“I spoke to a few people when I went out shopping earlier. I’m very good at coercion. It didn’t take much to find out where magic can be used here.”
Yet again, Jinx wondered what he was. She gazed surreptitiously up at his gorgeous, angular profile. Straight, gay, or in denial, this man was hot. She was certain he wasn’t human, but Lucian didn’t have the aroma of a Magical Being, either. He wouldn’t need her if he was. So, what else could he be?
They paused before a knockoff sunglasses stall. A woman stood behind the stall. A creeping sense of unease marched up Jinx’s spine. The smell of sweet magic hung in the air like a spider’s web. She stared at the woman, who was completely draped in an orange shroud. The strong waft of magic hailed from somewhere nearby. Jinx knew something was not quite right.
“Lucian,” she whispered. He silenced her with an abrupt squeeze of her hand.
All right then, she thought irritably and shrugged her hand away from him. He threw her a warning glance and stepped closer to the stall.
The woman raised a large and distinctly mannish hand.
“Halt, demon,” she said loudly and clearly. A shield of shimmering magic formed around her from her upraised hand.
Jinx spun around to face Lucian. Demon?
“What demon?” she squeaked. Lucian’s profile was hard and unmoving. He failed to respond to her question.
“I am not here to harm you,” Lucian said to the woman. The muscle in his neck strained with tension above the collar of his shirt.
“What do you want, demon?” the woman asked. She spoke sharply in a deep, accented voice.
“I need to use magic safely away from the magical ion-sensing devices littering this city,” Lucian said.
“You are not magical,” she replied. Her shimmering shield was still in place. “You are a demon.”
Jinx poked Lucian’s arm with a sharp finger. “Why does she keep saying that? You’re not a demon, are you?” A sickening twist grew in her belly. Was Lucian evil? He wasn’t a demon–he couldn’t be. She’d have felt it.
Lucian closed his eyes. His long, dark lashes rested on his cheeks for a moment as he apparently searched for an answer. “I’m sorry, Jinx,” he murmured softly. She could barely hear him over the cacophony of sound. He looked sad.
“You are?” She instinctively recoiled. “Oh my God.” She glanced down at her hand and wiped it on her trouser leg. Demons, particularly devilishly handsome ones, were bad news. If Lucian was a demon, she was in danger. Her strict, Maronite upbringing had taught her the dangers of consorting with demon-kind. Demons, no matter what flavor, fed off the human soul. Although Jinx was a genie, and part of her soul ensorcelled within her lamp, and she knew the risk his mere presence posed.
She felt Lucian awaiting her reaction.
“I’m demon spawn, technically,” he said, as much to Jinx as the woman in the shroud.
Jinx was speechless. Demon or demon spawn, it didn’t matter. How could she not have known? The Hellcats should have been the biggest hint. How had she been so blind?
“What powers do you have?” Jinx whispered.
Lucian didn’t respond, his gaze still locked on the shrouded woman.
The woman let her shield fall. “Demon spawn?”
“Yes,” Lucian said. His hand hung beside him, almost begging Jinx to take it. Instead, she clenched her fist and shoved it into her pocket, gratefully fondling the broken necklace there. She would not touch this man willingly–ever. She’d lost too much of herself as a genie; she couldn’t lose her entire soul as well.
Lucian tightened his jaw and stared at her. He gripped the edge of the stall instead and fingered the frayed cloth there.
“May I test your intention?” the shrouded woman asked, clearly noticing the sudden tension between them.
“Of course.” Lucian nodded and closed his eyes. He was docile and willingly allowed the woman to magically test him.
Jinx instinctively raised her hand to produce a shield of her own rainbow-hued smoke around Lucian. “Stop,” she said. Demon spawn or not, the urge to protect her master was strong.
Lucian opened his eyes and stared at her. “Why?” he demanded. “We need to use her safe facilities.” Anger warmed the edges of his words.
“You can’t just let some stranger test your intent,” Jinx retorted. “We can’t even see her face.”
Lucian stared at the woman in the shroud and back at Jinx. He hesitated.
“Djinn,” the woman said, pulling Jinx from her argument. “I will not harm him. I just need to test him.”
Jinx glared through the hazy rainbow of her swirling smoke. “I am not djinn. I am a genie. This is a curse. I wasn’t born this way.”
The woman’s voice sounded sly. “It does not matter.” She returned her attention to Lucian. “Demon spawn, order your djinn to drop her shield.”
“Don’t, Lucian. I don’t trust her,” Jinx implored.
For a brief moment, a look of desperation scurried over Lucian’s features. He was clearly torn. “I need to use magic safely, and we can’t do it in the open. This is our only hope.”
“No, I can find somewhere else. Let me try,” Jinx said. “This is not a good idea.”
Lucian ignored her. “Drop your shield, Jinx,” he said firmly. She could not disobey. At his words, her safe cocoon of smoke shimmered in the humid air and disappeared instantly. She wrung her hands together and fought off an angry growl. Her heartbeat boomed in her head.
Chapter Five
The shrouded woman paused and raised her large hand, ready to cast some kind of spell.
“Lucian,” Jinx whispered, but it was too late.
The woman’s shimmering, sweet magic surrounded Lucian and bathed him in the scent of cotton candy. He relaxed his head and let his hair fall over his face as he allowed her magic into his heart.
“You are under pledge?” the woman asked after a minute. Lucian opened his eyes.
Under pledge? Jinx wondered. Demon spawn with powers unknown–what more was Lucian hiding?
“Yes, but I will not harm you or yours. We need a safe and private place to perform some strong magic, and then we will go,” he said.
“I see that.” The woman pointed her hand toward Jinx. “She does not.”
“She’ll have to trust me,” Lucian replied and extended his hand.
Jinx looked at it and shook her head, plunging her hands deeper into her pockets. “I won’t trust a demon or its spawn. I’m sorry, Lucian,” she said softly.
Lucian hardened his gaze. “You don’t have a choice. I’m your master. You will do as I say.”
Jinx physically recoiled from the anger in his voice. “You cannot command me to trust you. No amount of magic can do that.”
“I can and do command you to take my hand,” he hissed. Jinx suddenly found her small, cold, and sweaty hand encapsulated by his big, warm one. Despite everything, her heart flipped.
Jinx tried to tug her hand away, but Lucian’s grip was tight, and his command forbade her.
“Don’t,” she said. “I’ve lost enough over the years. Are you going to take my soul as well?” she whispered, knowing she sounded miserable and terrified.
“I will not harm you.” Lucian’s tone was frosty in comparison to his warm hand. “I can promise you that.”
Jinx looked up into his eyes. They were shadowed by the blue canopy of the market place but were still intense. She believed him, God knew she shouldn’t, but she did.
“I’ll hold you to that,” she eventually muttered, tearing her gaze back to the shrouded woman.
“I’ll make sure you do,” he said. Jinx thought she heard amusement drowning somewhere in the depths of his tone.
“If you would come with me,” the woman interrupted any further banter. She gestu
red them to come behind her sunglasses stall.
“Wait,” Jinx mumbled and pulled Lucian back a step. “Something is still not right here.”
Lucian’s face was still. “What’s not right?” He slid his gaze to the tall, broad woman in the shroud. She gestured impatiently with her mannish hands for them to follow.
“I don’t know. She looks like a bloke in an orange sheet for one.” Jinx inhaled. The cloying sweetness of the shrouded woman’s magic clung to Lucian like wet silk. “Do you mind if I try something?”
He furrowed his brow, clearly uncertain of what Jinx was preparing to do. With a gentle touch, she ran her small hand over Lucian’s chest. She felt the shrouded woman’s magic lingering there, sweet and fluffy but deceptively malevolent. With a gentle whoosh of her rainbow-hued smoke, the other magic dissipated and left.
“That was a tracking charm,” she whispered, but Lucian was staring at the woman.
The shrouded figure halted.
“Why did you place a tracking charm on me?” Lucian’s voice was cold and resonated with power.
Everything went still. The bustle of the market was muted, as if the shrouded figure was holding them separate from everything; however, Jinx could not detect any magic.
“Ah, forgive me,” she said eventually. “Force of habit.”
“You make a habit of placing tracking charms on people who come to use your safe-room?” Lucian growled.
“Yes.” The large figure shrugged beneath the shroud. Jinx found the gesture unnerving.
“Why?”
“I have reasons of my own.” There was a smile in the woman’s voice.
“Lucian, this is not good.” Jinx turned and saw the entire market place was still. Every person underneath the blue canopy stared at them with deadened, dull eyes. Gone were the lively people and the faces that moments ago were so animated. Now, they were frozen and staring. The effect was creepy.
Lucian turned and stared. The vein in his neck bulged as he tensed his shoulders.
“What are you?” he asked softly, taking a step backward, his hand tight around Jinx’s. She bumped into his arm and suddenly, her nostrils were filled with his essence. Clean and soapy but somehow sharp. It distracted her. Lucian didn’t notice and took another step backward, tugging her as he did.
She tore herself from the dreamy deliciousness of his scent as a spike of alarm shot through her. The crowd around them closed in.
“Come downstairs,” the shrouded figure said. She gestured to a manhole that had materialized in a shimmer of magic near her feet. “It’s safer there. I will answer your question then.”
Lucian hesitated. “I don’t think it would be wise for us,” he said and turned to leave. His light brown eyes roved over the silent people crowding around them.
“If you wish to use magic with impunity in Kuala Lumpur, this is where you must go...and there is a price.” The shrouded figure gestured, again.
The crowd took another silent step forward, forming a human wall around them and the sunglasses stall.
“Call off your humans. This is unnecessary,” Lucian hissed, giving one man an experimental shove. As quick as lightening, the little man darted up his small, brown hand and caught Lucian’s wrist. Jinx heard his shocked intake of air. Lucian jerked his hand away, but the small man held it immobile with a tight, fierce grip.
“Release me,” he growled and tugged his arm.
“He will not,” the shrouded figure said. “You have come here seeking magic, and magic you shall find.”
“Oh, Christ.” The words slipped from Jinx’s mouth automatically. She tried to take a step back, but Lucian’s hand was tight on her own.
“Don’t,” he hissed.
“Don’t you want me to get us out of here?” she gulped as the dead-eyed crowd stepped closer.
“No,” he said and wrenched his captured arm, again. The ordinary man didn’t budge.
“Why not? This is bad, Lucian, can’t you feel it?” She looked up at his hard, irritated expression.
He chewed his lip. “This is the only place we can try–”
“Try what?” Jinx snapped. “I could take us to the Free Zone. I can do whatever you want there. It just isn’t safe here.”
“No, no we can’t go there. I didn’t realize it before, but because Kuala Lumpur has so many magical ion-sensing devices around, this is the safest place from the Mafia, not the Free Zone. If we go to the Free Zone, the Mafia will not only find me but be free to use magic to catch me. I have to remove the pledge before we can go there.”
Jinx halted and looked up at him. “Hmph, now you tell me.” Then, she absorbed what he just said. “You want me to remove your pledge? That’s your next wish?”
“Are you coming?” the shrouded figure asked. Impatience warmed her strange voice.
“Yes,” Lucian agreed. The small man instantly released his wrist.
“Oh no, Lucian,” Jinx groaned. “This is such a bad idea.”
“I’m demon spawn. What can they do to me that hasn’t already been done?” he said wryly.
Jinx absorbed his words for a moment. “It’s not you I’m worried about,” she retorted as he tugged her through the gap between the sunglasses stall and its neighbor.
Lucian raised a brow as a smile tugged at his lips. “That’s not true,” he said, looking down at her.
“You wish,” Jinx muttered. She was now staring so hard at the manhole and the dark maw yawning before them that she barely heard his next words.
“Maybe I will,” he said softly.
Oh. She felt bewildered, but before she could make further comment, the shrouded figure spoke.
“Enough talk.” The smell of her cotton-candy magic became strong once again. “As I say, there is a price to use magic in this place.”
“You’re forcing us to go down there, and you want me to pay before we’ve even done anything?” Lucian asked archly.
The shrouded figure inclined her head wordlessly.
“Haven’t you ever heard the phrase ‘don’t pay the ferry man ‘till he’s got you to the other side’?” Jinx asked.
“No,” she replied, clearly disinterested. “Payment now, before entry.”
Jinx and Lucian shook their heads simultaneously.
“You’re going to trap us down there,” Jinx retorted.
“Trap you?” The woman laughed. The cloth over her face fluttered with her breath. “Djinn and a demon spawn? I think not.”
“I told you I am not djinn,” Jinx snapped. “Can’t you smell the difference?”
Djinn were a race of magical beings often confused with the genies. A genie was a cursed magician, but djinn were born djinn. Djinn were frequently blamed for human misfortune, then captured and placed in lamps and bottles as punishment. Though the genie curse was derived from this practice, djinn and the genie were very different. The magic of the djinn was scentless, which was why they were often blamed for interfering in human affairs; few could smell their magic. One of the side effects of the genie curse was smoky magic—an exotic aroma that once known could never be forgotten.
The shrouded woman considered Jinx’s words for a long moment.
“What is your price?” Lucian’s tone was getting colder. He curled his lip as if the words tasted bad.
There was another sinister silence before the woman spoke.
“I want your word you will give me the genie when you have received all your wishes.”
Jinx heard her own sharp inhalation of breath roar like a vacuum in her head before her stomach launched into her throat and threatened to choke her. She forgot the commodity she was, and for a moment, she almost forgot it all.
This is what being around demon spawn does, she thought. The gorgeous smell that he wears like a cloak must be his e
vil pheromone. She stared up at him, waiting for his angry rebuttal. Surely, the man who commanded her to hold his hand, who bought her clothes and curry puffs, wouldn’t just hand her over to a faceless, magical being in an orange shroud?
She was mistaken.
“Yes,” he said, gazing steadily down the manhole.
With that one word, Jinx thought she’d crumble. Of course she was expendable. How dare she think otherwise? Once she gave him the three wishes, she would be of no further use to him, and he’d soon forget her. There was no point in pretending otherwise. Lucian wasn’t the kind of man to pretend or play games, anyway.
Her heart wanted to break.
“Shall we shake on it?” the shrouded woman asked.
“Of course,” Lucian agreed and pulled his hand free from Jinx.
Jinx looked away. She didn’t want to see them shake on it. There was nothing she could say to change it, nothing she could do at all. She was a slave and always would be.
She steeled her spine and plastered what she hoped was a blank face over her expression. Lucian was gesturing for her to follow him down the manhole. Determined not to let him to know the extent of her hurt, Jinx hazarded a wary glance at her clothes.
“We’re going to into the sewers dressed like this?” she asked, shaking her head. Jinx then uttered a spell, and in a small explosion of rainbow-hued smoke, she suddenly enveloped herself in a white paper coverall.
“Do you want one?” she asked Lucian, who suddenly looked a little angry.
“No, and in future, do not use magic outside.”
“She did.” Jinx gestured to the woman.
“She is not my genie.” Lucian’s voice was tight. “She can do whatever she wants.”
“I’ll be hers soon enough,” Jinx bit back.
Lucian tightened his lips. “Come on. Let’s get this wish over with.”
* * * *
As it turned out, the coveralls were unnecessary. The manhole was spotlessly clean, and the gaping, dark hole it appeared to be was merely an artfully created guise. It was actually a marble-clad stairwell leading into an immaculate, subterranean room.
Magical Redemption Page 6
