Now all I had to do was verify the information Rashid had given me ... information that could be a lie, a trap, a useless waste of time, or—and this I believed—a golden opportunity to finish Pearl once and for all.
Tracking on the aetheric is simple for Djinn since it’s their primary home, the environment in which they feel most alive, most comfortable. For humans, it is a closed door. For Wardens, there is access, but it is limited, and even the most gifted find it extraordinarily difficult to read the subtleties of that world; human senses, enhanced though they might be, are not meant to take in what is natural for Djinn.
But I had an advantage—I was a blind woman remembering sight. I could interpret what I could see in ways that most of the Wardens never could.
Distance was no barrier on the aetheric; my self-projection could travel easily enough without regard to the laws that governed the natural world. My next stop was California, where Pearl had established her second known camp. Like Colorado, this place had been closed and abandoned, but the traces were stronger. I didn’t dare venture too close. The shimmering blackness above it warned me that it would burn. I recalled the fate of my friend Gallan all too well—he’d been the first Djinn to come in too close to Pearl’s orbit, and he’d been destroyed. Utterly destroyed—unwound from the world, erased from existence. There were ways to kill Djinn, but in my opinion that was the worst.
The California facility still had a faint black shadow stretching out into the aetheric, fading to a thread-thin line. I followed it, careful to stay out of accidental touching range. Around me, lights flared and rolled in confusing shapes, coming and going in a brilliant neon flood. I was in an area rich with human history, from the ancient tribes who had first inhabited it to the flood of immigrants searching for land and gold to the modern-day prospectors panning for fame and fortune in an inhospitable land. Djinn were more difficult to spot than Wardens—Wardens flared with brilliant sparks, but Djinn were subtler, more inclined to fade into their natural environment.
I avoided them all as I raced after the fading trail of Pearl’s influence on the world. Where are you, sister?
The thread ended, fraying into gray smoke.
Gone.
I cast about, feeling more tired than I should. There was no sign of Pearl, nor of any other Warden or Djinn. I was standing in an utterly featureless area, one that held the soothing, nacreous colors of a shell.
Ah. I was over the ocean. The huge amount of the Earth’s surface covered by water had its own aetheric energy, but few features; humans traversed it, but made little lasting impact. Had I been Djinn, I could have seen the magnificent depth and variety of the life around me, but Wardens were not so perceptive.
I had lost Pearl at sea.
I marked the spot and opened my eyes into the mortal world while holding the aetheric steady as well, overlaying the two, and found the spot on the map where Pearl’s trace had disappeared. I colored it with a thick black dot, then drew a line from the rancid California compound to where she’d last left a mark.
Off the coast of Florida.
Journeying on the aetheric was tiring, and I was quickly burning through the power that I’d received before leaving the school. I should have taken power from Turner, my FBI friend and enemy, but delay might have cost me more than I would have gained. He wasn’t especially powerful, on his own.
No, all in all, I really had very little choice. I was cut off from the powerful Warden friends I might normally call upon—Lewis Orwell and Joanne Baldwin, so nearly equal in power and influence, had taken the majority of significant Wardens with them out to sea, seeking to stop a rogue Warden—or, possibly, something worse—from ripping a hole between universes and allowing destruction to pour forth. They’d been gone some time now, and the news had been ominously silent. We would know if they failed, of course. Success might well be heralded by a bland wave of sameness—and only the Wardens themselves could rejoice at that.
But whether success or failure awaited them, one thing was certain: My most powerful allies couldn’t help me now. My options were small, and dwindling all the time.
I could still draw power from Luis without speaking to him; it would be a simple matter, since the connection between us still existed. My entire being resisted that necessity, but I am nothing if not practical.
I knew he wouldn’t stop me, but I was reluctant to act like a parasite, preying on him for nothing more than existence. Even given what he’d done to breach the trust between us. I tentatively tugged on the connection between us, and got no response. I tugged harder, trying to open the flow of the low-level trickle that always existed between us, but he had blocked me.
I had no choice but to pick up the phone and call him. It was a difficult thing, to press the keys and initiate the contact. ... I didn’t want to talk with him, truly I didn’t, and yet some part of me yearned to hear his voice. I wondered if he felt the same anger, anguish, need, and desire, all rolled into a dangerously spiked ball. I couldn’t tell, truly. He was guarded now, more guarded than ever before.
Luis answered on the third ring, but said nothing. For a moment, it was a war of silence and static, and then I said, “I am close to finding a way to Pearl, but I’m running out of power. Will you help me?”
He was quiet for a long few seconds, and then he said, “Sure.”
“Why didn’t you simply let me draw what I needed?”
The pause this time was longer, and his voice was weary as he said, “Maybe I just wanted to hear your voice. Make sure you were okay.”
That hit me hard, and I took the phone away from my ear for a few seconds, struggling to sort out my own torrent of feelings. I finally took a deep breath and said, “I am fine.”
“Fine. Really.”
“Yes.” I wasn’t, not now, not listening to his breathing, his voice, knowing how far separated we were by both distance and emotion. “Luis—”
“Yeah?”
I couldn’t bring myself to forgive him, or even to acknowledge that I understood the decisions he’d made. I admired his ruthless dedication, but the scars were still too bloody. “How is Isabel?”
“Better,” he said. He sounded relieved that it was a less controversial topic. “She’s settling in, and the seizures are coming under control; Marion thinks we’re making good progress. She helps out with Elijah; he likes her better than any of the others.”
“But she’s suffered more seizures.”
“Yeah, one more,” he said. “Not as bad as the first one.”
“Have you given any thought to what I said? About the possibility of someone acting against you inside the school?” I hadn’t discussed it with him, but that mudslide had not been any sort of natural occurrence, not at that time of year. It had been brought down on me by a Weather Warden, one subtle enough to do it without tipping his hand early.
“I’ve looked around, but there’s nobody I can put my finger on. Maybe it was just random, Cassiel.”
His use of my full name felt like a barb, even though his voice remained calm and neutral. I had grown used to his nickname for me, Cass. I hated it on anyone else’s lips, but from him it seemed ... honorable. And warm.
“I don’t think it was,” I said. “So please, watch yourself. And protect Isabel.”
“I’d be able to do that better if you’d stayed.”
“I couldn’t. You know that.”
His voice was sharp enough to draw blood. “You made your choice, Cass. We’ll both get by without you. Sorry, but that’s how it is. That’s how you wanted it.” He was silent for a moment, in which I fought the impulse to protest that I hadn’t chosen this, not this, not this separation and anger and loss. I’d chosen him, and Ibby, to love, and that had been an enormous risk for me; it was duty that pulled me in a different direction, and I responded to it only because of my burning desire to keep them safe. He was the one who’d made the irrevocable decision to betray my trust, and I was certain that part of that was spite.
&nb
sp; “Just tell me that she’s all right,” I said, and closed my eyes. I felt suddenly very weary, and very alone. “Tell me that you’re all right, too.”
His voice, when it came again, was lower, softer. “I didn’t think you’d care whether I was or not.”
“I don’t know,” I confessed. “But I told you: Djinn don’t fall out of love that easily. And I do care about you, even if I wish I didn’t.”
“Ouch.” He sighed. “Cassiel, please. Yeah, I should have told you about the guys waiting outside to pick up your trail. I was going to when you stopped by my room, but ... You ever have one of those moments where you wish you’d done something, wish it with everything you’ve got? That was mine. I should have warned you. I didn’t want you hurt.”
It was an apology, but not the one I was seeking. “And Rashid?” I asked. “Have you freed him?”
“Cass—”
“Then there’s nothing more to discuss. I can’t trust you if you keep a slave against his will.”
Luis cleared his throat uncomfortably and changed the subject. “Where are you?”
“Far away,” I said. His voice sounded thin and distant now, fading as the connection fluctuated. “But never far from you if you need me. I hope you believe that.”
“I do. Cass? I’m sorry for what I said before you left. Not that it wasn’t true, but it didn’t need to be that harsh. I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to hurt you.”
“I know,” I said. “And I’m sorry that my decisions have led us to this, but I couldn’t see another way. Something must be sacrificed for the greater good.”
“And that something’s us,” he said, recovering some of the cool distance to his tone. “Even if it puts Ibby at risk.”
“I’m trying to save Ibby. And all the others. But I can’t do it from there—you know that.” Now we were entering the downward spiral of arguing the finer points again, and I knew where that would end—in pain. “Please take care of her.”
“I will,” he said. If there was the slightest emphasis on the “I” part of that statement, I supposed he could be forgiven for it. “If you need power, take it. I’m out.”
And he was, ending the call without any further courtesies. He was learning bad habits, but probably from me.
I had learned so much from him, including how bitter a personal betrayal could be. It seemed only fair.
I closed my eyes, calmed my thoughts, and reached for the connection between us. It was a slender thing, but still strong, built of trust and experience; our recent discord had frayed that rope badly but not broken it. Over time, it would repair ... if we survived.
There was an oddness to doing this now, a kind of strange, tentative worry that rose in me as I began to draw power out of him. This felt less intimate and more like a clinical transaction. That should have been a good thing; it held far fewer complications, for both of us.
But as the power sank into me, heavy and golden as liquid sunlight, I found myself thinking about his face, his mouth, his body, his skin ... all the things that were now forbidden to me, by my own choice.
And it hurt, again.
I don’t know what Luis felt, or thought, but as soon as I could, I cut the flow of energy between us. The contact had left me feeling restless and wild at a very deep, almost cellular level. I craved ... something. And I didn’t dare define what it might be.
I glanced at the maps again, and at the network of black dots I was slowly forming. I’d marked all the places where the FBI had identified either locations or suspected groups of Pearl’s growing list of followers. I could visit each on the aetheric if I managed my power carefully enough. That would have been the smart, methodical way to approach it, but I believed Rashid. Right or wrong, I believed him. And if Pearl had planned to have those children brought to her in New Jersey, then it was possible that was where her training efforts were under way—and where she would be visible, flesh, and vulnerable.
I went straight to the camp location in New Jersey. As before, there was a thin, toxic shimmer to the aetheric mists over the location, but this was stronger than before—and it seemed to have a sense of me, as well. I stopped well short of the vague, twisting shapes that shrouded the area, but it seemed that I couldn’t stop drifting toward them. Troubling—and then I realized that I had stopped, after all.
The mists were reaching out for me.
I quickly propelled my aetheric body backward, but a whisper of dark shimmer brushed me as I did, and a black, cold pain shot through me. It shouldn’t have happened; nothing should have been able to affect me on the aetheric level, not in this form. But I felt it like a freezing electrical shock, and tumbled away from it, out of control, driven by a panic even I couldn’t fully understand.
There was something there. Something alive. Something hungry.
It wasn’t Pearl, but it was an aspect of her. An avatar, waiting for the unwary Djinn or Warden. The chill I’d felt had been her leech battening on me to drain away all of my aetheric energy ... all that I’d borrowed from Luis, and all that powered the cells of my human body as well. This was new, and deadly indeed, if it could attack Wardens, and not only the Djinn.
Pearl was growing stronger, and I’d allowed that to happen. It was as Ashan had told me in the beginning: She was drawing power from humans, and from Wardens, and if she wasn’t stopped, she’d soon have enough to destroy all of the Djinn as well—a ravening black hole consuming all that it touched.
I experimented a bit with the trembling black fog, seeing what triggered it to move closer and what it would ignore. That was a dangerous game, and it brought me into contact with the mist more than once. By the time I’d done my investigation, and gathered enough information, I was once again running dangerously thin on reserves—but it was worth it.
I knew enough to get a warning through.
My next call was to Luis, again, to give him the information, location, and findings; he would tell Marion, who would coordinate the Wardens and warn the Djinn, such as remained on speaking terms with us. Luis brought up the issue of power, for which I was thankful; I hadn’t wanted to ask a second time. This time, the flowing energy was stronger, and the images and desires it woke in me more pronounced.
Not something I could share with Luis, but I was relieved when he said, a little hesitantly, “Do you want me to stay on the phone? I’m on some downtime. I could go up with you to take a look, see what you’re up against.”
The idea of seeing him, even in aetheric form, was irresistible, and the tone of his voice seemed to indicate that he wanted at least some kind of reconciliation. I forced myself to hesitate before saying yes, hoping I didn’t sound as desperate as I felt; if he sensed it, he had the kindness not to say anything. Our good-byes were nonexistent again, but I left the phone on and the channel open, and rose into the aetheric. The cell phone would be a great help, since humans could not easily speak on the aetheric, and even Djinn sometimes found that their conversations took on confusing, unintended overtones in the realm of energy and intentions.
Finding each other was easy. The connection between us could be used as a guideline, and I flew toward him at dizzying speeds through the aetheric—native, to the Djinn, but confusing and wildly unreal to human senses. I felt the vibrations between us grow in intensity until I saw him hurtling toward me with equal urgency. I slowed, and so did he, until we were hovering just apart. His form glowed a soft gold now, with flickers of copper in the form of flames on his arms. Most Wardens chose other forms on the aetheric, but not Luis; he was himself, in all important aspects. I still wondered how he saw me here, in this place. It wasn’t a thing I could witness for myself.
Speaking was all but impossible between us, but the feelings that cascaded back and forth were not. His hand reached for mine, and as he touched me I saw that my fingers glowed moon-silver on the right, dull copper on the left, because half of my left arm had been replaced and reworked with Djinn power in metal on the physical plane. It made little difference
to me; sensations still came through, even touch, though perhaps a bit muted. I actually forgot about it much of the time.
On the aetheric, though, the contrast was striking.
Intoxicating as being in his presence again was, I knew we couldn’t linger here; Luis’s time was limited, and he needed rest. There was an underlying flicker of gray around him that spoke of exhaustion.
But he’d come to me, despite everything. And I knew, because I could feel it, that his instinctive pleasure in my presence was as intense as mine in his.
I held his hand as we shot up in a parabolic arc through the mists and lights, dodging dimly seen figures of other Wardens on their own affairs and Djinn who registered in ghostly flickers. We came crashing down toward the flat representation of the world at the black spot on my map, near Trenton, New Jersey.
More of that black shimmering curtain, but this one rose higher and twisted with more power than before. It seemed to move like a silently blazing fire, reaching up to brush the roof of the aetheric world and stretching down into the physical world below—a burning black tree of power.
Of all the things that I had seen so far of Pearl’s influence, that was the most alarming. The power involved was staggering.
More than that—it felt aware.
She’s here. She might not have taken physical form yet, but it was a certainty that her energy was stored here, readying itself.
Something in me reacted to her presence with a kind of longing, and panic, and I dragged Luis to a halt, hovering well beyond any approach to the column of force. Shafts of multicolored light crackled within it, lightning without a storm’s logic, and on the real world I dimly heard Luis’s voice on the phone say, “We can’t handle this alone, Cass. This is way above our pay grade.”
He wasn’t wrong, but the fact was that there were no others to call on. Marion couldn’t leave the children; most of the other powerful Wardens had been called out to the emergency at sea. Pearl had timed her move to active strikes just perfectly; Ashan wouldn’t commit the Old Djinn to fighting her, and David couldn’t. He’d already tasked them to the Wardens and to combat existing threats.
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