Ghostland (ghostland)

by Jory Strong

  His father had lost dozens of sons and daughters before he, along with the most powerful of the ancients, had created the Kingdom of the Djinn deep within the ghostlands. Afterward there had been few born to any of their race, even The Prince.

  Silence reigned, heavy and full of dark memories in the Hall where The Prince was said to have painted the history of the Djinn using angel blood and the colors of the world that had once been theirs to rule.

  His father tilted his head as if listening to voices only he could hear, or perhaps he was glimpsing a sliver of the future, as it was said he could do. “There are few old enough to remember, but this is the moment when even those who belonged to the House of the Dove realized there would be no compromise with the god who came here from a place beyond our understanding and claimed our lands as his own playground. We, who were created of Earth’s fire, were ordered to kneel down to the creatures of mud and submit to their will. When we refused, preferring to fight to the death rather than yield, they were given an incantation allowing them to summon and bind us to a vessel so we could be used as unwilling familiars.”

  The Prince’s hand lifted to hover over the image of Jetrel. “This is the moment when we learned what would happen to us if we killed a human who held us enslaved. This is when we learned what it meant to become ifrit, soul-tainted, one whose name can no longer be spoken out loud, one whose spirit can’t be guided back and reborn into a new life.”

  His father lowered his hand. Zurael fought the urge to repeat his question, to point out what his father already knew, that he hadn’t yet been bound and so he could kill the one who’d summoned him without becoming ifrit.

  “Though few remember it and those who do won’t speak of it,” his father said, “before this moment when we knew we must create a separate kingdom for ourselves, there were Djinn who found the humans alluring. The son whose loss is a deep scar on my heart was one of those. Our women were plentiful then and our children easily conceived. Yet he became obsessed with a human woman, refused to give her up when I demanded it. She became his weakness, the bait used to trap him. Her blood was used in the first spell cast to summon and bind a Djinn.”

  Zurael’s spine stiffened at what his father implied. “I have no interest in the human female other than killing her.”

  “Walk with me,” his father said. “Tell me of the summoning.”

  Zurael’s earlier rage returned in a heartbeat. The pictures in the Hall faded from his awareness. “There was no warning,” he said, “nothing to hint I was about to be taken. I heard my name and with it a command to end a ceremony before a sacrifice could be made. As we have all been trained to do since childhood, I took the form the humans call demon. There were black-robed figures gathered in a candlelit room and chanting around an altar. Their dark priest had an athame raised and was about to drive it into the heart of a woman. I killed them and would have killed the one who summoned me, but she was protected. When I drew near, a circle flared to life around her and I couldn’t cross it. I left before she could command me further or bind me.”

  “This woman who summoned you, was she naked or clothed?”

  Zurael’s body tightened as his mind’s eye once again traveled over the woman’s figure. He turned away in order to hide the sudden erection pressing against the loose flowing trousers. “She was naked,” he said, hating that his cock had stiffened in her presence as well.

  “Then it was not her physical form that summoned you but her spiritual one. There were sigils in the circle surrounding her?”

  “No.” Uneasiness slithered down Zurael’s spine as he realized he had not seen his full name written in ash or flame as it should have been, nor had she summoned him with the recitation of a spell as she should have done.

  His father stopped walking and turned to face him. On either side of them the mural ended.

  They were on the cusp of the present. Beyond where they stood the Hall continued in endless darkness, the future not yet captured on its walls.

  “A final question and then I will answer the one you asked me. Were you compelled to kill the humans, or did you do so because they deserved it and you desired to do it?”

  Zurael closed his eyes and flashed back to the instant when he’d taken form in a world he’d rarely visited, though like most, he monitored it and dreamed of the day when the Djinn would reclaim it. His father’s question was a whisper in his thoughts as he relived those moments of ruthless justice when the stench of evil was replaced by the smell of blood. Horror filled him as he realized there was no distinction between his summoner’s command and his own free will, but he didn’t turn away from the specter of it as he answered his father’s question honestly. “I wanted to stop the sacrifice. I killed the humans because I could.”

  He opened his eyes and saw his father studying him closely, perhaps willing him to say more, to admit it was the female and not the violence that had shaped his cock into a rigid line against the front of his trousers. Zurael said nothing and the silence was like a held breath.

  Along the walls, the scenes painted there shimmered with captured emotion. Unwillingly his gaze traveled the distance his feet had covered and stopped on the image of the first son and the first summoning.

  Icy dread found its way into Zurael’s heart. It was not dispelled when his father said, “Unless summoned, you may leave the Kingdom of the Djinn only once.”

  AISLING shuddered as she looked at the carnage in front of her. Fear held her trapped in the protective circle. The demon’s promise of retribution froze her limbs and withered her courage, even though she knew she needed to find out where she was, so she could return to her physical body with the knowledge.

  She closed her eyes and turned her face to bury it in the comfort of Aziel’s warm fur. Her heartbeat slowed, though the stench of blood and bowels and scented candles made her queasy.

  The desire to be back in her own body swelled up with sudden fierceness, along with an aching need to return to the only family she’d ever known. “Let’s get this over with,” she whispered to Aziel before she opened her eyes and stepped from the phantom ring.

  Elena’s chest rose and fell in a regular rhythm. The bloodred sigils painted on her eyelids and mouth, on her palms and the soles of her feet, stirred a memory in Aisling, but she knew it was a shaman’s memory and not a personal one.

  She climbed the stairs and, moving through the house, stepped out into the darkness in order to look for an address. The night was still, but the presence of the predators who roamed it wasn’t hidden from her as it would have been if her spirit and physical body were joined.

  Aisling could sense the ice-cold signature of a vampire looking for prey. Farther away a lone Were prowled, its hot energy a beacon though it wasn’t close enough for her to determine its animal form.

  Inside the other houses on the street she could hear muffled conversation. She could feel the terror the night held for the occupants who sheltered behind barred windows and locked doors.

  At the end of the block a bent pole still carried a street sign. Aisling read it and let her awareness of her surroundings fade. The gray of the ghostlands passed with a swiftness that left her dizzy.

  When she opened her eyes she found Father Ursu hovering just inches away from the protective circle. “3574 Rhine Street,” she said.

  Father Ursu took a phone from his pocket and relayed the address, though Aisling knew it was for show. Just as before, she felt another presence, someone else monitoring the room. This time she glanced around and noticed the small mirror on the wall above the table where Elena’s picture had been and where Aziel was now curled in apparent sleep.

  “You encountered a powerful demon,” Father Ursu said, drawing Aisling’s attention back to him and making her heart thunder with renewed fear.

  “How did you know?” Her voice came out little more than a whisper.

  Father Ursu gestured at the blackened ring of salt around her. “What happened?”

  Aisling
’s breath grew short as she stared at the protective circle. She shivered as the demon’s beautiful face and deadly words filled her mind.

  For a moment terror held her completely in its grip. Impending death covered her with a shroud of certainty. As soon as she broke the protective circle, the demon would come for her.

  “What happened, child?” the priest said in a soft voice as he crouched down in front of her.

  She tried to find the words and failed. A soft thump sounded as Aziel jumped from the table. He scampered across the room as if sensing her distress and her need of his comfort. Before the priest could grab him, he crossed the circle, brushing the blackened salt away with his feet and tail.

  He climbed to his favored position on Aisling’s shoulder. He chattered as if he was scolding her, reminding her that he was the one who had given her the name Zurael to whisper on the spirit winds.

  Aisling shuddered as the terrible fear left her in a sudden rush. She closed her eyes and concentrated on answering the priest’s question. “There was a dark mass. They were chanting, but a demon came before they finished the ceremony.” She took a harsh, involuntary breath as the events played out in her mind. Guilt tangled with the relief of having saved Elena. She’d wanted the sacrifice stopped, but now the deaths lay on her conscience. She’d commanded Zurael to stop the ceremony and he’d obeyed. She looked at the priest and said, “They’re all dead, all except for Elena.”

  Father Ursu nodded. “Black magic is dangerous.” He stood and offered his hand. “Come, child. I’ll take you back to your room. You’ve had a long, difficult day.”

  Aisling allowed him to help her to her feet and guide her from the room. She was emotionally exhausted, no longer able to worry about whether he was an ally or an enemy.

  ZURAEL pushed through the door and out into the night. The gentle breeze and rich scents greeting him did nothing to soothe the turmoil of his thoughts, the conflict of his desires, the unspoken questions raised by his father and left unanswered.

  For an instant he was tempted to gather the sand around him in a swirling, seething mass and roar through the desert until his emotions settled. He was tempted to take the form of a falcon and fly until he was too exhausted to think or question. But those were the responses of a child and he hadn’t been one in centuries.

  Above him the starless, moonless sky was pitch-black. If he were to hunt for the one who summoned him, he would need to do it during the day. The human he was looking for wouldn’t go out among the predators of the night.

  Zurael retraced the route he’d walked with his father’s advisor. He moved with casual grace, barely aware of his surroundings. With each step the urgency to find the one who’d summoned him grew and spread outward like a spider’s poisonous bite.

  He faltered with the thought, slowed, stopped. He was in a courtyard he rarely delayed in. To his left was an archway he’d seldom found a need to pass through.

  For long moments he contemplated what it might cost him. But in the end he turned and took the path leading to the House of the Spider.

  A young male Djinn, wearing the simple white trousers of a student, opened the door. He stepped back to usher Zurael in with a sweeping bow. “Welcome, Prince Zurael en Caym of the House of the Serpent. You honor us with your presence. Do you wish to call upon the one who leads our house? Or will another serve you?”

  “I will see Malahel en Raum,” Zurael said. The payment required of him would be steep, but he didn’t want to share the details of his shame, his summoning, with anyone other than the strongest in the House of the Spider.

  “As you wish, Prince Zurael.” The student bowed again. “If you will follow me, I will take you to the room she favors.”

  Like the walls of the Hall of History, the walls in the House of the Spider were covered in pictures. The images were captured in the silken weave of tapestries rather than painted in blood. Some of the scenes were reminiscent of the ones his father had created. But where The Prince’s history was filled with war, with small victories and larger defeats, with the theft of the Djinn land, the history found on the walls in the House of the Spider was interwoven with carnal depictions of intertwined humans, angels and Djinn.

  Zurael’s lips moved in a silent curse as the image of the female who’d summoned him filled his thoughts and his cock hardened in response. He turned his attention away from the twisted silken threads covering the walls and forced himself to think instead of the terror he’d felt in that instant when his name had been whispered on the spirit winds and his body had dematerialized against his will.

  Rage returned to fill the place carved out by terror. He thought of the humans and their black mass, their foolish desire to call for those trapped in the hell of the ghostlands. In a blink their deaths passed through his mind, and before he could stop himself he was once again standing in front of the female.

  Zurael’s penis throbbed. His lips pulled back, a silent snarl in defiance to the heat that rose upward, spiraling through his chest and neck and face. There was no hiding the erection pressed against the front of his trousers.

  He nodded stiffly when the student stopped at a doorway and bowed him into a small room. “I will tell the one you seek that you wait here.”

  The room was bare of influences. The walls were painted the gray of the ghostlands. Three large gray pillows served as seating around a wooden table only inches above the floor. Three teacups waited in a cluster at the table’s edge. Nearby, a ceramic teapot sat on a brazier, the glow of hot charcoal a symbol of the Djinn, whose prison kingdom was surrounded by the cold spiritlands.

  In four strides Zurael was next to one of the cushions. The smell of jasmine tea teased his nostrils. He contemplated the teacups and felt the stirrings of uneasiness in his chest. He had never been one to frequent this house.

  He turned at the sound of the door opening. Malahel en Raum stood in the doorway. She wore the concealing robes of a desert dweller, though like the room, they were gray. In deference to her position Zurael bowed slightly and said, “I thank you for attending me.”

  “Another would attend you as well,” Malahel said, entering the room.

  Zurael’s pulse spiked at the sight of the Djinn who stepped into the doorway. Like Malahel, Iyar en Batrael of the House of the Raven was dressed in the concealing robes of a desert traveler. His skin was as black as the material covering all of his body and much of his face. Only the gold of his eyes was easily seen.

  “Enter,” Zurael said, acknowledging Iyar with a bow of equal depth to the one he’d given Malahel.

  The three of them seated themselves on the cushions.

  “You wish to pour?” Malahel asked, indicating the waiting teacups with a small flick of her fingers and giving Zurael the choice as to whether to lead the conversation or not.

  Zurael picked up the teapot and filled the ceramic cups. “I was summoned.”

  Both Malahel and Iyar freed the lower half of their faces from the concealing material. Iyar’s dark fingers stroked the handle of a teacup. “The Prince has given you permission to pass through the gates in order to kill the one who summoned you?”

  “Yes.”

  Iyar nodded and took the teacup to his lips.

  Malahel set her teacup down. Her irises were as black as Iyar’s skin.

  “Tell us about the summoning,” she said.

  Zurael repeated what he’d told his father, hesitating for an instant but finally including the oddity of the summoner’s ability to call him in her astral state with little more than his name. Where his father hadn’t shown interest in the humans who’d been killed, Malahel and Iyar leaned forward as he described the black mass and the woman whose sacrifice he’d prevented.

  “Where were the sigils written?” Iyar said.

  Zurael conjured up the scene, focusing on an aspect that had been insignificant at the time. He’d barely glanced at the woman on the altar, and yet with Iyar’s prompting he was able to answer, “Her eyes, mouth, the palms of bot
h hands.”

  “The soles of her feet?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Iyar shrugged. “What you saw was enough.”

  “Enough for what?” Zurael asked, uneasiness returning with the look that passed between Malahel and Iyar.

  Malahel placed her teacup on the low table and settled her hands on her knees. “What is it you wish from the House of the Spider?”

  What did he want? What impulse had made him take the path that led here?

  Zurael sipped his tea as his thoughts danced from one scene to another, always returning to the female who’d summoned him and the fear that he would be bound in service before he could ensure his freedom by killing her. Divination was one of a Spider’s gifts. “I would know what power the human holds over me that she was able to summon me the way she did.”

  Malahel’s head tilted slightly. Zurael’s chest tightened as he imagined himself caught in her web. Dark eyes bored into his, unblinking, the thoughts behind them completely hidden.

  There was always a price to pay for coming to the House of the Spider. At the moment, his debt was canceled by the information he’d provided about the summoning.

  Zurael forced himself to lift the teacup to his lips with a steady hand and drain it of its contents. When he set it on the table, Malahel said, “I will read the stones on your behalf if you will accept a task.”

  “What task?”

  Malahel’s eyes flicked to Iyar. Iyar said, “The dark priest you killed was trying to summon an entity from the ghostlands and bind it to a human form. The sigils on the eyes, mouth, the palms and the soles of the feet are meant to give the priest complete control of the being. This is not the first time such a thing has happened in the recent past. There are Djinn lost to us, cursed to wander the human spiritlands because their souls are tainted by the ones they killed, making them ifrit. Their names are unspoken, crossed out in the Book of the Djinn. The House of the Raven would not have them summoned again, bound and used again by the humans.”