“Perhaps there’s no one up here,” Iole said softly, looking at a wall hanging, stunning even in the dim light. Inadvertently, she bumped into Douban standing at the entrance to a sleeping chamber.
“No,” he said, staring into the room. “We are in the right place.”
Iole followed his gaze. In the middle of the room, a woman—or a man, Iole couldn’t tell—was sitting, or standing, perfectly still. The bottom half of the person was bloated to at least five times normal size and had been covered in various places with pieces of clothing and fabric. But the skin was dark, almost purplish. The upper half, by contrast, was shrunken and distorted so that the head and neck were almost of the same shape and thickness and curved slightly to one side. The skin went from purple at the torso to yellow as it covered the neck and face. In fact, only the tufts of black hair at the back gave any indication of where a face might be. In Iole’s mind, there was absolutely no question.
“She’s a fig.”
“Yes,” said Douban, the large sapphire fruit already in his hand. As they approached the person, two eyelids flew open, causing Iole to put a hand over her heart. The person gave a tiny squeal in what was, unmistakably, a woman’s voice.
“Do not be alarmed,” Douban said, his voice supremely calm and even. The woman looked at Douban, and Iole saw the lines of fear around her eyes relax. Even Iole was settled at the sound of the young man’s words, thinking to herself what a wonderful manner this physician had.
“We are here to help you,” he said, placing his hand where the woman’s shoulder should have been, but feeling only hard yellowed skin. “Please, be so kind as to eat this.”
Without a word and completely trusting a man she didn’t know, the woman took a bite of the blackish purple fruit, even though only moments before, she’d seen the hard stone change into a pulpy fig.
At once, her bloated legs and feet began to shrink and lighten to a normal color. Her head was redefined from her neck and the skin on her upper half lost all its yellowness. Her hair grew long and full and her beautiful face came fully into view. It was more than beautiful, Iole noticed. This woman, who used to be a fig, was almost as beautiful as Aphrodite.
“We are fully aware of the situation,” Iole said, watching Douban’s eyes go wide. “We are trying to help the rest of your brothers and sisters.”
“We know about Giondar and his vengeance on your family,” said Douban, his voice taking on an altogether different tone. “What we do not know is your name.”
Out of the blue, Iole felt something utterly beyond her comprehension. Douban was being more than nice to this lovely young woman; he was flirting with her. Death and destruction all around them, Pandy downstairs quite possibly getting killed, and this youth—who had all but driven Iole from the desert sand dunes not two nights before—was now flirting with some girl he’d just saved from slow death as a fruit. Without warning, Iole became furious, protective, and exceedingly territorial on behalf of her best friend.
“We can obtain that information later.”
“I am called ‘Fair Persian,’ ” said the young woman, now rising from a chair that had been hidden by her previous form.
“Delightful,” said Iole. “Charming in oh-so-many ways. All right, Fair, are there any—”
“Fair Persian,” said the woman in a tinkly voice. “It is all one name. Apparently, my appearance has elicited this response from many a young man who has—”
“Yes, I am enthralled, mesmerized, and cannot wait to hear the end of your story,” said Iole, turning and practically shoving Douban from the room. “But we must attend to the rest of your family. If you have other things to do, like finding some decent clothing, we certainly understand. Don’t let us detain you.”
“Fair Persian,” said Douban, “can you help us to find … I believe there are two unaccounted for—a brother and a sister.”
“I did hear a commotion several weeks ago from a chamber down the corridor,” Fair Persian said as she flew past Iole toward the entryway. “Let us go and see.”
“Oh, by all means,” Iole mocked to herself through clenched teeth as she raced after Douban who was racing after Fair Persian. “Let us go and seeeeeeee.…”
“That’s my choice?” Pandy mumbled, even as she felt the tiniest bit of air inflating her lungs. “I get to choose how I wish to die?”
“It may be as painless as you’d like,” Giondar said, casually flinging Homer, who’d begun to circle around behind the genie, out into the garden. “But choose!”
“Then I choose to die many years from now on my own sleeping cot!” Pandy huffed, watching Homer get to his feet.
“You insist on being clever?” said Giondar, clenching his hands again. “How clever will you be when I dismember you slowly, roasting each limb over hot coals as you watch?”
Suddenly Pandy saw a glint of morning sunlight bouncing off something on Homer as he crept back into the large salon.
The lamp.
Without warning, and utterly surprising in the midst of her current situation, Pandy involuntarily tried to imagine the enormous genie squeezed into that tight little space.
And then it hit her.
“Very well,” she wheezed as his thumb pressed again into her shoulder. “I’ll tell you how I wish to die. But first …”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Rage
Hurrying down the corridor on the second floor, Iole stopped at a blown-out opening in the wall that looked straight down into the salon precisely at the moment when Homer had been tossed into the garden. She saw Pandy held fast in Giondar’s grasp. She was about to scream when she felt Douban’s hand on her arm, pulling her away.
“Pandy!” she mouthed furiously to him.
Douban watched the scene below, a look of despair on his face.
“She’s trusted us,” he said finally, turning to Iole. “We must have faith!”
“Gods,” Iole thought, following him into a chamber at the end of the house. “He’s starting to sound like me! Either that or he just doesn’t care about Pandy anymore.”
She was about to spit her thoughts out to Douban when she stopped cold, speechless once again. Fair Persian was talking softly to a young man cruelly chained to a wall, large black spots covering his thin body. She was wiping his brow and cradling his head, telling him that Douban and Iole were going to help him. Gently Iole approached the youth, trying to keep silent so as not to betray her growing revulsion.
The black spots were actually indentations. Something or someone had been scooping out his flesh little by little and black was the color of the congealing wounds. Some were fresher than others and, as they watched, a small chunk of flesh flew out of the boy’s upper arm and a small pool of blood began to form. With a cry, the boy almost passed out.
“Hurry!” urged Fair Persian.
“Which is it?” Douban asked Iole.
“Quiet!” she said, then dropped her voice. “Let’s solve it logically. I have one pear and a peach.”
“I have an apple, another fig, and a pear,” Douban replied.
“It’s not the fig. And I think Alcie was right about the pear being for—for whoever’s downstairs. That leaves the apple and the peach.”
“Please, try both!” pleaded Fair Persian.
“We can’t,” Iole said as if she were talking to somebody who really should have been more informed. “We only have one of each here, and if we use the wrong one, it would be disastrous.”
“What does he resemble?” Douban asked.
“Nothing that we have,” Iole replied. “So that line of thinking is out. But what is being done to him? Why is his flesh being taken? He’s being pocked, cratered, indented, excavated, dimpled, dented, scooped, dug into …”
“Pitted,” Douban offered.
“Stop!” Iole commanded. “That’s it!”
“What?” said Fair Persian.
Ignoring her, Iole rummaged for the opal peach.
“What do you do to a
peach when you eat it?” she asked Douban.
“You remove the pit. You pit it.”
Gingerly Iole moved toward the young man, feeling the cold hardness of the opal melt away.
“Kerim,” said Fair Persian. “Kerim, you must eat this.”
But Kerim was in such pain he could barely lift his head.
“Help him, Douban,” Iole said.
Slowly and gently, Douban lifted the young man’s head and opened his mouth. Iole broke off a small piece of the beautiful, ripe fruit and placed it delicately on his tongue. Kerim’s head lolled forward again and the bit of peach dropped out of his mouth. Hitting the floor, it crystallized into a small opal and rolled into a corner. Iole broke off another bit of peach and again placed it in Kerim’s mouth. This time Kerim managed to swallow it without chewing and the transformation, as every time before, was instantaneous. Kerim opened his eyes, his face a mask of increasing relief. Every indentation in his flesh began to fill in, the hard, congealed blood dropping to the floor like dark leaves. However, he was still chained to the wall and there was no lock or key to be seen. Then Iole noticed that the manacles weren’t as tight as they could have been and if Kerim could just …
“Oil,” Iole said. “I need oil.”
Fair Persian fetched a small lamp from a nearby table.
“Pour it on his wrists,” Iole said, stepping up to the weakened youth. “I’ll wager you haven’t eaten in weeks. There’s space for you to wiggle out. Think you can do it?”
Kerim smiled at her.
“My family used to tease me because I was rather … thick,” he said, working his slick wrists and hands through the manacles until at last he was free. “Not anymore.”
“I should think not,” answered Fair Persian. “Come, we must find Zinebi.”
It was at that moment they all heard the words “Watch. Then prepare to die!” followed by Giondar’s malevolent laugh, rising up from the lower floor and reverberating through the house. Iole’s blood ran cold. Without another word, she made a run for the staircase.
Giondar relaxed his grip.
“But first?” Giondar asked.
Pandy’s thoughts were going so fast she was surprised her brain wasn’t leaking out of her ears. She had one idea. Only one, but if it worked … Giondar was a little slow, but he wasn’t stupid. If it didn’t work, if he caught on and saw what she was trying to do, then he would kill everyone in the house on the spot, she was sure of it. What would her father do in the same situation? (Well, he would never be in the same situation, duh! Because he wasn’t dumb enough to take a box of evil to school like she did!) But if he was, he would act swiftly and decisively, even if he was uncertain of the outcome. Simply by having the right attitude, he would make everyone around him think he knew exactly what he was doing. What did he used to say to her when she was much smaller? Something about … failing. Then Pandy remembered:
“If you’re gonna fail, honey, and you will,” Prometheus had said, “then fail BIG and most people will never know the difference. Then get up and fail again. Only next time, fail better.”
Pandy looked Giondar square in the eyes.
“But first,” she said, her voice even, “I would like you to answer one question and swear by your roc master that you’ll tell the truth.”
Giondar raised one eyebrow ever so slightly, surprised and a bit alarmed that she invoked his roc.
“Ask your question and be quick.”
“Do you swear that you really lived in that little lamp? Homer! Hold up the lamp!”
Homer untied the lamp from around his waist and held it high for all to see.
“Do you really think that we’re all stupid enough to believe you could fit in there? Your little fingernail, okay, I could see that. Maybe. But not all of you. So, do you swear it?”
“By my roc master, even though he has forsaken and abandoned me, I swear that lamp was my prison. Now, how do you want to—”
“Nope,” Pandy sighed. “I don’t believe you. And if you kill me now, I will die thinking that you are a liar.”
Mahfouza and Amina gasped. A genie’s word, once given, was beyond reproach.
“You dishonor my word,” Giondar said, softly, almost hurt. “You dishonor me.”
“Yeah, and killing an entire family of innocent people for the … the crime of one little girl who probably didn’t know what she was doing in the first place isn’t dishonorable, right? Oh well, I guess you’ll just have to be dishonored. ’Cause I think you’re a liar. And I always will.”
She paused. This was the moment.
“Unless I see it. With my own eyes.”
Pandy blinked at Giondar several times.
“These peepers. So go ahead, liar. Kill me. Let’s see, how do I want to—”
“Very well,” Giondar spat. “Since you have questioned my word after my oath, I shall prove it to you, unclean dog with the fleas of a thousand camels! Watch, then prepare to die!”
With a laugh so loud it shook loose another beam from the ceiling, Giondar tossed Pandy to the ground. She landed on her injured shoulder and came close to passing out, biting her lip in pain. She got to her feet just in time to see Giondar dissolve into an enormous cloud of black smoke that extended itself far out into the garden. Then the cloud began to condense into a fine, swirling stream.
“Homer!” Pandy yelled. “Gimme the lamp!”
Homer sent it sailing through the air. Pandy caught it, setting it on the cracked tiles in front of her. The black stream had formed a spiral over the garden, and as everyone watched, it shot back toward the house like a bolt of lightning.
“Here we go!” Pandy cried.
Giondar flew back into the house, crashing first into a table, which disintegrated. Then a couch, which splintered. Then the black stream sizzled through a tattered privacy curtain, sending it up in flames, before it ricocheted off the corridor wall and flew back into the parlor, narrowly missing Noureddin and Amina. The black stream of smoke that was Giondar then exploded off one wall and onto another.
“It’s just smoke. It shouldn’t be doing all this damage,” Pandy thought, mesmerized. She was so focused on the careening ribbon that she didn’t react fast enough when it caromed off the floor and headed straight for her.
In an instant, as it hit her with full force, she knew why the smoke was destroying everything in its path. It was Rage. Pure, unadulterated Rage. Then her mind went as black as the smoke driving through the middle of her body. Her stomach twisted into a knot and she felt as if she were going to vomit. The next moment, her rage at things she hadn’t thought about in years was so great, she wanted to kill, maim, shred, dismember everything and everyone around her. The other girls and maidens who’d laughed at her for any reason at all. Her mother for not understanding anything about her. Her teachers, all of them, for every cruel, useless, cutting remark meant to mortify her when she’d failed in some way. Every boy that had ever been unkind. Her face for being her face. Her girl’s body for being ridiculous. Then she flashed on Hera. She’d thought she’d been angry at Hera before. But now, if the goddess were in front of her, Pandy would tear her limb from immortal limb.
And then it was over.
The pain in her stomach disappeared as the last of the black smoke left her body, but her breath was labored and she realized she’d been crying. Hard. She watched from the floor—how had she ended up on the floor?—as Giondar hovered above the lamp, then slowly and evenly filtered into the tiny, tapered opening until nothing remained.
On her knees, Pandy was motionless except for the great rise and fall of her chest as she tried to catch her breath.
“Stop it up!” Alcie shouted.
Pandy looked up at Alcie as if she didn’t understand what she’d said. Then her mind cleared and she leapt forward; ignoring the stabbing pain in her shoulder, she grabbed the stopper on its chain and pushed it deep into the opening, sealing the lamp with Giondar inside.
Mahfouza, Amina, and Zoe screamed with
delight, then screamed louder at seeing Kerim and Fair Persian rush in, fully restored. Noureddin and Hassan hugged each other as Alcie and Homer hurried to Pandy.
“Can you stand?” Homer asked.
“Yep,” Pandy said, getting to her feet.
“Gods,” Alcie whispered. “Look at your clothes—and your hair. Pandy, you just dropped to the floor. When that smoke was going through you, you fell on your knees and you were shaking so hard. Are you okay?”
Pandy nodded her head, then she looked down and saw that her toga was burnt brown, its edges singed. Her armband was hot on her flesh and she could have peeled the metal away as if it were soft cheese. Her hair was dry and brittle, her nails were black, and the skin was peeling on her knees, shins, and elbows. Her sandals were basically lumps of burnt leather and ash.
“How can I still be alive?” she asked.
“Because, doofus, you’re semi-immortal, remember?”
“Oh yeah.”
“Can I be Iole for just one moment and say buh—,” Alcie began.
“No, you can’t, because I’m right here,” Iole called as she and Douban flew into the salon from the corridor.
“Did you see it?” Alcie asked.
“Only the smoke,” Iole replied. “We ran from the staircase and it came within millimeters of hitting us. Douban was thrown onto his head.”
“Are you all right?” Pandy asked.
“I am fine,” he replied, and Iole was quick—and delighted—to notice the slightly dreamy tone in his voice as he looked at Pandy.
“I got knocked back against the wall,” Iole went on. “I lost my breath for a bit and I lost a little hair, that’s all. So, even though I wasn’t here to see how you induced Giondar to turn into smoke, for whatever you did, may I just say buh-rilliant!”
“Thank you,” Pandy said.
“As I was just about to say,” Alcie huffed. “It’s even more amazing than you think, Iole. Wait till I tell you what she did, how she outsmarted him! Pandy, are you certain Giondar was Rage? The big Evil, the giant falafel patty, the huge wheel of cheese?”
Pandora Gets Angry Page 18
