Harley Merlin 12

by Bella Forrest

  “But we can’t do this without you,” Abdhi murmured, staring helplessly into her eyes. “We don’t know how to be free without you to lead us. How do we use your gift?”

  “I have thought… of that, too.” Safiya lifted her shaky hands and touched the sides of Abdhi’s head. Scarlet light shot from her palms and into Abdhi’s skull. His eyes lit with such ferocity that I had to look away.

  What is she doing? I whispered to Kadar.

  Handing over everything inside her head. Passing on her knowledge, he replied.

  Sensing the dying of the light, I looked back to find Abdhi standing at his full Marid height, holding Safiya in his enormous arms. She looked so small and vulnerable, her life clearly waning. Whatever she’d done had freed Abdhi from his lamp ahead of time. If she really had succeeded, I guessed those trapped in lamps and the like would return to their original states in due course, but she’d expedited it for Abdhi. The Storyteller’s strength and fortitude was beyond anything I’d ever seen, but that didn’t alter the pain of knowing she wouldn’t live to see what she’d purchased with her life. It was like the old adage of planting an oak tree, knowing you’d never get to stand in its shade, but planting it anyway for the generations that would come after.

  “I feel your memories.” Abdhi’s voice strained. “Your thoughts, your past, your hopes… are all in my head.”

  Safiya chuckled softly. “My last gift… to you. You must lead them now. Make this world your own, and make it… the perfect sanctuary for… djinn. We will never bow or obey again, unless… we choose to.”

  All of this had happened so quickly that my brain could barely keep up. Kadar remained inside me, but then, I’d known that would happen. Even so, some of my weariness had begun to fade.

  Can you feel the change? I asked Kadar.

  I… think so. The pain is lightening, like sweating out the last of a fever, he replied.

  The other djinn seemed to feel the same. Across the vast gathering, I heard mutterings of, “I can breathe easier,” and, “The agony is not as strong,” and various iterations of the same sentiment.

  “You should have warned me,” Abdhi murmured, sinking to his knees so all could see his precious cargo. “You should have told us of your intended sacrifice. Others would have given themselves in your place.”

  Safiya moved her hand down to his cheek. “Precisely. Someone would… have tried to be heroic and do what I… had to. Someone younger… with so much more… life to give than I do. The truth is, Abdhi… I have told stories all my life, and… it was time I became… the heroine of mine.”

  “You really did this for them?” I looked around at the stunned faces of the crowd. I knew my question was a little redundant, but I wanted to hear her reply. I wanted to understand why she’d done this, without a thought for her own existence. I had to.

  Safiya nodded weakly. “We were born to be slaves… but… we deserve more. All I ask, in return for… my sacrifice, is that… you use this gift well. Be free, be happy… and build a world… for yourselves. And if Erebus comes back in his Child… of Chaos form, and the otherworld does… recognize his authority and remove you… then rebuild elsewhere. He cannot… stop you now.”

  A death rattle wheezed in her chest. A moment later, her body went limp, and the light in her eyes faded. Her skin flaked into ashy fragments, then drifted into the air where they turned to smoke and disappeared—until there was nothing left of her, and Abdhi’s arms lay empty of the Storyteller.

  “You heard her.” Abdhi looked up, black tears sliding down his cheeks. “We mustn’t waste what she has given. Let’s build this new world, to ensure her last act was not in vain.” Solemnly, he turned his face to the gray sky. Beneath the scarlet skin of his chest, his heart glowed.

  The other djinn turned their faces up as their hearts glowed vividly. Tears sprang to my eyes as I watched them mourning her. All of them. And I had the feeling that Kadar was, too. Those tears weren’t entirely mine.

  Safiya had given her life for the djinn’s independence from Erebus. They would be weaker, and the addendums they’d sought would be null and void, but now they had a world to call their own, away from anyone and anything that might try to harm them or bend them to their will. Here, they could come and go as they pleased, knowing they had a safe haven to return to. And Safiya had done all of this for them without pomp or circumstance, or any expectation in return.

  After thousands of years, her own story had finally ended. Now, the djinn would have to write their own book, starting afresh, living out the promise to make it a good one in her honor… preferably without eating any humans.

  Thirty-Two

  Finch

  I stared at the dead bluebell. It didn’t inspire optimism. Nash might’ve had good reasons for making his blood unusable, but the problem was—I needed to use it. Sure, I’d developed some respect for the guy, but I didn’t know him. And, unfortunately for him, I had to look out for myself and my people first.

  “Look, we wouldn’t ask if we weren’t desperate,” I told him, setting my jaw and nerves.

  Nash scraped a stool from under the workbench and sat. “I get that, but I won’t just give up this djinn curse for one person. If I do that, I open myself up to hunters again. And if it comes down to my life or someone else’s, I’m sorry, but I have to put Huntress and myself first.”

  Seems like you and I have something in common…

  “But our friend is in dire need.” Melody knelt beside Huntress and scratched between her flicking ears. “Only you can fix him. Please, Nash. Could we offer you protection in return for your help?”

  “You think you’re the first to offer that kind of exchange?” Nash rested his head on his hand. “I’m not saying you’ll stab me in the back. You seem like good people. But I’ve been double-crossed so many times. I can’t risk it anymore. There’s no safe place for me in this world, as long as I’ve got this blood in my veins.”

  Melody met his gaze. “I’m the Librarian, Nash. I can find a solution to protect you from the hunters—so you don’t have to cut your life short, either at the hands of hunters or this slow-killing curse. I swear, I won’t stop looking until I find a way, if you agree to help us.”

  “Even if you could, it’s not like you’ve got a djinn handy to remove the curse,” Nash replied.

  A lightbulb went off in my head. “But we need your blood in order to save our friend, who does have a djinn inside him. That’s why we’re here. You might know of him—Raffe Levi? Another of the soldiers who took down Katherine in the Battle of Elysium. A brave warrior, one who wants to be freed of a curse far worse than yours.”

  “Raffe Levi?” Nash frowned. “The name rings a bell, but how can his curse be worse than mine?”

  “Because it affects generations upon generations of his family and kills innocent women in childbirth.” A bubble of determination rose in my throat, and a tiny bit of acid guilt. This wasn’t why I needed his blood clean and functioning, but I had to put on a believable show. “Raffe’s djinn needs amputating, and he’s the one who can break your curse. We can do this. Melody can find a different way to keep the ol’ black spot off you, and we can save Raffe and make a little djinn very happy, all at the same time. Come on, Mr. Claus, doesn’t that sound like Christmas to you?”

  Nash hesitated. “You’re asking a heck of a lot from me, Crowley. I don’t even know you.”

  “No, but you’re not a hard-ass,” I replied. “It’s all well and good, hiding and staying off-grid, but what’s the point of any life at all—long or short—if this is all you do? We’re offering you a potential way out. A permanent fix to the hunters. And all you have to do is let us remove your curse so you can help us. From where I stand, that’s a win for everyone.”

  “It’s that ‘potential’ part that’s not quite selling it to me.” Nash sighed. “What if Melody can’t find a way to protect me? Will she get Luke to bring in a colleague—give me a bodyguard for the rest of my days? Because I’ve al
ready got one, and that’s not much different than the life I’m leading now. It's not a win for me, more of a break-even with significant risk.”

  “Better than a loss,” Luke chimed in, right on the money.

  Silence unfolded across the cabin. Even Huntress quieted to only the softest of pants while Melody continued to fuss over her. Nash picked up one of his half-made knives and ran his fingertips over the smoothed bone handle like he wanted to take it out for dinner. I saw the cogs whirring. Our hermit friend was weighing his options. Do nothing and be safe in his selfishness, or help us and risk putting a target on his back again. No judgment from me, though—he and I were in twin canoes, about to lose our respective paddles. I’d understand if he stood his ground and said no… I just hoped he wouldn’t.

  And that is one hundred percent your selfishness talking. You’d throw this plaid sucker under a fleet of buses to gain your freedom, a whisper hissed inside my head. The gremlins were back, less than an hour after my last dose. And that had been a double dose, to top up the one before it.

  I dug my fingernails into my palms. The twinge of pain lodged me in reality, and I needed to hold on to reality for a while longer. Just until Nash agreed. He was teetering on the edge of yes; I could see it on his face. I thought about finding that pocket of calm Melody had tucked away inside my noggin, but that would mean abandoning ship. If I did that, Nash would have questions, and that might make him think twice about putting his faith in us. It wouldn’t have been the first time someone encountered my dark side and turned tail.

  “If it gets really bad, we can always find another djinn to restore the curse.” Yup, I was scraping a grimy barrel now. But only because I had no idea how long I’d be able to fight the gremlin tide. If faces started getting twisty and demonic again, Huntress might turn me into fleshy ribbons to protect her soul-partner.

  “But it shouldn’t come to that.” Melody swept in. “I have an entire world’s worth of information in my head, from centuries of magicals and Chaos. Trust us. We’ll get you out of this predicament, if you get us out of ours. Our friend’s life depends on it. I know that may not mean anything to you, but it means a great deal to us.”

  Nash sighed. “I’ve got to say, your timing is weird.”

  “What do you mean?” I prompted.

  He glanced at us as if debating whether to continue. “Well… I’ve been feeling worse lately. This curse is meant to keep me good for another decade or so, but… I feel messed up. It’s harder to get out of bed in the morning, and it ain’t because of the cold. It’s why I moved back here from another outpost—I couldn’t maintain an interdimensional bubble. It took too much out of me.”

  Erebus’s separation from the djinn must be affecting him, too. I knew Erebus couldn’t interfere with djinn magic, but maybe the magic itself weakened when the power source wasn’t providing the juice. But I couldn’t say that without revealing that our need had something to do with Erebus.

  “You’ve been sick?” Melody pressed.

  Nash peeled back the Band-Aid on his arm, revealing cracked, dark threads of collapsed veins. “Yeah. I don’t bounce back so easy. Even walking in the woods leaves me breathless.”

  Melody and I exchanged a glance, evidently on the same wavelength.

  “And if you find a way out of this, then… ah man, I don’t know. It’s a lot to give up, and it’s a big gamble for me.” He covered up his wound again. “But this curse has definitely sped up, and I wouldn’t want to die with unfinished business.”

  “Unfinished business?” Luke narrowed his eyes. “What kind?”

  “Personal stuff.” Nash’s grip tightened around his unfinished blade. The grim expression on his face told me it was more than finishing his knife collection. No, I’d seen that look before… he was referring to a vendetta. One burning him up inside.

  A noise outside made all our heads whip around. An oh-so-human scuffle of feet, crunching in the snow. The spike of terror that jolted through me tipped the fragile balance. The floodgates tore open, and my brain sailed away on the unleashed torrent.

  I envisioned a horde of demonic magicals in the clearing, palms raised and ready to pound us into oblivion. A second later, Erebus’s distorted figure loomed over me. He stood on the top of Mount Sisyphus in his otherworld, gesturing to ten wooden posts he’d erected, complete with eleven dangling figures all strung up by their arms. Blood splattered across them, their bodies ragged with open wounds: Harley, Ryann, Wade, Melody, Luke, Saskia, Garrett, Tatyana, Kenzie, and Kenzie’s mom and sister. Purge beasts crouched in front of each person, awaiting orders to execute.

  “You have disappointed me for the last time. I warned you, did I not? I warned you until I was blue in the face, and it made no difference. You understood the stakes, and yet you chose to fail me,” Erebus hissed in my ear, back in his floaty Child of Chaos form.

  This isn’t real… it can’t be… Erebus is still in human form. But I no longer knew what was what—the lines had blurred beyond recognition. I felt the hot-and-cold prickle of Erebus’s breath on my neck. I heard the roar of the Purge beasts below. I smelled the metallic tang of fresh blood in the air, and the foul stench of the creatures waiting to kill the people I cared for.

  I tumbled off my stool to the floor, then clung to it, using it to pull myself upright. Burying my face in my knees and wrapping my arms around my legs, I cowered as the panic and nightmares hit me in wave after wave. Closing my eyes wouldn’t have helped. The nightmares played out in front of me, phasing in and out of reality and the cabin surrounding me.

  Just then, Huntress charged me, her white coat and husky face morphing into a gigantic hellhound with bared fangs that dripped blood. The scent of sulfur and fire washed over me. I screamed, lifting my hands in preparation to unleash a blockade of Telekinesis.

  “Calm down!” Melody shouted, tugging Huntress away before skidding to her knees at my side. “Find the monastery. Find it and stay there until I can get you out again.”

  “I can’t… I can’t do it… I can’t control anything…” I wheezed, struggling for air.

  Melody grabbed my face. “You have to!”

  Black eyes stared back at me. I saw sharp fangs slide from under Melody’s lips. I watched, horrified, as her skin turned ashen.

  “You’re one of them! Your face—you’re one of them! You want to kill me!” This time, I did squeeze my eyes shut, to block out her evil face.

  “What’s the matter with him?” Nash came over, Huntress padding close to him. I heard her paws click against the hardwood floor.

  “He has a delusional disorder, and it’s getting worse. He has pills, but they don’t work anymore. I gave him a safety bubble in his mind, to take him out of the delusions, but I… I think he’s too far gone to reach it.” Melody’s words tumbled out.

  I peeked through my lids to see Nash glare at the door behind me. “I take it you’ve seen this before?” he asked.

  Melody nodded. “I don’t know why they come on, but they seem to be intense panic attacks. He hallucinates, too, which is why he’s saying we’re out to kill him. These attacks hit him hard. I’ve seen it once, and that was bad enough.”

  “What if he’s not entirely paranoid?” Nash hurried to the door and flung it open. “You all heard that noise.”

  “NO! Don’t let them in!” I howled, feeling an icy blast on the back of my neck. I didn’t have time to deal with it, as the nightmares swamped my vision. The cabin disappeared, leaving me on the mountain, watching my friends hang from their wooden stakes, broken by torture.

  “I warned you, Finch.” Erebus appeared in front of me. “Now you will watch as they die, all because you did not obey. You had the power to save each and every one, and you failed them, as you failed me. Their deaths are on your shoulders. Not that you will have to live with it for long, but guilt of this magnitude will follow you into the hereafter. If it does not make you into a poltergeist.”

  “No…” I sobbed, hot tears streaming down my c
heeks. “I didn’t fail… I didn’t.”

  “Too late, Finch.” Erebus clicked his fingers and the Purge beasts leapt forward, fangs and claws bared to murder my friends and sister in cold blood. And I couldn’t do a single thing about it. I sat there, shaking and sobbing, frozen to the spot. Just the way Erebus wanted. A hellhound’s jaws opened to sink into Harley’s throat, her head limp, too weak to fight back…

  “Crowley, swallow this!” Nash’s voice wrenched me out of the nightmare before the hellhound finished the job. Cold glass clinked against my teeth. Luke had his thumb and forefinger pressed against my cheeks, forcing my mouth open. Both men looked like demons, their eyes black, their skin gray. I writhed to escape them, but Melody sat behind me with her arms around my chest, pinning my arms. Tepid, thick liquid spilled down my tongue and into my throat, as Nash clamped his hand over my mouth and nose.

  Suffocate or swallow, my gremlins chorused. We suggest suffocate. They’re trying to poison you.

  Next thing I knew, Huntress leapt up. She barked so loud, right in my face, that fear of her overtook everything else. Instinctively, my throat swallowed, swiftly carrying the liquid down into my stomach. I waited for the pain and dissolving of tissue to start. Instead, a cold sensation unfurled in the pit of my belly and climbed into my chest, working into my limbs and up to my brain. Not an unpleasant cold—more like sinking into a chilly pool on the hottest day of the year.

  As the cold reached my brain, the gremlins halted in their tracks. I literally felt them stop. The vision of Tartarus evaporated, taking the terror and grief with it. Then, the gremlins themselves dissolved, disappearing into the recesses of my mind. It was almost the same sensation I’d experienced when I first took my pills, so many years ago.