Blood Passage

by Heather Demetrios

  Raif nodded. “That’s exactly what he’s saying. But if we don’t hurry, that Ghan Aisouri I was telling you about? She’s sick and if she doesn’t get help soon, none of us are getting into that cave.”

  21

  MALEK HELD NALIA IN HIS ARMS AS THE SUN ROSE OVER the dunes. Ripples of sand surrounded them, as though they were stranded in the middle of a golden sea, the last two living creatures on Earth.

  “Wake up, hayati, please,” he whispered.

  He’d been saying that for hours. She wouldn’t. Sometime in the frigid night she’d fallen asleep curled against him, then retreated into some hidden place within herself that he couldn’t reach.

  He watched the sunlight spread across her pale face. She looked at peace and there was really no point in waking her. If she opened her eyes, he’d have nothing to offer: no food, no water, no shelter. Maybe it was better this way. The last time he’d watched Nalia sleep was after she’d had a nightmare about Haran, the ghoul that had nearly killed her. Strange that after living so long the happiest night of his life had only been a week ago. He’d believed that she wanted him, needed him. All lies, he knew that now. But it had felt so real. For nearly an hour, he’d watched her, breathless and terrified because no one had ever had such an effect on him. He’d known it was foolish, to let himself feel that way, but he’d been powerless against the pull of her chiaan. The feel of her in his arms.

  Their only hope was that someone other than the Ifrit would find them, and soon. A Berber nomad, one of the Dhoma. Unless, by some miracle, Nalia woke and her chiaan returned, there was nothing to be done. It was pointless to walk. Though he had a vague sense of direction based on the sun, he could only carry her for so long.

  A shadow swept across the sand and Malek looked up—a flock of strange desert birds. They circled over him, like vultures spying carrion.

  “Off with you!” Malek shouted. He grabbed a fistful of sand and threw it at the creatures, but they swooped out of range, then settled on the ridge of a nearby dune. Seven birds. One of them flew off, in the opposite direction of the sun. It was eerie, these huge black beasts that stared him down. As if he needed any more problems.

  Once the sun crested over the horizon, Malek picked Nalia up and carefully descended the dune they’d hiked up to late the night before. He found some shade, then lay against the dune, holding her to his chest. He pulled off the kaffiyeh that had been twisted around his neck and draped the checkered scarf over them. It was meager protection against the elements, but it was all he had. Malek closed his eyes and waited for sleep, focusing on the beat of Nalia’s heart and her faint breath on his neck.

  Zanari stood over the sleeping couple. She was glad Raif wasn’t here to see this: Malek holding Nalia, her head on his chest. Samar had insisted on one of the Djan’Urbis staying at the camp as insurance against escape. Raif had been more than happy to let Zanari be the one to go, though she could tell by his restlessness that he was worried. Nalia had killed his best friend but it was eating him up, not knowing if she would be okay.

  The salfit and the slave owner, she thought. They deserve each other. Zanari lifted her foot and sent the toe of her boot into Malek’s ribs.

  He jolted up with a shouted curse in Arabic, the kaffiyeh slipping from his face. Nalia fell to the sand, her eyes remaining closed. Zanari couldn’t tell what was wrong with her. She didn’t look injured.

  “Get up,” she said. She wore a pair of sunglasses the Dhoma had given her, in order to more easily avoid any chance of Malek making use of his hypersuasion again.

  “Where the hell have you been?” he growled. His voice was raspy, his lips chapped. He wore dirty jeans and a torn T-shirt. She’d never seen him look like anything less than the most powerful human in the world.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Zanari said. “I had no idea you’d miss us, what with you trying to kill me and all.”

  Malek looked down at Nalia and gently lifted her into his arms. She hung, limp and lifeless.

  “What’s wrong with her?” Zanari said.

  Just a few days ago she and Nalia had been fighting side by side. Willing to bleed for one another. But Nalia had broken Raif’s heart and killed someone Zanari had loved. There was no going back from that. So why did it hurt to see Nalia like this?

  “I’m not saying another word until you give me water,” Malek said. “A lot of it.”

  Zanari turned and motioned for him to follow her to the Sun Chaser.

  “A ship?” Malek said as they neared the lowered gangplank.

  “I thought you weren’t saying another word until you had water. I liked that policy.”

  “Enjoy your little power trip while it lasts, Zanari. I assure you it’ll be short lived.”

  Zanari turned and flicked her thumb across the tip of her nose, the jinn version of flipping someone off.

  “I always thought you Djan were a classy bunch,” Malek said.

  She was surprised he knew what the gesture meant. Then again, it wasn’t hard to imagine Malek giving the jinn he encountered cause to do the same.

  “It’s a Dhoma sand ship,” she said. “I’m taking you to their camp. There’s a healer there, and you’ll be safe from the Ifrit until Nalia recovers.”

  “You’re guests of the Dhoma?”

  “That’s one way of looking at it,” she said.

  Samar leaned over the railing of the ship. “What’s wrong with her?” he asked.

  Malek sighed. “Water. Then I’ll explain.”

  They set sail immediately. The Shaitan Dhoma on the crew raised their hands to the sky, their palms turning the color of burnished gold as they called for the power of air. A steady gale whipped over the desert and as the sails caught the wind, Zanari leaned against the mast, using it to keep her balance as the ship navigated the dunes.

  Malek drank as much water as the Marid jinn on the ship would manifest for him, then poured it over his face and head. Nalia lay on a pile of blankets beside him, still and lifeless.

  “Thought you’d be in the cave by now,” Malek said, once he’d finally finished.

  “Turned out to be a little more difficult to get inside than we thought,” Zanari said. “Don’t think that gives you an advantage, pardjinn.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “I always have the advantage.”

  “Really? Sitting in the middle of the Sahara, waiting to die?”

  “I can’t die.” He smiled and pointed his index finger at her. “That’s an advantage, wouldn’t you say?”

  Zanari snorted. “Your arrogance knows absolutely no bounds. One of these days, the gods are gonna catch up with you.”

  “Then they’ll have to be a lot faster than they’ve been thus far.”

  Zanari shook her head. “Okay, you’ve had enough time to blaspheme the gods and drink a lake’s worth of water. Now tell me what happened. You’re supposed to have a Dhoma guide and a functioning Nalia, and I see neither,” she said.

  Malek counted off on his fingers, his eyes darkening as he described each new horror. “Calar spent the better part of a day torturing me—lovely woman, I can see why your realm is doing so well right now. Apparently, she’s a bit like you.”

  “Like me? What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

  “A voiqhif of sorts. Has some mental magic. Basically she can get in your head and fuck it all up to hell.”

  Zanari stared. “I knew she could read minds after Nalia recognized her in my drawing, but . . . fire and blood.”

  “Well, blood and a little bit of fire, later on, but I’m getting ahead of myself,” Malek continued. His voice was tight, like he was stretched thin, ready to break. All the calm and swagger was gone, leaving only a man on the verge of a breakdown. “Nalia’s brother paid a visit to my cell.”

  “Wait. Bashil is in Morocco?”

  “Was, not is.”

  As Malek narrated the events of the past day in a brief, strained monologue, Zanari finally understood why Nalia wasn’t waking up.

&nbs
p; “What can I say?” he finished. “It’s been a pretty shitty twenty-four hours, Zanari.”

  Zanari closed her eyes. She hated how much it hurt, hearing what had happened to Nalia. She wanted to think it was fair, that somehow the gods had seen fit to dole out their own form of justice, linking Kir and Bashil. But the cruel, gruesome death of an innocent boy was never something to feel satisfaction over. Gods, if she’d lost Raif that way . . .

  They passed the rest of the journey in an uneasy silence as the Sun Chaser glided across the Sahara. The fawzel flew in two formations: one ahead of the ship and one behind. Zanari hoped they could make it to the Dhoma camp before any Ifrit patrolling the desert caught sight of them.

  The peaks of the Dhoma’s tents came into view, a burst of life and color on the barren landscape. Zanari still had trouble believing the structures were made of canvas. Some were two or three stories and leaned like drunken men. Many had smoke from cooking fires coming out of the roofs or jinn calling to one another from their windows. And over it all, the shimmering bisahm.

  “We’re here,” Zanari said.

  “Will your brother be gracing us with his presence?” Malek asked.

  Zanari glanced at Nalia. He’s going to lose his mind.

  “Unfortunately, yes,” she said.

  The Shaitan sailors calmed the wind, and Samar threw an anchor over the side of the ship. At the bottom of the gangplank stood the jinni from the council room who’d worn the white robes of a healer.

  “I’m told we have a Ghan Aisouri in need of care,” she said. Her raven hair was pulled back in a loose bun and she reached out a hand as Malek neared with Nalia.

  “The injury is in her mind, I think,” Zanari said. “She lost her brother.”

  “I’ll do what I can.” The healer’s golden eyes caught on Zanari’s, and Zanari blushed, suddenly breathless. “I’m Phara, by the way,” the healer said.

  Zanari placed her hand over her heart in greeting. “Zanari. Um. Djan’Urbi.”

  “I know.” Phara smiled once more, then turned to Malek, frowning. All the Dhoma knew he’d been a slave owner. Their camp was a stop on the underground caravan, so this didn’t sit well with them. “Follow me.”

  Zanari walked behind them, dazed. She didn’t need this kind of distraction, a jinni who made her light-headed just by looking at her. Besides, it never ended well. Male, female, it didn’t matter. Anyone Zanari thought she’d had a connection with turned out to want her brother and his power more.

  She scanned the village for Raif. She found him sitting in their tent, his head in his hands.

  “Hey, little brother.”

  He looked up, his eyes bloodshot. “How is she?”

  Zanari sat on the floor opposite him. “I’ll tell you, but I want you to promise me something.”

  “Zanari—”

  “Listen. I know you still love her. Of course you do, love doesn’t just go away like that.” She snapped her fingers. “But you can’t forget who she is and what she’s done.”

  “How. Is. She?”

  “It’s bad.” She took his hand. “Her brother. Calar killed him in front of Nalia. It was really awful, Raif. She’s alive, but . . . she hasn’t woken up. Malek says her chiaan has disappeared.”

  She could feel Raif’s own chiaan plummet, as though someone had cut him, bleeding the magic out.

  “I shouldn’t have left,” he whispered. “Why did I—”

  “Because she’s a murderer. Because you need to be the leader of the revolution now, not a lovesick boy.” Zanari stood up, suddenly enraged. She was tired of Nalia, tired of the power she had over Zanari’s family. “Her brother died. All your brothers are dying.”

  She swept past him, out of the tent, and across the camp. She didn’t stop until she reached the lake, that impossible body of fresh water nestled between two mountain-high dunes.

  It had always been like this, their whole lives: Zanari keeping her brother sane, Zanari doing whatever her brother wanted, Zanari cleaning up his messes.

  She was the eldest Djan’Urbi child. But the tavrai hadn’t given a second thought to passing over Zanari, not to mention her mother. Raif had only been fifteen summers old when Dthar Djan’Urbi died, but he was chosen as the next leader without question. He’d always felt everything too much, had never been comfortable in their father’s shoes. Every day he was trying to impress a ghost.

  It didn’t matter that Zanari had a power few jinn possessed. It didn’t matter that she was far more levelheaded or a better strategizer or the only one in her family capable of making the tough choices. What mattered was that she wasn’t a son. The Djan had always been patriarchal—even the barbaric Ifrit had no qualm choosing a young female to lead them in the bloodiest stage of the war yet.

  She thought about what Phara, the healer, had said in the council meeting the night before: Join us.

  The Dhoma were free jinn, living in relative peace. What was stopping Zanari from leaving Arjinna forever, just as they had? She wasn’t sure she knew anymore.

  22

  RAIF WAITED UNTIL THE SUN HAD SET TO SEE HER.

  Zanari’s words had stung, but they were no surprise. Nobody understood what Nalia was to him, least of all himself. As the sun moved through the sky and day turned to dusk, Raif fought a war in that tent, his heart battling reason.

  She killed Kir. Then, I love her. Then, But she killed your best friend. Then, I still love her.

  Finally, he stood up and left the tent, no closer to a resolution than he’d been since he’d heard she was sick. He didn’t know what he’d say or what it meant that he kept being drawn to her side against both of their wills. He wondered if there’d always be this push-pull with Nalia and if he’d simply have to learn to live with it, like the scars from the uprisings.

  The healer’s tent was at the edge of the camp, set against a dune and far from the noise of the fires and communal tables. A glass lamp in the shape of a red star hung from a pole near the entrance. The flap moved to the side, and someone exited the tent. It was dark and it took a moment for Raif to recognize Malek. He wore Dhoma clothing, a kaftan over linen pants, with the fabric for a turban wound loosely around his neck. He held a cigarette to his lips, but lowered it as Raif stepped into the moonlight. They stared at one another for a long moment, then Malek threw down the cigarette and strode toward him.

  “She needed you,” Malek said, his voice low and dangerous. It was the last thing Raif had expected him to say. “She needed you and you abandoned her. You left her to Calar. Do you know how close Nalia was to dying? And you—you could have saved them both, but instead there was just my gun and not enough time. And now she’s gone and I don’t know if she’s ever coming back.”

  Each word was a perfectly executed punch, hitting him right where it would hurt. For once, everything Malek said was true.

  “Get out of my way, skag.”

  Raif started forward, but Malek pulled back his right arm and swung, his fist landing squarely on Raif’s jaw.

  Raif’s hands flew in front of him, his emerald chiaan twisting around Malek so that the pardjinn flew back, then fell to the ground, hard. Raif heard something crack and the sound was deeply satisfying. The skag would need a healer for that one. Malek cursed, struggling to his feet, but Raif kicked his legs out from under him so that Malek was on his stomach, defenseless. Then Raif pressed his boot against Malek’s spine, pushing harder when he grunted in pain.

  “So help me gods, Malek, I know I can’t kill you, but I will get as close as possible. Now, I am going into that tent. I suggest you find somewhere else to occupy your time.”

  He lifted his foot and Malek got to his knees, then slowly stood. Sand clung to his stubble and he ran the back of his hand across his mouth, then turned to the side and spit.

  “I’ve always accepted Nalia for who she is,” Malek said. “She’s darkness and light. Always will be. You can’t tame her.”

  “I would never try to tame her,” Raif said. “She
’s not an animal to be trained.”

  “My feelings for Nalia and my method of expressing them may not have your nobility, but they’re what kept her alive. So go in there, convince the girl lying in a coma that abandoning her was the right thing to do. Inshallah, she will see you for the coward you are.” He paused. “If she ever wakes up.”

  Malek lit another cigarette as he strolled toward the outskirts of the camp. Raif watched him go, seething. The bastard was right. He was a coward. Letting Nalia go had been a relief. Without her, he wouldn’t have to disappoint his tavrai, he wouldn’t have to forgive her, or live with this love that was so big it threatened to crush him.

  Raif slowly turned toward the tent. Could he forgive her? Could he really choose her every time?

  He took a breath and walked inside.

  As Raif entered the tent Phara stood, ghostlike in her white healer’s robes. It was warm, too warm, and completely silent. A pot of herbs burned on a small table: desert sage, sandalwood, and a host of other scents Raif couldn’t place. Nalia’s bed was in a dark corner. In the dim light from the few candles that lit the room, he saw that she lay beneath a purple striped blanket, her dark hair splayed across a white pillow. The only color in her face was the black curve of her eyebrows and the soft lashes that brushed the dark circles under her eyes.

  “On Earth, they say purple is the color of healing,” the jinni said as she crossed to him. “And, of course, she’s a Ghan Aisouri. They say she has purple eyes.”

  Raif nodded. Swallowed. “Yes. They’re . . . they’re beautiful. When they’re open.” He gestured to the bed. “Can I . . . ?”

  “Of course. Talk to her, let her know you’re there. It helps.”

  “When will she wake up?”

  “Faqua celique.” Only the stars know. The jinni smiled and moved toward the tent flap. “Will you be here for a while?”

  “Until she wakes up.”

  “Then I will let you be.”

  Raif moved toward the bed in a daze. Zanari had called him a lovesick boy, and he was.