Thea Harrison - Oracle's Moon

Then there was their companion, the Djinn. Khalil Somebody Important.

It almost sounded like the setup of a classic joke. Do you know what happens when a Vampyre, a Wyr and a Djinn walk into your house…? Only Grace found out that the punch line wasn’t funny.

Max’s illness was one of the reasons why she had tried so hard to persuade Carling, Rune and Khalil to come back at a more reasonable hour, but they couldn’t be dissuaded. At least Carling had healed Max’s ear infection before formally petitioning to speak to the Oracle.

Thankfully, nighttime petitions to consult the Oracle were rare. When they did occur, they tended to involve matters of some urgency. Such was the case with Carling and Rune. Rune had been wounded, and apparently their mission was urgent, and shit just sometimes happened.

The shit that had happened this morning just before daybreak had been big and bad enough to attract some of the most Powerful creatures on the North American continent. All but one of the seven Elder tribunal Councillors had converged in a tense confrontation with Carling and Rune. Two of the seven demesne rulers—Dragos Cuelebre, dragon and Lord of the Wyr from New York, and Julian Regillus, Vampyre King of the Nightkind demesne from San Francisco—had also been present.

Catching sight of the dragon that had filled up the back meadow before he shapeshifted into his human form—now that had been a helluva kick in the head.

Nothing Grace had ever seen on television or in movies or in her own imagination could have prepared her for the sight of the dragon in real life.

She had already been struggling. She’d had the sleepless night with Max. Then she summoned the Power of the Oracle in an intense session with Carling and Rune that had left her with a blackout of blank time in her head. And to top it all off, Rune had shoved Carling—he had meant to get her out of danger, but Grace had been in the way. Carling had fallen into her, and Grace had been knocked on her ass hard enough to jar her whole body.

And things kept going from weird to worse, like some sort of high-speed hallucinogenic car chase. Picking herself up after the fall, Grace had watched from one side, largely unnoticed, as the scene unfolded.

She hadn’t understood everything the group discussed. For some reason, Carling was under a death sentence. Then the Elder tribunal decided to put her in quarantine instead. Except Grace was pretty sure Carling didn’t have anything contagious. Where the tribunal would hold Carling was also under some debate. Grace couldn’t figure out if the tribunal meant to put Carling in a hospital or a jail.

To complicate things, Rune had also taken Carling as his mate and refused to be separated from her. They couldn’t go to the Nightkind demesne—there was some kind of bad feeling between Carling and her progeny Julian, the King—and nobody liked the idea of the pair going to the Wyr demesne.

Meanwhile, image upon fantastic image careened by in front of Grace’s astonished gaze.

The Councillor from the Elven demesne, standing tall and shining and ageless. Holy crap, that woman had been riveting. The Djinn Soren, Demonkind Councillor and head of the Elder tribunal, with white hair and stars for eyes, whose Power was a tower of flame so intense it burned her mind. The trio of Vampyres: the Nightkind King with his pleasant-faced companion, Xavier del Torro, who was so notorious even Grace had heard of him, and the blonde woman with them who had pulled a sword on Carling while in sanctuary. That single act confirmed everything Grace had ever known, that the laws protecting the Oracle, her petitioners and her land were simply not enough.

Then the strangest thing of all happened. Everything around her slipped a groove. If reality was an old 45 vinyl record playing on a turntable, the needle had jumped, skipping an important part of the song.

And suddenly Rune shapeshifted into something monstrous. He killed the blonde Vampyre, who disintegrated into dust and blew away on an early morning breeze.

Grace had thought the group had argued a lot before, but that was nothing compared to what came next. She was reeling from exhaustion and shock but glued in place, because what those deadly, immortal Power brokers decided mattered a whole hell of a lot to her.

When at last the Demonkind Councillor turned to her and asked for her opinion, she was all too happy to give it. She knew she hadn’t seen everything that had happened, nor had she understood all of the arguing, but she saw one thing clearly enough, and she knew how she felt about that.

The Vampyre woman had drawn a sword on her land. As far as Grace was concerned, whatever Rune had done after that point was only what the woman deserved. Grace would have killed the woman herself if she’d had the opportunity.

Once she had said her piece, the whole thing had been over.

To a young, inexperienced human Oracle, the morning had been extraordinary, dangerous, confusing and terrifying. And she hadn’t had a chance to talk it out with anyone or process what had happened. The events kept swirling in her mind like a funnel cloud.

The fact that Grace hadn’t had to kill the woman in self-defense was beside the point. The early morning’s violence hadn’t even been directed at her, but witnessing it had changed everything. Grace’s quiet home and her small life had been indelibly marked.

Her world had already been shaken to its foundations these last four months. Now she felt like she and the children lived in an unimaginably fragile house of glass, and she did not know how she could stand for them to stay there.

At least all the covens in the witches’ demesne recognized what an unmanageable position Grace had been in ever since the accident. It was impossible to meet the obligations and uphold the traditions of the Oracle’s position while also acting as a single parent.

At the instigation of Isalynn LeFevre, the Head of the witches’ demesne, a roster had been developed of witches who were on call to babysit whenever Grace was petitioned to act in her new role as the Oracle. The witches donated their time as part of their tithe of community service. The tithe was required of all actively practicing witches in the demesne, but sometimes the help they gave Grace was grudging. In any case, the babysitting roster was only a stopgap solution. It didn’t solve any of her larger problems.

Or alter the fact that something, somehow, had to change.

It had to, because continuing like this was inconceivable.

The oven timer dinged. The pasta was done.

Grace stood and fed the children supper.

Khalil reformed on the roof of the house, not necessarily because he felt any particular desire to take physical form again but more to give his roiling energy a focal point. He crossed his arms and leaned back against a dormer. The roof was shabby and missing a few tiles, he noted with disapproval. The land was as unkempt as the house, with grass that was too long and weeds that sprouted around fence posts. They were overtaking once well-tended flower beds. Everywhere he looked there was evidence of neglect, while the lazy, contentious human napped. He did not approve of how the property was maintained or how she cared for the children. He tapped his fingers on his biceps and thought.

The Djinn were among some of the first creatures that came into being at the Earth’s formation. Born of magic and fire, they were beings of pure spirit. They gained nourishment from the energy of the sun, from the living things of the Earth and from sources of Power. Any form Khalil chose to take was like donning a suit of clothes. He did not need to eat food or drink liquids. This body would not grow hungry, or grow old and die. Easily assumed and easily discarded, it would fade into nothing as soon as he let go of it.