Tales of the Djinn: The Guardian (6 page)

Even as she choked out a little laugh, tears
spilled hot down her cheeks. She’d shed far too many lately, but
she let them fall anyway.

~

Lost in thought, Arcadius and Joseph dropped
at almost the same moment to sit on the black modern couch in their
living room.

“That was interesting,” Joseph said after a
short silence.

Arcadius leaned forward across his knees.

“She’s attracted to you,” the servant said.
“I saw her pulse beat faster a couple times.”

Arcadius had noticed this as well. The
response was one he was familiar with. He shoved aside his
irritation that her excitement hadn’t been stronger. “What did you
think of the cousin?”

“Beautiful,” Joseph said, “but
untrustworthy.”

Arcadius pinched his chin. That had been his
impression too. “She knows something about this basement. Why else
would she suggest it was cursed if she weren’t hoping to scare us
off?”

“Why would her father volunteer to take over
managing the building if he didn’t want more access?”

Seeing they were on the same page, Arcadius
turned sideways. His elbow draped the couch’s back. “Do you suppose
it’s common for humans to turn cellars into homes?”

“I don’t know,” Joseph said. “If it isn’t,
one might infer Elyse’s husband was a participant in whatever was
going on.”

Arcadius’s mouth turned down. If that were
true, Elyse might be even more alone than they’d supposed. With a
start, he realized he was offended for her sake. Unsettled by that
idea, he spoke firmly. “We need to examine the magical nexus. Find
out what, if anything, has been done to it.”

“I am ready to do that now,” Joseph said.
“Elyse’s meal restored my strength.”

His expression said he was aware of the
irony. Djinn were sensitive to vibrations. Scents, emotions, even
colors were alive to them. Food cooked with care was more
fortifying than if it were prepared slapdash. Their landlady had
unknowingly benefited their mission.

They proceeded without delay. Joseph had a
key he’d stolen from his previous master, a magician to whom he’d
been apprenticed—the same magician who’d cruelly castrated him. The
key was enchanted to open any physical lock. The padlock Elyse had
attached to the apartment’s forbidden door was no match for it.
Joseph slid in the instrument, released the hasp, and swung the
much-painted egress wide.

Stale air rushed out through the opening.
Arcadius’s new body shivered. True to Elyse’s claim that this was a
mechanical room, the light from their narrow hall illuminated an
assortment of tanks and pipes. Beyond this he couldn’t see. The
darkness was as thick as if it were made of fur.

“Do you wish to go first?” Joseph offered
politely. His poorly hidden grin revealed he was teasing.

Amused but hiding it, Arcadius quirked one
brow at him. From humans’ standpoint, djinn were creatures of
darkness. They wouldn’t be afraid of it. “I don’t suppose you
packed a lantern in one of your little bags. My current body’s
night vision isn’t what I’m used to.”

“One moment.” Joseph disappeared into the
transformed bedroom, returning with the item his master had
requested.

The lantern was already lit when Arcadius
accepted it. “Watch our backs,” he said, not so proud he’d pretend
the territory they were exploring couldn’t hold dangers. Better
safe than sorry wasn’t a bad tactic.

As Arcadius expected, the mechanical room
provided access to the entire unfinished portion of the
basement—perhaps three quarters compared to their apartment. The
lantern helped them navigate. Cracked cement formed the floor, the
cellar itself hewn from nearly black bedrock. Apart from an
occasional stingy window, the space could have been a cave. No
hallway simplified their journey. Randomly sized rooms led one to
another, no seeming rhyme or reason in their arrangement. Stacks of
old belongings blocked their way here and there, boxes and
furniture he sincerely doubted anyone was returning for.

One small room held nothing but discarded
fake Christmas trees. Another revealed a toilet and sink only the
most desperate handyman would dream of peeing in.

Arcadius could almost hear spiders
skittering.

“I don’t sense the nexus,” Joseph whispered
behind him. “Something is blocking it.”

“Let’s be still,” Arcadius advised. “If we
close our eyes and breathe, its location may come to us.”

He followed his own suggestion. With his
sight shut off, the cellar seemed to expand in every direction, no
longer a building’s base but an unlimited netherworld that was
neither djinn nor human. Arcadius had faced too much in his life to
succumb to fear, but his skin admittedly was crawling.

“Almighty God,” Joseph swore suddenly.
Arcadius’s eyes snapped open.

“What?” he asked. He saw nothing new in the
shifting lamp shadows.

“You didn’t hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“That terrible scream. Like someone . . .
having parts of them torn off.”

When Arcadius held up the lantern, Joseph’s
face shone with sweat. Arcadius didn’t have to think hard to
imagine what he was remembering. The servant shook himself and
recovered. “It must be a psychic echo of the murder I sensed
before.”

“Can you tell where it happened?”

Joseph focused. “Close by. Through that next
opening, I think.”

They went through it. They’d reached a part
of the cellar’s warren with no windows. The area was maybe ten foot
square, near the center of the building. Interestingly, its walls
were built of new cement blocks. Perhaps Elyse’s husband had
erected them? The only object he saw inside was an old fashioned
child’s rocking horse. The toy was molded out of plastic and
colored to resemble the animal.

As Arcadius and Joseph approached, the steed
began rocking by itself.

“In the name of the Almighty, show yourself,”
Joseph said.

No mere spirit could resist the mage’s
authority. An ifrit appeared in the horse’s saddle, roiling smoke
in the shape of a small monkey with bat wings. Like Joseph and
Arcadius, the ifrit was djinn. Unlike them, it viewed their Creator
as an enemy. The ifrits’ view was that any god who expected them to
treat a younger race—i.e., humans—as superior ought to be rebelled
against.

“
Mine
,” the ifrit proclaimed, its
yellow eyes glaring angrily at Joseph. “My death energy to
eat.”

Confident in his power, Joseph crossed his
arms. “I don’t think so, devil.”

The ifrit tried wheedling. “You don’t need it
and I’m hungry.”

“Your kind don’t frequent New York,” Joseph
said without softening. “How did you get here?”

The ifrit glared but Joseph’s will was firm.
“Through the teeny tiny hole,” it answered sullenly. “None of my
brothers were eating here, and many beings die badly in this
city.”

“Can you show us how the human died?”
Arcadius asked.

Less impressed with him, since he wasn’t a
magician, the ifrit made its smoke nose grow longer so it could
look down it. Arcadius wanted to smile but kept his face
impassive.

“You will show him,” Joseph ordered before
the lower level demon could say something impudent.

“If I do, what do I get?” the ifrit
demanded.

“How about your life?”

The demon’s smoke mouth pouted. All djinn,
low or high, loved baubles.

“Show us,” Joseph insisted. “Or I shall use
the power of the King of Kings against you.”

Naturally, the ifrit disliked this threat.
“Fine.” It flung itself off the rocking horse, its vaporous body
shredding and flickering. As Joseph had known it could, the ifrit
was using its own substance to recreate past events.

The space they stood in didn’t change much at
first. The light was angled differently, and the rocking horse
became transparent. Whatever had happened here, the toy hadn’t been
here then. Suddenly the figure of a man stumbled into the room, his
image passing through Arcadius and Joseph on the way. He looked
real but he wasn’t. Neither was he a ghost. Though Arcadius doubted
the ifrit knew the word, the man was a very sharp hologram—the same
as he and Joseph had seen in human media.

Seeming afraid, the person who’d just
appeared scrambled back on his hands and butt. Tallish and lean, he
wore baggy pants with many pockets and a paint-spattered navy shirt
with the sleeves pushed up. The terror twisting his features didn’t
hide his appealing looks. His hair was wavy and wheat colored, his
jaw and cheekbones firm. Wire rimmed glasses balanced crookedly on
his nose, knocked askew by his desperate flight. He shoved the
spectacles straight with one finger.

“I don’t have the door,” he pleaded
fearfully.

“You’ve had free rein down here for a year,”
rumbled another voice. The sound was so low Arcadius wondered if
the ifrit were exaggerating its deepness out of some flair for the
dramatic.

The frightened man was scared enough as it
was. He’d retreated until the cement block wall stopped him. Now he
stood, squared his shoulders, and tried to look less trembly. “I
haven’t found the door yet. Only the nexus, which is here.”

A large man-shaped shadow fell across
Spectacles. Half a moment later, the male who cast it appeared.
This individual was very tall, taller than Arcadius and even
thicker with muscle. His head was shaved. His scalp—and all the
other skin they could see—was covered in swirling barbed black
tattoos. Arcadius was relatively sure the tattooed man was human.
He wasn’t quite terrifying enough to be djinn.

Spectacles cowered as if he were an ogre.

“You’ve been seen with a magic book,” Tattoos
rumbled in an accusing tone.

“A f-friend loaned it to me. I didn’t get it
from the Qaf. The book isn’t the door!”

Tattoos slapped a meaty hand around the
other’s neck. The move cut off Spectacles’ air, trapped him against
the wall, and forced him onto his toes.

“Where is the door?” Tattoos demanded.

“I don’t know,” Spectacles choked. “I swear
I’ve looked everywhere. Her father hid it too well.”

Tattoos released him. The other man rubbed
his neck. Though his face was red from having his windpipe
squeezed, being let go seemed to increase his confidence. “I just
need a bit more time.”

“You’ve had a year,” Tattoos growled.

“My wife doesn’t know anything. I’ve had to
search from scratch. Listen, now that your employer knows what I’m
doing, maybe we should talk.”

Tattoos let out a derisive snort. “You want
to talk to my employer.”

“I’m sure we could come to a mutually
satisfactory arrangement.”

The bigger man seemed to swell. He jabbed a
finger into Spectacles’ breastbone. “There’s only one arrangement.
You give us what we want and we don’t kill you.”

His threat issued, Tattoos turned away in
disgust. His path took him toward Joseph and Arcadius. He didn’t
see what they did. Behind his back, Spectacles suddenly stood
straight, a look of eagerness altering his formerly frightened
face. He dug in his rear pants pocket, his hand emerging with a
seven-inch silver spike.

“
Heart
,” he murmured as he threw
it.

Tattoos’ back was exposed. The spike should
have hit its target. It was a magical weapon, after all. Sadly for
Spectacles, the other man’s tattoos sprang outward from his skin,
one barbed curlicue neatly snatching the projectile out of the air,
mid-flight.

“Shit,” Spectacles hissed, flinching back to
the wall again.

Tattoos turned. He rolled his big neck and
shoulders as the swirling marks resettled on his skin. In his right
hand, he held the silver spike poised to throw.

“That was a mistake,” he said ominously.

“I was just defending myself. You threatened
to kill me.”

Tattoos lifted the spike and spoke to it.
“Serve me,” he said, “and I’ll let you drink all of him.”

The spike wriggled in his hand as if it liked
that prospect.

“You need me,” Spectacles said. “I’m in the
perfect position.”

“You’ve had a year in the ‘perfect position.’
What you are is a waste of time.”

Spectacles fell to his knees on the concrete
floor. “Please,” he begged, his hands clutched together before him.
“Don’t.”

Tattoos grinned, the stretch of his lips
revealing big white teeth. “
Blood
,” he said with relish to
the spike.

The spike leaped from his hand to attack its
new target. By the time it finished its grisly work, it was twice
the size it had been before. Naturally, it couldn’t drink all of
its victim’s blood. The remainder sprayed and pooled and splattered
from Spectacles’ uncountable slash wounds. The screams that had
spooked Joseph earlier echoed around the room. In the end,
Spectacles was so savagely ripped up it was hard to make out that
he was human. Arcadius and Joseph had seen a lot of deaths, but
they were both wincing.

“Return to me,” Tattoos intoned.

The silver spike flew obediently to his hand,
shining and spotless and seemingly inanimate once more.

Tattoos looked like he’d stood in a shower of
blood and thicker things. If he minded, they couldn’t tell. He
looked down on the remains with an impassive face.

“Is that enough?” the ifrit’s voice asked
Arcadius and Joseph. “Shall I show you again?” The demon sounded
amused. It wouldn’t have minded replaying the gore fest.

“That is enough,” Joseph said.

The hologram of the past dissolved. As it
did, they realized the ifrit’s feeding activity must have masked
the nexus’s location. They perceived it now, not with ordinary
vision but in their minds’ eyes. The magical hot spot resembled a
slowly rotating sun. A micron-sized black speck, presumably the
teeny tiny door the ifrit had referred to, marred the radiance.
Aside from this single flaw, the nexus was beautiful. Its rays
spiked upward, threw off rainbow glints, and then fell back in a
surprisingly organized rhythm. Though the pattern wasn’t
predictable, it was visually melodic.