by Gwynn White
I brushed away some of the dirt, and then licked my thumb and polished the area that might’ve once held a label.
Just as I glanced back up at Rafe and Fatima, about to say that it didn’t seem to be anything special at all, Azar left out of his hiding spot in the hallway yelling, “Do not touch that bottle.”
But it was too late. I was already pulling out the court as if compelled.
Fatima and Byron pulled weapons, both leaping in front of the children to protect them. At the same moment, Rafe began shouting, “It’s okay. He’s with us. He’s with us.”
Azar waved his arms wildly, still exhorting me not to touch the bottle. Coit stood at the mouth of the hall, knives drawn, watching everyone warily as he prepared to jump in wherever necessary to protect his crew.
And every last one of us froze in place when the sick, cold white smoke poured out of the bottle that I had uncorked, obscuring us from each other’s sight.
18
A whirlwind wound in my hair and the air twined around me like a lover’s arms. I spun around once, confused, disoriented. And then an enormous form stepped out of the whiteness, taking my arm in his.
“You summoned me?” The new arrival was easily seven feet tall and from where I stood he looked at least as wide. His hair was pitch-black, his eyes a startling blue. He wore a close trimmed goatee that framed his flashing white teeth when he spoke—teeth that shone bright against the pale, pale blue of his skin, the color of moonlight at dusk.
His accent sounded similar to Azar’s, but his words were more clipped and precise.
Once he was certain I was steady on my feet, he let go, as if touching me had pained him. He took a half step back and executed a short, smart bow. “What do you desire?”
I blinked at him then glanced at Coit, Rafe, and Azar. A whole raft of answers shot through my mind, and I almost tossed one off flippantly. But the serious, intense expression in his gaze stopped me.
“What do you have to offer?” I finally managed to stammer out.
“Do not wish anything from this one. He is evil,” Azar said.
Rafe raised his eyebrows. “When a fire demon says someone is evil, does that make him double evil?”
“Like, super extra double evil,” Coit agreed.
Great. Now those two had closed ranks against anyone else.
Bind them.
The words hissed through me, and still whatever it was that had drawn me to the bottle in the first place whispered madly in my year.
This one this one this one this one.
“Where did you come from?” I finally managed to ask.
Fatima and Byron held the children behind them against a wall and pointed weapons at the newcomer.
He is a magical creature,” Azar said. “One who purports to grant wishes, but will twist your desires in order to do something evil and cruel.”
“Oh my God! He’s a genie,” Rafe shouted.
The newcomer scowled impressively, crossed his arms, planted his feet, and thundered “I am Djinn.”
“Man, I used to want my very own genie in a bottle,” Coit said. “Especially after I watched reruns of that television show from the sixties. Did you have that in your world?”
“Djinni,” the blue man corrected.
“I Dream of Jeannie,” Rafe said, grinning and nodding his head up and down. “Whoa, she was hot.”
“Djinni,” the blue man repeated, more insistently.
“Everyone shut up,” I said. I held my hands to my temples. “You’re all giving me a screeching headache, and I don’t know what any of you are talking about.”
The djinni narrowed his eyes and tilted his head. “You truly don’t know what I’m offering?”
“I don’t. And I don’t care. We had a journey to complete and we had best be on our way.” I nodded politely and gestured my people to follow me.
“That’s it?” Coit said. “A genie in a bottle pops out and offers you your three wishes and all you’re going to do is say ‘thanks but I’ve got to move along now’?”
“Really, Larkin, this could be helpful to us,” Rafe said, turning serious as he stepped close and pitched his voice low. He tilted his head in toward mine and twined his fingers through mine. “On my world—and apparently Coit’s as well—we have stories about these genies. They can be tricky to deal with, but they really do have the power to offer wishes. You could get your brother back, or send Coit home, or put everything back like it was before your brother ever left.”
I inhaled deeply close my eyes. I, too, had heard of the djinn. And I knew Rafe was right.
I glanced down and realized that I still held the bottle in one hand. I glanced up at him, this creature who, according to legend, had come out of the bottle.
I haven’t seen him do it, not exactly. I’d seen the mist come out of the bottle and the man come out of the mist.
I wasn’t going to examine the connection any more closely than that.
“How long were you in here?”
The djinni shrugged. “Days. Years.” He glanced around at the destruction that surrounded him, the rubble that had drifted throughout the building where we stood. “Perhaps millennia, if the evidence in front of me is to be believed.”
Since warning me against the djinn, Azar had stood silent, his jaw clenched, the fire burning behind his eyes more hotly than usual.
“You are not in our world,” the fire-demon finally ground out.
The djinni frowned. “What world am I in?”
“Tehar,” I said.
“A Rift-world,” Azar added. “One of many.”
The djinni’s face paled to an even lighter blue, though I wouldn’t have believed it possible had I not seen it.
“And this Rift?” he asked. “Where does it lead?”
“As far as anyone knows, it leads… everywhere.” I turned one hand out and half shrugged. “Of all the Rift-travelers I’ve ever met, no two have ever been from exactly the same world.” I glanced at Coit and Rafe, remembering how crushed Coit had been by the realization that Rafe’s home world was not his own.
“And why do you travel together?” The djinni asked, eyeing us, and then examining the small group of children cowering at the back of the room.
I glanced at the children. “We’re not all together. Some of us are going to the Rift in hopes of making a trade, or going home, or finding someone else. Others are traveling away from the Rift.” I paused. “Do you have a preference? Would you like to find your way to another Rift? Or would you rather get as far away from the Rift as possible?”
The djinni blinked, as if the question of his own preferences had never occurred to him before.
With a practiced smile, he swept a bow in my direction. “My dear Lady of the Lamp, it is your decision. I am but a humble servant of the lamp, and look forward eagerly to learning your will.”
Something that sounded remarkably like a snort came from behind us. I darted a glance in Azar’s direction.
“Do not believe him. He is a trickster and a liar, like all his kind,” the fire demon said.
I glanced back at the djinni. “Is he right?” I asked. “Are you determined to trick us and lie to us?”
“I am.” The djinni crossed his arms in front of his chest and stood looking down his regal nose at me.
There’s no telling how long we might’ve continued standing that way had gunfire not erupted outside again.
Rafe cursed. “Everyone down.”
“Bring the children here,” I said gesturing Fatima and her charges toward one of the inner rooms.
Byron drew up to his full height and pointed at me. “We would be long gone if not for you. If these children die, it is your fault.”
Part of me wanted to argue—I wasn’t the one who had put them through the Rift. I haven’t abandoned them. I had done nothing to hurt any child in all my life.
But I understood his anger. Anything that caused them to pause on their way out of the city could kill these children.
I spooled a line of magic into my hand, pulled at it from deeper than I had before. When it finally gave with a slight jerk and rushed into my palm, I saw Rafe feel the tug deep inside. He blinked, then turned around to meet my eyes.
My theory was right.
I was sure of it.
But that wouldn’t help me either save Fatima’s children or deliver us to the Rift.
In all the chaos, the one figure that had not moved was the djinni.
“You come with me,” I said pointing at him with one hard jab of my finger. I let him down into the hallway where we had hidden earlier. Keeping an eye toward all the entrances, I watched, my power ready to let loose a bow against anyone who came at us.
“Tell me the limitations of the wishes you can grant.”
“There are no limitations.” The djinni raised one supercilious eyebrow.
“So you…” I shook my head. “No. Let me try this again my name is Larkin.”
The djinni swept a deep bow. “I am honored to learn my lady’s name.
I had never before heard anyone manage to be quite so deferential in word and yet the exact opposite in tone.
“I don’t care about you calling me ‘my lady’ or whatever.” I stumbled through my words, trying to find what I was wanting to say even as I attempted to craft sentences that would work with a . “What is your name?”
“I am Zehr.”
“Hi, Zehr. Nice to meet you. So… you’ve been trapped in a bottle?”
“I have.” He inclined his head.
“For how long you don’t know, correct?”
“Indeed.”
“And you are required to give anyone who finds you—anyone who sets you free—a wish?” I tried to dredge up what I could remember of childhood fairy tales. There wasn’t much there. In a world where the Rift throws out new dangers upon your shores every day, fairy tales seem less significant, and sometimes less magical, than simply hearing the latest news from the city.
“Three wishes, my—Larkin.”
Outside, the fighting was growing near. I was certain it had nothing to do with us, but if it found us, things would not go well for either the people I had grown to care for or the children we had met up with.
In the other room, I heard a child crying and Fatima desperately trying to hush it up.
All I could do was hope that none of those other kinds of monsters—the ones who hurt children—were outside involved in the fighting.
I paused, sitting up perfectly straight.
No.
Actually, that wasn’t all I could do.
“Tell me about these wishes. What are the parameters?”
The djinni shook his head. “Only your words. When we deal with magic,” he gestured at the ball of green fire I held in my hand, “we mold the world to our will. Your words become my will.”
Your words become my will.
I narrowed my gaze at him. That was important. All magic users knew that spells had to be crafted carefully, or they could go awry—wildly, spectacularly wrong.
“And I get three of these wishes?”
“Unless you can find some way to legitimately trick the magic into giving you more.” One corner of Zehr’s mouth tilted up in a smile. “But I warn you, no one has yet to play the system—not mine.”
“I don’t want more wishes. I simply want to keep the children safe.”
Something like doubt flickered through his eyes, but the djinni nodded. “Is that your wish? To keep the children safe?”
“Absolutely not.” I shook my head vehemently. “I was merely stating a potential desired outcome for my wish.” I knew precisely how a vague wish like that that could go wrong. The children could end up perfectly safe from outside harm—but locked away in a cavern deep underground where they would slowly starve to death. Or in some airless space where they would suffocate within minutes.
Not knowing if this djinni had a mischievous bent, I wanted to give him as little ammunition as possible.
The fighting sounded like it had moved into the hallways behind us—into the area we had used to get here from the city entrance.
There was no way the children would be getting out that way.
I considered my words for a long time before I finally spoke.
“Djinni,” I said—and then I reached out and placed my fingertips on his arm. “Zehr. Please. It is my wish that these children and their caretakers arrive safely and unharmed at their intended destination for this journey.” I ran the request over in my mind several times.
For the first time since I’d begun crafting the wish, I glanced at Rafe and Coit.
“Don’t look at me.” Coit held up his hands as if warding me off. “I’d wish for more wishes.”
“I haven’t been here long enough to learn much about magical language,” Rafe said. “Not more than I knew from fairy tales back home. It sounds…well, sound, to me.”
I turned to face the djinni. He was watching me with a slight twinkle in his eyes. I hoped that didn’t mean I had just done something really stupid.
“Is that your wish?” he asked.
I sent tendrils of my own magic questing out trying to trace any possible lines of a misspelling. But the Rift made tracing out futures an uncertain endeavor at best. In the end, I simply had to trust that my instinct to protect the children was the right one.
I nodded once, firmly. “That is my wish.”
The djinni half-closed his eyes, waved one hand lazily in a circle, and brought his hand out with a flourish.
All the children, Fatima, and Byron, disappeared in the blink of an eye.
“Holy shit.” Coit shook his head and stared around, turning around to look around him.
My stomach sank. For the djinni to have given in that easily, I must’ve missed something. There must have been something terrible he could have done to the children despite my careful wording.
Truth be told, I could think of several things myself, now that I was no longer under pressure.
“Where did you send them?” I asked Zehr.
He pursed his lips as he stared down at me. “First, tell me this: what benefit did you gain by using one of your wishes for the children?”
I blinked in confusion and shook my head. “None.”
“Absolutely no benefit to you whatsoever?”
“Well, I suppose I get the benefit of not being guilt-ridden over the deaths of half a dozen children on my watch. I suppose that counts for something.”
The djinni’s frown stayed in place, but he waved his hand in the air and snapped once. An image hovered in the air before us for just a moment: the children and adults piling into the boat we’d left down by the river, then pushing off the embankment and into the water.
Safe.
“Was that real?” Rafe asked, subdued.
“Absolutely,” the djinni replied—and although I wasn’t certain why, I believed him completely.
I nodded. “Thank you.” I turned to the others. “Ready?”
They both nodded.
“Good. Then let’s move.”
We all headed toward the exit that would lead us out and deeper into the heart of the city, toward the Temple and the Rift.
19
Why are you with us?”
I sat down next to Rafe after we’d made camp that evening in yet another abandoned building. “I mean, really? What are you going to the Rift for?”
He glanced over at the other men as they worked to set up a campfire. “I can’t go home.” He opened his hands as he looked down his body, gesturing to himself. “Not like this. As far as I know, there aren’t really any werewolves in London in my part of the Riftverse. If I go home, I’m a monster.”
“You’re a monster here,” I pointed out. “Where you are doesn’t change your nature.”
“No, but it can change how I perceive it.” Again, he glanced around our makeshift campsite. “Here, I have a purpose. It might not be much of one—but I’m a….” He paused. “I’m like a coyote
on the border back home—they’re the ones who help people get out of one country and into another one, help them try to find a better life. I’m like that. I get people to the Rift, I get them away from the Rift, I move them past guards and gangs, I take them where they want to go. Sometimes, I help them find what they want to be.”
“And is that enough?”
He shrugged. “I can’t go home. I will never see my family again, never spend time with my friends from before. Not while I’m like this. The very least I can find it in my heart to do is help other people get back to their homes, their families.”
I reached out and hooked my pinky with his.
“Whatever happens on our quest, if I survive, you’ll always have a place with me,” I said.
“I don’t know if I could stay away from you if I tried.” The words sounded harsher than his tone made them seem. He smiled gently as he gazed into my eyes. “For as long as the Rift is here, I will help people find it, help them escape it. But in between those times, it would be nice to have a home to come back to.”
I nodded. “Always.”
He leaned down and butterflied a gentle kiss across my lips.
That’s when I realized something about our small group.
We are all Rift-cursed.
There was something important in that awareness—something I needed to hold on to. But the voice of the Rift echoing underneath the night sounds of this destroyed city held its whisper against my skull, and I could not think beyond it.
Cursedcursedcursedcursed.
Even when I didn’t hear the words, I could hear the echoes of it hammering against my skull.
The closer we got to the Rift, the more the words writhed in my brain, like tiny parasites eating their way through from the inside out.
I pressed the heels of my hands to my forehead and moaned.
“Are you ill?” Azar asked, brushing his heated fingertips across my temples. I hadn’t seen him move toward me, and yet there he was, taking over smoothly as Rafe moved away from me to check on the rest of our camp.
Warmth from his hands soaked into my skin, calming the pounding in my head.
“That feels heavenly,” I whispered.
