her throat out.”

  I stepped in front of Mia. “Just try it.”

  “How noble,” the composed Blooder said, red eyes blazing. “You really should have known better than to leave your little sanctuary, but then is anywhere really safe anymore? Why are you outside of the compound? Hmm, where are you going?”

  “That’s none of your business,” Pyke barked.

  The female Blooder paced back and forth until the male Blooder grabbed her arm.

  “Calm down, Jeannie,” he warned.

  She snatched her arm back. “I’m plenty calm, Harry.” Jeannie looked to the composed Blooder with pleading eyes. “Can we eat them now, Alec? Can we?”

  Alec raised a finger. “In a moment. Let’s not rush this. I want to know where they’re going.”

  “But the Guardjinn could be on their way,” Harry said.

  “We are Guardjinn,” I said and what little colour Harry had in his face flooded away.

  “Alec?”

  Alec shot Harry a warning. “Relax, Harry. Guardjinn, Djinn … it doesn’t matter. Food is food.”

  “What are they doing so close to the compound?” Pyke whispered.

  “They look desperate,” Mia said. “They’re probably alone and starved of blood.”

  “We can take them.” Pyke’s hands frosted.

  “We do it quick and as a team,” I said.

  Alec pulled a vial from his pocket, barely bigger than his thumb and filled with red liquid. “Bottoms up,” he said and tipped the contents down his throat.

  “Now!” I shouted and lunged at Alec.

  Harry and Jeannie drank their own vials as Mia and Pyke engaged. I tackled Alec, knocking him to the ground. He kicked his legs and flipped me over.

  He rolled onto his front in a crouched position. “I wonder what new ability I’m going to get today.” He tensed, muscles bulging as sharp thorn-like spikes grew from his skin, like he was a porcupine.

  “Sorry, all I’m offering is swift death.”

  I lunged at Alec again but he darted out of the way, scraping his thorny arm against my side. The blow didn’t hurt; it didn’t even leave much of a mark. My skin was covered in little paper cuts.

  Alec’s smile fell. “Well, well. I wasn’t expecting that. Your ability will make a fine addition to the collection.”

  To my left, Pyke and Mia were locked in battle against Harry and Jeannie, who were using some kind of earth ability. Harry was throwing rocks at Pyke, who returned the attack with icicle punches.

  Mia was screeching at Jeannie, who was forced to cover her ears and drop to the ground. Blood dripped through Jeannie’s fingers until she stopped moving all together.

  “Jeannie!” Harry crushed his hands into the road causing a ripple effect that knocked everyone over. Harry clutched Jeannie in his arms and brushed the hair from her face.

  A blow hit me in the chin, knocking my head backward. More paper cuts slashed my cheek. I caught Alec’s fist before the next punch. The thorns dug into my skin, though I felt nothing more than slight pressure.

  I elbowed Alec in the jaw, shattering some of his spiked armour. A jab to his side and an uppercut to the face, and then Alec lay on the road broken.

  Pyke sent a barrage of ice arrows at Harry, tearing him into a bloody mess. His body fell beside Jeannie’s.

  Alec watched them die and didn’t seem all too upset about losing his friends. Did Blooders even have friends? Families? Was there any of their humanity left, or was all they cared about their next meal?

  “I underestimated you,” Alec said. “It won’t happen again.”

  Another vial of blood down his throat and Alec disappeared like a mirage in the desert.

  Pyke jogged up behind me. “Where’d he go?”

  “Invisibility,” I replied. “There’s no way we’ll find him in the woods at night.”

  I clenched my fists. I should have stopped him, killed him when I’d had the chance. Mia and Pyke had taken care of their Blooders with little problem, but Alec was different. The other Blooders were desperate; Alec was calculating. He thought about his moves, his words.

  “We should still search the woods,” Mia said, the blue fading from her skin as her ability cooled down.

  “No,” I replied. As much as I wanted to kill that Blooder and any Blooder that threatened the safety of the compound, I couldn’t.

  “Killing him isn’t our job right now. If he comes near the compound again the Guardjinn on duty will take care of him. Our mission is to find the Greenwood girl.”

  Chapter Six

  It took a few days of driving to get to the last-known location of Kyra and Malcolm. The intelligence we had was a few months old, and the Guardjinn had only thought he’d seen Malcolm. There was no sighting of Kyra.

  We had been driving non-stop since leaving the compound, taking turns at the wheel and sleeping. Food was whatever we picked up at gas stations—mostly packets of chips, when Mia shopped.

  I had never spent so much time with my friends before. Sure, we trained together daily and went for runs in the park, but then we would part ways and I’d have alone time.

  I liked my alone time. Things were getting a little too close for comfort lately.

  “Pyke stop looking at yourself in the mirror and focus on driving,” Mia said from the backseat.

  I had been staring out the window and turned to see Pyke giving himself eyes in the rear-view mirror.

  “I’m multitasking,” he said. “Relax. At least I know how to drive.”

  Mia kicked the back of his seat.

  Pyke had a point. Mia had done the least amount of driving on the trip because she wasn’t very good. The first time we’d let her take the wheel she’d floored it so hard that we’d skidded toward the gas pump. If Pyke hadn’t grabbed the wheel and steered us away, we’d be dead.

  “My driving is fine,” Mia replied. “I make one mistake and suddenly I’m dangerous.”

  “You were always dangerous,” I said, and Pyke laughed.

  As much as we were getting on each other’s nerves it was great to be on the road with my best friends.

  “Take the next exit,” I said to Pyke. “The town is coming up.”

  “Finally.” Mia slumped back in her seat.

  ***

  Pyke pulled up outside the high school, a modern building, mostly steel and glass. It was the end of the day and students filled the car park.

  “This is where the Blooder was last spotted,” I said, going through the files.

  “That sighting was months ago. They won’t still be here,” Mia said, glancing out the window.

  “No. The report says they vanished after the sighting.”

  “If they saw him at all,” Pyke said. He leaned his arms and chin on the steering.

  “You think they were wrong?” Mia asked.

  “Or lying,” Pyke said. “Maybe they couldn’t find them but didn’t want to go back to Ivan empty handed. I’ve met the guy. He doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who handles no results well
.”

  “In any case,” I said, bringing us back on topic, “we need to check this out. If he was spotted at the school then Kyra must have been going there. We’ll talk to some of the students and see if they know anything. Remember, they use fake names.”

  “Yeah, that’ll make it easy,” Pyke said. “Excuse me have you seen a girl called Kyra, but she won’t have been called Kyra and I’m not entirely sure what she looks like because I only have a picture of her from when she was a kid.”

  Mia rolled her eyes and exited the car. I followed. Pyke had been acting this way for the last few days. Mia and I were trying to be sensitive because we knew it had to do with Malcolm. We weren’t tracking him as fast as Pyke would have liked and he was getting frustrated and annoying us.

  “Kyra’s seventeen so talk to people from her year level,” I said to Mia.

  She nodded and disappeared into a crowd of students. I scanned the yard for kids that looked as if they were in their final year at school.

  They were all wearing uniforms with blazers that made it hard to distinguish between them. I suppose that was the point.

  “Umm … excuse me.”

  A short girl with curly blonde hair stood behind me. Her hands were behind her back and she was bouncing on the balls of her feet. She smiled at me, blushing.

  “Hello,” I said.

  “Umm … hi,” she said. “I haven’t seen you around before.”

  “Just passing through,” I replied. “I’m Will.”

  “Tam.” She shook my hand.

  “Can I help you with something?” I asked.

  “Oh no, nothing,” Tam replied.

  “Then why did you come over to me?” I asked.

  Tam blushed and ran her fingers through her hair rhythmically. “Oh, right. I guess I just was wondering why you were hanging out in front of the school?”

  “I’m actually looking for someone.”

  “Your girlfriend?” she asked.

  “No. I don’t have a girlfriend,” I replied, and Tam’s face lit up.

  “Who are you looking for? Maybe I can help. I know pretty much everyone.”

  “A girl. She’s seventeen, dark brown hair, golden eyes …”

  “Oh, you mean, Stella. She was in my class a few months ago and lived just down that road over there in the house with the funny green roof, but I’m afraid she and her dad left a while back.”

  “Do you know where they went?” I asked.

  Tam bit her lip. She knew something, but I must have been setting off a lot of warning bells for her—a stranger asking about a girl …

  “Why are you looking for her?” Tam asked.

  “She’s my cousin,” I replied. “I thought I’d visit her. I’m on a road trip with some friends and I just had to say hello.”

  “Oh, cool. You’re so lucky to have that much freedom. My dad would never let me do that. Well … yeah, like I said they left a few months back. Didn’t they tell you?”

  “I’ve been out of signal range for a long while. So do you know where they went?”

  Tam twirled her hair around her finger and shuffled closer to me. “I did overhear Stella on the phone the day she left. She was talking to her dad. She said something about heading south.”

  “South where?”

  “She didn’t say. A few minutes later her dad picked her up in their old blue Ute and I never saw her again.”

  “Thanks, Tam. You’ve been a great help,” I said.

  Tam shifted on the spot and touched my arm. I couldn’t feel it; she was doing it so lightly.

  “Are you planning on sticking around for a while?” she asked.

  “Will,” Mia called.

  She had a look of disdain as she approached Tam and I.

  “Hey,” I said. “Mia this is Tam. Tam, this is my friend Mia.”

  “The one you’re road-tripping with?” Tam asked, glaring at Mia.

  “Will, we should be going, don’t you think?” Mia said. “We have stuff we need to be doing.”

  Tam grabbed hold of my arm. “You don’t have to go, do you?”

  I smiled at her. “Sorry, but thanks for your help.”

  Mia practically dragged me to the car. “What the hell was that?” she said once we were inside.

  “What?”

  “We’re supposed to be looking for Kyra.”

  “I was.”

  “Really? Because it looked like you were flirting with that girl.”

  “Maybe he was multitasking,” Pyke suggested, and gave me a thumbs up.

  “I wasn’t flirting with Tam,” I said.

  “Oh, Tam, is it? Well she was definitely flirting with you. Twirling her hair and touching your arm …”

  “Well there you go. Will wouldn’t have noticed that,” Pyke said. “He can’t feel it.”

  Mia growled. “We didn’t find out anything.”

  “Well I did. I know where they lived and have a lead on where they were going.”

  Chapter Seven

  We found the old house where Malcolm and Kyra were living, a block away from the school. It was easy to spot—the only house with a green roof.

  It was late and everyone was safe in his and her own home. Street-lamps spotlighted the road, and a cool chill carried on the breeze.

  Mia and Pyke stood beside me in the house’s backyard, hidden in the shadow of a leafless tree.

  “Remind me why we’re doing this again?” Pyke asked, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his leather jacket.

  “We have to make sure there are no clues here,” I said. “The rest of our lead isn’t much to go on. We can’t just keep heading south and hope we come across them.”

  Pyke grumbled, pulling his chin closer to his chest. Mia was wearing a jumper under her jacket. It must have been pretty cold. My breath puffed out in little clouds.

  Mia had made me wear a jacket despite my objections. Whatever anger she’d had earlier had simmered. I was glad to have her focused again.

  We moved up close to the house and I elbowed one of the small square windows in the back door.

  A clatter of glass hit the inside floor and we paused to make sure no one had heard. Pyke reached in and unlocked the snip on the door.

  We stepped inside, closing the door behind us. The kitchen was classic—black and white tiles with stainless steel counters.

  “Mia, check the basement,” I said. “Pyke, you have this floor and I’ll go upstairs. We search for fifteen minutes, then we are out of here.”

  They nodded and we split up. I made my way through the kitchen to the lounge. A small wooden staircase twisted up to the second level. I stepped lightly, but this house was new and nothing creaked yet.

  The second floor spilled out into a lookout over the lounge area. I could hear Pyke slamming cupboards in the kitchen.

  Only two doors to choose from … I opened the closest. It was the master bedroom with adjoining bathroom. The room was bare, like everything else in the house. I sniffed the air for any kind of scent that might still be lingering, but was only hit with an overpowering smell of cleaning products.

  I covered my nose and sneezed as chemicals burned my nostrils. I went over the bathroom, but it was even cleaner as if someone had dumped an entire bottle of cleaning agent on the floor and left it to soak.

  The other bedroom was smaller with no bathroom, just a built-in cupboard. The room was a simple square shape with a single window overlooking the street. This would have been her room.

  I glanced out the window and spotted a light shining from across the road in the neighbouring house. The purple curtains were drawn back, the walls covered with posters of topless boys with styled hair and cheesy poses. Sitting on the double bed was Tam.

  She wore purple pyjama pants and a singlet top. Her laptop was perched on her knee as she typed and giggled. She must have been talking to someone.

  I watched her and thought about earlier today. According to Mia and Pyke, Tam had been flirting with me, and I suppose the
y were right. I’d seen Pyke flirt with plenty of girls back at the compound. He’d move in close and run his fingers up and down their arms, which made them blush.

  Pyke got a lot of action. Mia said it was because he was a broken soul and girls like to think they could fix him. Don’t know why they’d waste their time.

  Was that why Mia liked me? Was I a broken soul because my father had left me and I couldn’t feel anything? Did she want to fix me? No girl could fix that.

  I knew what attraction looked like. I’d seen almost everyone around me attracted to someone at least once. But I’d never experienced it.

  Did it really matter, though?

  I was Guardjinn. Protecting and serving came above all else. Being attracted to someone wasn’t going to make me better at my job; it was a distraction. I knew from experience that relationships didn’t last and only led to heartbreak. Why would I want that?

  I had hardly ever felt the sensation of touch. I had my own way and it worked just fine.

  I turned from the window and stared at the empty room. I took another deep breath and chemicals stung my nose again, but there was something else too. The chemicals were bitter, but there was also the slightest hint of sweet.

  I pulled off my jacket and tee, undid my pants and shifted into dog form. It was easier to sort the different smells out this way.

  I sniffed the floor sifting through each scent. Carpet cleaner, dust, soap, coffee …

  Cinnamon and apples.

  I raised my head. It was coming from the cupboard. I shifted back and opened the doors. Empty except for a set of built-in drawers. I yanked each drawer open, but there was nothing aside from a fine layer of dust. I slammed the last draw back in place.

  Where is that smell? I sniffed. It was in here, somewhere.

  I ripped out the drawers, tossing them to the floor and letting them crack and splinter against the wall. I pull on the drawer frame, but it was bolted to the floor.

  “Will?” Mia entered the room with Pyke behind her.

  I ignored them and focused on my mission. I might not be able to feel anything when a girl touched me, but I could track down and save one from a vicious monster.