Dark Djinn (The Darkness of Djinn Book 1)

by Tia Reed

  “The charge to re-acquire the princess is mine,” Ahkdul said, “since she is my betrothed. And I must determine she remains undamaged before I accept her hand. I will accompany this party. It is my due.”

  “Very well.”

  They were talking about Kordahla like she was a possession! “I want to go too,” Vinsant said. “She’s my sister too.” If he was there, Mahktos might protect her. He had offered the frangipani for her.

  “Prudence dictates one heir remain in the realm,” Levi noted, but there was calculation in the delivery. The Crystalite Mines loomed large, but Vinsant did not have time to consider what Levi had in store. Three strides brought the Shah to him, which was impressive given how far he had backed away. Father’s iron grip as he pulled Vinsant close so their faces almost met was downright menacing.

  “The Majoria is right, else I would send you to mete out justice under the supervision of your master before he has you whipped to an inch of your life for your part in this. And if she is besmirched, I will beg Ahkdul that you be the one to wield the sword that restores honour to our name. You will not forget this as long as you live, and if you ever pull a stunt like this again, I will invoke blood honour upon you!” The Shah shoved him against the wall.

  “Mahktos said…” Vinsant squeaked. No sooner were the words out of his mouth than his body became unresponsive to his command. My eyes. Someone needs to tell me about my cursed eyes was all he had time to think before Levi’s voice boomed in his head.

  You will not take our god’s name in vain, nor will you lie in his name.

  One leg slid forward as Vinsant sagged. A pounding headache akin to the one after his initiation ceremony dropped him to the stone floor. He vomited what little of the apple pie remained in his stomach.

  Father threw him a disgusted look. With Ahkdul reaching for the shah’s goblet, that just wasn’t fair. Vinsant wiped the revolting spittle from his mouth. He was right. Kordahla was right. Mahktos help her! Father and Levi and Mariano had to see how wrong they were. He had to convince them. “Ahkdul doesn’t even want Kordahla as a wife,” he said from the floor. “He takes children to his bed.”

  The swine’s face reddened. Spluttering, he slammed the gold goblet onto the dining table and stepped back, right into one of the chairs. “Is this how you treat a guest? Is this slander what I and my offspring can expect of you?”

  Father yanked Vinsant up and dealt him a backhanded blow, not even caring the pig was a drunk. “You will apologise.”

  Blood trickled over his lip and into his mouth. He sulked up at Father, defiant. The scums would turn to drinking water before he apologised to that ogre.

  “Guards!” Father roared before turning to Arun. “You leave in one hour. I will hold you personally responsible for both Prince Mariano’s safety and the return of the princess.”

  “Let the Minoria stay. I will accompany Prince Mariano,” Levi said as the doors opened. There was a quick eagerness in his voice Vinsant found disturbing, like the Majoria relished the chance to oversee his sister’s punishment.

  The Shah emptied the bottle of wine into his goblet and took a long swig, holding Ahkdul’s eye. “This may yet come to war. I cannot permit my Majoria to fall into enemy hands. No. The Minoria will go. It is only fitting since he fell for the deception of children.”

  “You seem willing enough to send your heir, and for no other reason than revenge,” Vinsant muttered.

  Just his luck Father had the ears of a hound. “What did you say?” His voice was dangerously low.

  Vinsant glared but kept his mouth firmly closed. It did not appease the Shah. Realising the guards were awaiting his bidding, Father made an offhanded gesture at Vinsant. “Throw him in the dungeon for the night. It is time he learned duty and respect.”

  “There is the matter of dereliction as an apprentice,” Levi said, his parched voice cracking with frustration. Vinsant eyed the Majoria as the guards hauled him to his feet. He wouldn’t put it past Levi to think inflicting pain on a spirited prince was an appropriate outlet for his resentment. The dungeon would be a holiday compared to whatever punishment that zealous man dreamed up. If he could manage to stop thinking of his comfortable bed.

  The Shah had turned away. “Tonight he faces my wrath. Tomorrow, do what you will with him. I do not want to see him again until this is over.” Father waved his hand and the guards dragged Vinsant out.

  After two hours, the continual plink of water dripping off the walls was beginning to wear on Vinsant’s nerves. The green slime that clung to the stone made leaning back disgusting, and the musty straw let the dampness leach through his tight churidar if he sat. The guards, not mahktashaan, were rather wary of him in his cloak. After they had secured him in the cell, he had managed to coerce a rather stilted conversation. That was until he had removed his hood and revealed his startling eyes. At that point, they had promptly remembered urgent tasks and left him all alone. The joke was wearing thin. He was bored, starving, and nearly out of his mind wondering what was going on. When the door at the end of the passage clanged, and steps drew near, Vinsant leapt to the bars, ready to offer Father an effusive if insincere apology. He did not expect a hooded mahktashaan.

  “Am I glad to see you,” he said when he saw the cerulean crystal.

  “Have you had enough time to cool off?” Arun asked, in a tone that suggested he quite supported Vinsant’s incarceration.

  Vinsant let go the bars and stepped back. “Why don’t you let me out of here and find out?”

  Arun turned to leave.

  “Wait,” Vinsant said. “I’m sorry.”

  “I thoroughly doubt that. Latchtos.” The lock clicked open. Arun stepped inside, drawing the barred door closed after him. Vinsant heard the lock latch back into place. Arun waved his hand and murmured, and the straw dried out, losing much of its stale odour. At another gesture, a stool appeared, and a final selos had the air thrum.

  “I have created a sound shield. We may talk in private,” the Minoria said, seating himself.

  Vinsant sat cross-legged on the straw, leaned forward, and sucked the ulcer on his bottom lip. He eyed the stool, wondered if the same magic could produce a bed, and asked, “Do you think you’ll find Kordahla?”

  “I have no doubt we will.”

  “Will she…I mean Ahkdul and Father…will they…”

  “They are both in a rage, and your father’s at least is unprecedented. Either one may invoke blood honour. I think a lot will depend on her attitude when she returns. It is why I am relieved to part of the search party. She might listen to my counsel if I can speak with her alone.”

  “Then Father won’t recant his offer.”

  “The shame is his, Vinsant. It is up to Ahkdul whether to honour the terms agreed, and the Verdaani have too much invested in this marriage to back out if she remains pure. Though I have no doubt he will make her pay for the rest of her life. If she returns, you must bid her humble herself. It may mean her life.”

  Vinsant did not think she could bear to live with Ahkdul’s constant punishment. He bit his tongue – literally since it had got him into so much trouble of late – but gave Arun a look he knew would communicate the sentiment.

  “I did not come here to discuss Kordahla,” Arun said.

  “Uh, my eyes,” Vinsant said with relief. He felt his brow relax and his headache ease.

  “Your vision of Mahktos, yes, if you will not mind later on recounting what you tell me to the Majoria, and perhaps listening to a repetition of all I say.”

  “Where is he?” Vinsant asked, craning his neck to check the dark corridor and half expecting Levi to be lurking in the shadows.

  “Busy. It is only because Kordahla is involved in this that I seek to learn anything which may temper her predicament.”

  “Not because you want to put me out of my misery?” He caught Arun suppressing a smile.

  “A little of that. It is important we know exactly what Mahktos said.”

  The entire expe
rience was etched into Vinsant’s memory. He was sure he would never forget a single detail as long as he lived. “I thought if the mahktashaan were going to kill me, I might as well see whether Mahktos forgave me and die at his hand if he didn’t. It is the more noble end, don’t you think?”

  “You disobeyed me yet again.”

  “It worked out, didn’t it?”

  “Vinsant, I am close to washing my hands of you.”

  “Just so you know, just for a moment, I wished you were there with me.”

  “I feel privileged,” Arun said dryly.

  Vinsant cleared his throat and squirmed on the rustling straw, then saw the warmth in Arun’s eyes. “Mahktos accepted my offering but said He was mad I gave my sister the quartz. He said I would pay for that treason. Then He said the mahktashaan were warned admitting me to their ranks would spell havoc for their order. And he also said there is much at play here beyond their ken.”

  “That is interesting indeed,” Arun remarked. “Anything else?”

  Vinsant ran his tongue over his sore lip, and frowned as though trying to recall. What he was really doing was trying to decide how much to tell Arun. He met the Minoria’s eyes and knew this man though years his senior was perhaps the truest friend he had. And Kordahla’s only hope. “He said He gave me no sanction for my service. What does that mean?”

  Now Arun’s smile widened as he chuckled. “It means we are yet to treat you as an apprentice for all the god has marked you as special. He wants you to rise through the ranks by proving yourself.”

  He tore a piece of straw into strands. “Well how else would I do it? I mean I’ve been saying I want to be treated like a normal apprentice all along.”

  “If you were that, Vinsant, you would be long dead. At least thrice over.”

  Vinsant looked down to hide the flush in his cheeks. “There was one more thing he said.” There was nothing to be gained from holding back. His secret, and Kordahla’s, were exposed. “He said I might keep our secrets, Kordahla’s and mine. He said He would not tell me more because I must carve my own destiny. He said He would not interfere.”

  “That is most intriguing of all.”

  Vinsant waited, but Arun was thoughtful. “The gods can influence us then?” he asked.

  “We have free will. They will not interfere with that. But Mahktos has implied events are being shaped in the higher realms, events that will impact on this earth. Such events rarely deliver a peaceful end.”

  “But if he was so mad at my actions, why did He give me permission to keep them a secret?”

  Arun sighed. “I do not claim to know the mind of a god, Vinsant.”

  “But you can guess. I mean, you know about all this stuff.”

  “I am hardly an expert, but I have to think that you will somehow be involved, for better, in whatever events Mahktos hinted at, but that your actions may imperil the mahktashaan.”

  Vinsant slid his eyes to a glob of slime oozing down the wall. It looked ready to splat to the floor. It didn’t make sense that the theft of a single crystal could place the mahktashaan in such peril.

  Astute as he was, Arun noticed his thoughts had drifted. “What are you not telling me?” the Minoria asked.

  “I need to know about my eyes,” Vinsant said, with a fleeting crooked smile as the slime stretched.

  “Not before I have all the details.”

  “I don’t think it matters.”

  “Let me be the judge of that,” Arun said.

  “You said I could trust you.”

  “You could hardly be in more trouble than you are in now.”

  “So tell me about my eyes first. I’m obviously still an apprentice. Why do I have the eyes of a mahktashaan?”

  The glob plunked. Arun stood and paced the width of the cell. “What I am about to tell you is our most closely guarded secret. It is made known to mahktashaan only on the day of their induction. I told you there are those who fail that test, and of the fate they suffer.” He paused and Vinsant nodded. “Of the promising apprentices, it is generally those who cannot accept what they learn that day that fail.” It had to be one massive secret, because he sucked in a deep breath before he was ready to reveal it. He put on a real earnest expression, too. “The mahktashaan draw their power from a very specific source.”

  “The crystals.”

  “The crystals are a conduit for the power, but not its source.”

  Vinsant sucked on his cheek. “The power comes from Mahktos.”

  “Indirectly.” Arun moved his hand. The air thrummed with a higher frequency. “Our true power is sourced through the djinn.”

  Vinsant felt his jaw slacken. “You mean,” he said, and had to stop to suck his cheek because the idea was almost beyond comprehension. “You mean the djinn do your bidding?”

  “I mean we tap into their power. We draw on them as a power source, but we certainly do not control them.”

  “But aren’t they evil?”

  “They are djinn. Quite simply, their nature is not our own. We perceive them as treacherous, but that is applying our standards to beings beyond our ken.”

  “And they just let the mahktashaan use them?”

  “It is not them we use, but their power. And there is a price to pay. As we bind to them, so they bind to us. We presume our magic allows them to interfere in the world to a far greater degree than would otherwise be possible.”

  “So if there was no magic, they wouldn’t be looking to trick us into making pacts.”

  “They will always do that. It is their nature. But I think the nature of the pacts, and their impact might be different, less personal. We have no real way of knowing for sure.”

  Except by forsaking magic, Vinsant thought. But nobody is going to do that. It was a lot to take in. He shook his head and found his brows were knitted so tight his headache was worsening again. “I don’t get it.”

  “I’m not surprised. You will probably need to undergo the induction ceremony before you comprehend.”

  “What does this have to do with my eyes?”

  “A mahktashaan’s eyes reflect his power.”

  Vinsant bobbed his head about. He had always known mahktashaan eyes were the same colour as their crystal. It wasn’t as though the hoods concealed their eyes. “Yeah?”

  Arun sat on the stool. “Our crystals are the colour of the djinn whose power we channel. Our talents are limited by the abilities of those djinn.”

  Vinsant pulled several different faces, to no effect since he had no idea what he was feeling. “So some are more powerful than others?”

  “Yes. Some are created that way but they may grow and learn as we do. If the stories of the same djinn appearing to subsequent generations are true, they have thousands of years in which to do so.”

  Vinsant shook his head. “That means a mahktashaan is only as strong as the djinn whose power he channels. That’s not fair. You could work incredibly hard and never amount to much in the mahktashaan.”

  “Do you really want to apply the word fair to the djinn? For some inexplicable reason, a mahktashaan seems perfectly matched to the crystal he bears. Mahktos’s hand is in that, which is not surprising since the djinn are his creation.”

  “Huh?”

  “I will leave that for now. We have your eyes to discuss.”

  “Mahktos has already decided I’m to be bound to a crimson djinn?” He scooped up a handful of chaff and let it sieve through his fingers.

  “Oh no. This is an honour more profound. That particular shade of red is the preserve of Mahktos himself. You, Vinsant, will be calling on the mightiest power of all. You will channel the power of the god.”

  Vinsant could only blink. After a very long time he opened his mouth. Only a croak came out.

  Arun said, “Do not get too ahead of yourself, my young friend. From what I understand, Mahktos has decreed you are to complete your apprenticeship, and you have still to pass your induction.” He broke into a sardonic smile. “From the way you attend t
o your training, your acceptance might not be a given. What I don’t understand is why, when he warned us to abandon you, when he hinted you would be our undoing, he bestowed this unprecedented honour.”

  Much to his chagrin, Vinsant could only shake his head again.

  Arun rose, once more the Minoria asserting his rank. “I am a mahktashaan, Vinsant. I must protect our order even as I protect the royal family. What is it you are holding back?”

  In the face of these revelations, Vinsant took a deep breath, stood up and faced Arun. “You said I could trust you. You said you would listen man to man.”

  “If it helps Kordahla.”

  “I gave Kordahla a crystal to take to Myklaan. I took it after the Majoria examined Errol, my grapper. We thought it would help convince Myklaan to grant her asylum.”

  The Minoria lips were tight. “I see.” He faced Vinsant some seconds more, then picked up the stool, went to the door of the cell and let himself out. Vinsant followed, but Arun swung the bars in his face. “This is not something I will tell the Majoria, and I suggest for the moment you hold your tongue. Your violation of our trust is enough to have you put to the sword. Do not try to invoke Mahktos’s name, it won’t save you, not when he decreed he has not sanctioned your service. A ghost may channel Mahktos’s power as well as a living soul, and the Majoria will not hesitate to create ghosts if the mahktashaan are threatened.”

  Vinsant gripped the bars. “I didn’t mean to do any harm. I did it before Mahk…before I atoned.”

  “It is for that reason I will take no action on this. Vinsant, if that crystal gets to Myklaan, it could do us irreparable damage. I hope the night will see you reflect on the path you wish to take. And your true allegiance.”

  “You’re not really going to leave me in here, are you?”

  “You did the right thing by telling me. It is information I should have if I reach Myklaan. But I’m afraid I am in accordance with the Shah on this. It is high time you learned some respect.”