Rachel Caine - Unknown

Ashworth didn’t comment on that. He said, instead, “Not many Wardens left these days. Some are off chasing ghosts, some lying low, the rest just trying to hold things together. A good portion of them died fighting the Djinn in the rebellion. Some say there’s still a war going on, one of attrition. Fewer Wardens, stretched thinner. Enemies picking them off, one by one.”

“Some say it could benefit the Ma’at,” Luis pointed out.

Ashworth’s face twisted in a tired grimace. “People talk nonsense most of the time. I have no interest in making the Ma’at any kind of replacement for the Wardens. You should know that, better than most. The world needs Wardens; if she didn’t, they wouldn’t be here. They’re part of the natural order, same as the Djinn. Same as regular human beings, animals, plants, insects, protozoa. Ma’at, boy. Everything in balance. Now. Why are you here? You could’ve turned around and gone straight back home, nothing to stop you.”

“Guess just wanting to visit Vegas isn’t a good excuse.”

Luis’s attempt at humor—never more than half-hearted—fell into a cold silence. Ashworth didn’t reply. He shifted his gaze to me. “You really do think this creature’s real.”

“Yes,” I said. “She’s real. She’s a threat to the Djinn. A genuine threat. And until we can locate her again, we are fighting shadows. She can target us. We can’t target her in turn.”

Rashid made that sound again. I turned to face him, and he folded his arms across his chest. “Yes?” he asked.

“You have something to tell me?”

“Not really,” I said. “I presume when you’re screaming your last, the way Gallan screamed, you will take my words more seriously.”

I left that deliberately ambiguous. He would know of my friend Gallan’s death—the death of a Djinn never went unremarked, and Gallan had been no minor power. What Rashid did not know, from the sudden burst of brightness in his eyes, was whether or not I had been the cause of it.

I knew well enough what he suspected.

“I take you seriously now,” Rashid said. “Believe it.”

“Enough,” Ashworth snapped. “The both of you. You’ll not be settling any grudges in my office; I just redecorated. Luis, what the hell do you want from me? I can’t offer you any real help. And I don’t have any real information.”

“Then there’s one other thing you can do. You can lend me a Djinn,” Luis said.

There was a sudden, startling quiet among the four of us; Ashworth’s gaze leapt to Rashid, and mine moved to focus on Luis as I struggled to process what he had just said.

He had a Djinn. He had me. I felt a sudden, baffling surge of rage and confusion, and I wondered if it was . . . jealousy? Surely not. Surely I had not sunk so low.

Rashid’s voice came from behind me. Very close behind, so close that I felt the whisper of air on the back of my neck. “You must not be performing to his expectations,” he said. “How very sad for you.”

I turned, slammed the palm of my hand into the flat of his chest. It should have sent him flying across the room, splintered paneling, crumbled concrete in his wake.

Instead, Rashid simply stood there, smiling at me with a terrible bright light in his violet eyes. Then he took hold of my wrist, and snapped my arm.

I cried out as the bones broke, twisted, and ripped into muscle. Pain tore through me in a livid white wave, loosening my knees, and darkness flickered over my eyes.

“Rashid!” Ashworth shouted, and surged to his feet behind the desk. Luis, however, was faster. His armchair tipped over, and before it hit the carpet with a dull thud he was next to me. He pointed a finger at Rashid, and for a second I saw—or thought I saw—black flames lick up and down his arms. I blinked. It was an effect of the pain, surely.

“You,” Luis said. “Let go of her. Now.”

Rashid did, still smiling, and stepped back. Luis took my arm in both his hands, and his touch was extraordinarily gentle and warm. I felt the warmth cascade into me, power twining in intimate circles around the damage. I swayed closer to him as my strength left me, and he caught me with one arm around my body, holding the injury clear as the healing continued.

“Point made,” Rashid said, sounding bored and waspish. “She’s no better than a human, is she? Hardly of much use at all. You do need a Djinn. But why, I wonder?”

“I need one who thinks he’s invulnerable,” Luis said through gritted teeth. “You’ll do fine.”

Rashid frowned, and a little of his overwhelming arrogance flickered away. Not enough to matter, however. I found some strength left after all, and pushed away from Luis to stand on my own. My arm felt fragile and barely knitted together, and I knew I shouldn’t test it, though the healing was vastly accelerated. Rage had subsided to a low, hot burn deep within me, but I was less pleased with what had replaced it: fear. Was this how humans lived, so afraid of pain, so aware of their fragile and temporary bodies?

I didn’t like it. Not at all. “What are you doing?” I asked. Luis sent me a dark, urgent look that almost demanded my silence. He went back to a silent war of stares with Rashid, who, finally, crossed his arms across his chest, lowered his chin, and gave a wolfish smile. “You think you can challenge me with threats of danger? Little man, you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, sure, you’re a big man, breaking the arms of women without giving them chances to fight back,” Luis said. “Big talker. I get that. But what I’m asking is for something that’s going to take some balls and some brains. Maybe you should go get somebody, you know, better. I’ll wait, man.”

Rashid’s eyes grew molten, and I thought for a dull, terrible second that he would simply burn Luis down to the ground for that. He was fully capable.

Instead, Ashworth snapped, “Enough, you two. We don’t have time or luxury for this. Rocha, tell me what you want, and don’t be coy about it. Now.”

It must have taken a sincere and awesome act of will to turn his back on Rashid, but somehow Luis managed it. For security, I kept an eye on the Djinn. I didn’t for even an instant trust him. He was a jackal, sniffing for opportunity, and I had a sudden and sickening experience—for perhaps the first time in my long existence—of being the wounded prey.

“I need a Djinn who can verify where this boy came from,” Luis said.

“The dead boy?”

“Yes. Time’s critical. Traces fade. I need somebody who’s not full of bullshit and bluster.” That, of course, was specifically thrown at Rashid, and I watched the Djinn consider, again, whether or not to kill us. If he decided to act, there would be little Ashworth could do to stop him, and while Luis and I would put up a fight, it was a foregone conclusion how it would end.

Wasn’t it?

I don’t know what expression must have crossed Ashworth’s face, as he assessed all these things, plus of course the potentially lethal damage a fight could do inside his dark-paneled sanctum. Finally, he said, with absolutely no emphasis, “I think we could work something out. However, it would have to be done as a strictly voluntary effort on the part of the Djinn. That’s our code.”

“Of course,” Luis said, and hesitated before continuing. “Thing is, from everything we know about this situation, tracing this dead boy back to the ones behind him could be dangerous. Even for a Djinn. I wouldn’t want anybody to misunderstand the risks involved.”

Rashid was still giving us that unsettling predator’s smile. Now he said, “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Ashworth sighed.

“Then I pronounce you all friends and allies. Mazel tov,” he said, in a tone that was weary with disgust. “Now all of you, get the hell out of my office, out of the hotel, and go kill each other someplace where I don’t have to worry about cleaning it up.”