by Pat Esden
Terror drove me forward, the spears inches behind. I careened out of the tunnel and into the performance area. Cheers roared from the crowd, for a moment louder than the grunts and howls coming from the fire-encircled platform just ahead of me. On it, the three men still battled. Blood and sweat coated them. Knives slashed. Fists connected with flesh. Bones crunched. One was lean and fast, more wolf than man. The other was all muscles and bulk, the electric blue of his aura spiking through the links in his chain mail. In a gulp of horror, I knew who they were. Samiel and Ouzel: the champions. The third fighter was—
“Chase!” I screamed, bolting toward them.
The glass spears screamed past me on both sides and slammed themselves point first into the ground, forming an impenetrable fence between the fight and me.
Two guards grappled me by the arms, hauling me up a set of stairs and onto the stage. As they dragged me toward the head table, Malphic and his guests rose to their feet.
“Annie,” Mother gasped.
Malphic’s spy folded his burn-scarred arms across his chest and grinned. Fuck. I was so fucked. Jaquith was there too, standing behind Malphic.
I twisted free from the guards. Below I could see the fight, unreal at this distance like a bloody TV show, like how Lotli and Chase’s dance had seemed for a moment. Except I knew this was real with every cell in my body. I could smell the blood. Hear the suck of a knife withdrawn from flesh.
Samiel leapt toward Chase, but Ouzel caught him upside the head with a battle-ax, sending the bloodied lealaps flying through the flames and off the platform. Ouzel threw the ax aside, motioning with both hands for Chase to come and get him. Chase prowled toward him, his eyes focused, his marks glowing like blue sapphires. Ouzel charged, taking Chase to the ground. Punches flew. Ouzel’s head snapped back, blood spewing from his mouth, his aura hot blue as fire. Chase’s marks flared brighter, matching his opponent as they broke apart and came together again, fist slamming ribs, slamming throats and kidneys. The crack of breaking bones. The flash of knife blades. The crowd stamped their feet, chanting, “Samiel. Samiel . . .” as the lealaps crawled through the encircling flames and back onto the platform, his muzzle splattered with bloody saliva, his teeth bared. The three men circled, their eyes battle-hungry, their movements all instinct and ferocity.
I whirled toward Malphic. “You have to stop this. Chase. He’s your son. They’ll kill him!”
Malphic chuckled. “It makes a father proud to see him like that.”
Mother grabbed Malphic’s arm, the high pitch of her voice echoing mine. “Do as she says. Please, for me.”
Malphic yanked from her grip, his fierce eyes on mine. “What makes you so certain the boy won’t win?” The burn-scarred spy leapt out of the way as Malphic stormed around the table toward me.
Shoulders back, I thrust my knife out in a warning. “Stay away from me.”
A jackal-like smile lifted his lips. “Nice knife,” he said, stepping closer.
“I mean it.” My hand trembled, despite how hard I tried to keep it still. In fact, my whole body vibrated.
He held his hands out, as if he meant no harm. “It’s a valiant gesture, this bravado of yours. But you’re too late.” He took another step, out of the shadow cast by one of the columns and into streaks of brightness. He stopped and glanced toward the source of the light. “My, what could that possibly be—sunrise?”
Beyond the columns and the rocky outcrop, where the ocean met the horizon, rays of sunlight slashed upward into the lightening sky and a sliver of sun inched into view.
Pain gripped me. Hunching over, I clutched myself and groaned as the transition began.
“Annie,” Mother cried. She started toward me, but Jaquith appeared out of nowhere, pinning her arms behind her back, keeping her from getting to me.
“Don’t worry,” I panted, trying to keep my face calm despite the spasms branching inside me. “I’m fine.”
Fighting the pain, I straightened as much as I could and shoved my knife back into the strap. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Chase, down on all fours while the two fighters pummeled him with kicks and punches. My chest clenched, I lost focus and the transition took me.
“No,” I moaned, sinking to my knees, sunrays passing through my body as the weight went out of it, my hands and arms shimmering, fading from solid into ethereal. My head swam from the force of it.
I heard Chase grunt. A yelp and slam. The crowd screamed. The genies on the stage applauded. Even Malphic turned to see what had happened.
Mother wrenched free from Jaquith and launched herself at Malphic. “Stop this!” she shouted.
He pushed her back. “He chose to return. He and our laws, not I, will determine his fate.”
I gripped the edge of the table, pulling myself up to my feet. “Please, listen.”
Mother’s fingers clamped Malphic’s forearm, her voice strong and determined. “You have the power. Free him. Give him sovereignty over his fate.”
“If that’s what you wish,” Malphic said. His gaze skimmed in my direction, a pleased smile on his lips. In one swift motion, he swiped a black decanter from the table and poured the contents on the floor.
Mother’s eyes went wide. “No. Not that!”
It took me a second to realize what was happening. When I did, I staggered backward. The shelves of bottles in the harem. Solomon’s genies jarred up like preserves in my family’s treasury. My body as ethereal as any of theirs.
Malphic grinned at Mother, his voice terrifyingly sweet. “Your wish is my command.” He raised his index finger. “But you may only have one wish, not two. Which will it be? The boy or the girl?”
“I’ll stay!” I shouted, so loud my voice ripped across the arena. The air hung noiseless for a moment. I moved forward and raised my gaze to meet Malphic’s.
He stroked his hand down the decanter. “This is your mother’s choice not yours.”
“Let Chase go,” I demanded, my voice solid as bedrock.
Ignoring me, Malphic began to chant under his breath, his index finger making a slow circle around the decanter’s mouth. His aura glowed and shimmered, faceted and bright as deep-blue diamonds in the sun. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t understand a word he said, but each phrase rang in my ears and pulled the breath from my lungs. My skin tingled. The taste of dried mushrooms settled on my tongue. The oily scent of roses filled my nostrils.
I dropped to my knees and began to tremble, harder and faster, my ghostly body no longer under my control, moving in a smokelike tendril toward the decanter, siphoning inside.
Mother’s voice reached my ears—glacier cold. “Let Annie go,” she said. “That is my wish.”
Through the dark glass, I could see Chase, a blue fluorescing outline as much liquid fire as man, still fighting the two genies glowing just like him. Tears slid down my cheeks. Chase. My Chase. Please. Please don’t go insane. Please wait for me.
Malphic’s voice rumbled, as loud as thunder, “Your wish is my command.”
Still holding the decanter, he reached to his sash and pulled out his knife, a twin to the one Chase had taken from him five years ago. There was a flash of moonstone as he raised it upward into the air.
“What tears also opens. What burns also builds,” he bellowed, slicing the knife downward.
Blinding light flashed against the glass and I was slammed to one side of the bottle as he flung the decanter toward the rising sun, toward the ocean and the rocky spires.
CHAPTER 30
Happy 6th Birthday to my brave little princess.
Love, Dad
—Tag on pink flashlight
I woke, lying on my stomach with my arm crooked under my face. My body ached all over. My arm burned as if a thousand wasps had stung it. I rolled off it, onto my side. Slimy rocks, broken glass, or whatever I was lying on crunched and jabbed into my skin. Something hard boxed me in. The stench of seaweed and dead fish crusted inside my nose. Only the wet remnants of the linen shift covered me.
Blinking my eyes open, I struggled to get my bearings. I lay, soaking wet, in a shallow crevasse. Flies buzzed all around me. Beneath me was sand, shells, seagull feathers, a dead fish, and—
Holy crap!
A dark-red jellyfish.
I scrambled away from it, fingers digging into the slippery side of the crevasse to help me stand, slime caking under my nails. I glanced at my arm, the one that had been under my face. Nasty red welts blotched the lower half of it. Jellyfish stings, plus cuts and scrapes.
My head whirled with hazy memories of what had happened: me being ethereal, inside the decanter, Malphic throwing it toward the ocean, toward the rocky spires.
My pulse quickened and I looked up at the rocky pinnacles above me. The Pirate’s Coffin, that’s where I was, the real one, in the human realm. And—thank God and Hecate or whoever else was watching over me—the tide was out.
I pushed past the throbbing in my muscles, pulled myself out of the crevasse, and started to climb down. The barnacle-crusted rocks sliced my naked feet and legs. My fingernails split as I dug them into slick handholds. When I hit the soggy ground, dizziness closed in around me. I swayed, staggered a few steps, and fell to my knees. My stung arm ached like holy hell, stealing all other thoughts.
“Saltwater, wash it off, then scrape,” Selena’s first aid advice sang in my head.
I crawled across the mucky sand to a puddle, got out my dagger, then submerged my arm and scraped it with the blade. As woozy as my head was I could barely see.
Hysteria came over me and I cackled. I’d have to put this in my Sotheby’s profile. When thrown from the djinn realm, don’t land on jellyfish.
Something rubbed against me, small, furry, and damp. Houdini.
I scooped him up and hugged him tight, his purring loud in my ear.
“Look! It’s Annie!” Zachary’s voice echoed out from somewhere.
He and the Professor were on the beach, running toward me.
The Professor reached me first. “We thought you were dead, dreadfully, horribly dead. Oh, my goodness. Are you all right?”
“I got stung. Jellyfish,” I rasped. But even as I said it, I realized how ridiculous it sounded in light of everything that had happened. I could taste blood on my lips and something warm trickled down my forehead. I’d gotten thrown off a cliff or through the sky, but none of that mattered. I was okay. But Mother. Chase. They were still there.
Zachary panted up to us. “I told you the cat wanted to show us something.”
“You were very much right, Zachary. Now run to the house and get help, ever so fast.”
I let go of Houdini and the Professor grabbed me by the underarms, bringing me to my feet. I leaned against him, staggering along. What seemed like a moment later, Tibbs arrived and helped the Professor haul me up the beach stairs. When we reached the cliff top, I glanced at the house, the sun spangling the windows, reflecting off the roofs and the white railings of the widow’s walk.
My chest tightened and tears streamed down my face. “I have to go back. I have to get Mother. Chase. They’re going to kill him.”
“Shush,” the Professor said. “Save your strength.”
Kate rushed out from the house. She flagged her hand at the terrace. “Put her on the chaise. Selena needs to flush those stings. We’ll do that right away and get her hydrated, then take her upstairs.”
They helped me to the chaise and Selena slid a pillow behind my head.
“Lie back,” she said. She took my arm and dabbed it with something that was piss-warm and smelled like dill pickles.
Kate held a glass of lemonade up to my mouth so I could take a sip. “We’re so glad you’re okay. Shocked, actually. We never should have trusted that Lotli girl. We should have listened to you.”
I pushed the glass away. “What are you talking about? What did she say?”
“Nothing.” Kate’s voice went sharp. “She ran off before we could get the truth out of her.”
“Ran away?” I wriggled my arm out of Selena’s grip.
The Professor shook his head. “Indeed, without as much as a word.”
“That doesn’t make sense.” I squeezed my eyes shut for a second, warding off the throb of a headache. “She was going to wait. Help the rest of us escape. Tell me—what happened with Lotli, exactly. What time is it?”
“It’s almost noontime,” the Professor said, “but she vanished hours ago. She was ever so pale. Her teeth were chattering. It was foolish, but we left her alone in the sunroom to dress. When we checked back, she’d taken her belongings and run off.”
Kate’s eyes darkened. “The girl had every reason to feel ashamed. Leaving you and everyone behind like that, it was a horrible thing to do.”
“No,” I said. “She didn’t do anything wrong. I told her to leave. It was my—my fault everything fell apart. I broke the pendant she gave me, there was a bright light and the oil failed for a second . . . Chase. Mother. Malphic has them both.” My throat closed off until I couldn’t breathe as flashes of Chase fighting and Mother’s horrified face came back to me. I shifted and started to sit up.
Selena pressed her hand against my chest. “Hold still.”
“I can’t. We have to go back. We need Lotli and there was no reason for her to run away. If anyone was in the wrong, it was us asking her to endanger herself for nothing.” I glanced at Kate. “She took all her stuff?”
“Every last thing.”
“Ah—not everything.” Zachary scuffed forward.
Kate nailed him with a glare. “What are you talking about?”
He pulled Lotli’s tiny medicine bag out from his pocket. “I found this under her bed.”
“Zach, you’re such a moron.” Selena scowled. “Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
He huffed. “Maybe ’cause I didn’t have time. Mom wanted me to let the cat out, then the cat wanted me to follow him to the beach, then I found Annie.”
Their voices buzzed in my head. I took a steadying breath and was about to tell them more about what had happened in the realm when Tibbs spoke up.
“Umm—I found something too,” he said.
Everyone turned to gape at him.
“Well, what was it?” Kate’s voice was tart.
“I saw fresh ATV tracks on the side lawn this morning, like someone had come out of the forest trail and turned around.”
Kate thumped her fisted hand against the chaise. “And you didn’t say anything?”
Tibbs’s ears went red. “I heard the sound of its engine, too—just after daybreak. I—I thought it was Selena sneaking in.”
“I’d never have gone anywhere last night”—Selena’s voice hitched—“not while Chase and Annie were in the other realm.”
The Professor turned to Kate. “Wasn’t it around dawn when Lotli went to get changed?”
A horrifying thought struck me. The forest trail. The route Selena took to go partying. Strange tire tracks. Lotli missing. The black car. Lotli in the trunk. “Shit,” I said, far louder than I’d intended.
Everyone stared at me. Zachary snickered.
I looked at each of them in turn. “Lotli wouldn’t have left without her talisman bag. She even wore it to the realm.” My gaze went back to Selena. I hoped to never have to spill our secrets, but it was time. “I think Lotli’s been kidnapped.”
“Ohmigod,” Selena murmured. Slowly, she turned toward Kate. “I should have said something. Ah—something happened the other night. I mean, Lotli and I snuck out and went to a beach party. I was dancing. She was just hanging out. We weren’t drinking. But, someone—” Her voice failed.
I took over. “I followed Selena and Lotli to the party because I was jealous. I thought . . . Well, what I thought doesn’t matter anymore. What’s important is that someone drugged Lotli at the party and locked her in the trunk of a car. I found her before anything worse happened.” I gentled my voice and directed my next comment to Selena. “It was a black car. It might have been a Mustang. I saw a g
uy near it too.”
“Newt? It couldn’t have been his car—or him. He was with me.” Selena’s eyes widened with shock, but surprisingly enough her voice held more anguish than anger. My stomach tensed. There was something else going on inside her head, beyond the shock that I was hinting her boyfriend’s car might have been involved in the attempted kidnapping. But this wasn’t the place or time to delve into that. We needed to focus.
“The guy I saw wasn’t Newt. It was his brother, Myles,” I said. “I convinced myself I was wrong. But now I’m almost a hundred percent sure.”
Tears welled in her eyes.
“Dad’s going to kill you.” Zachary grinned.
I waved at him to be silent. “Zach, not now. Please.”
“I really liked Newt.” Selena’s bottom lip trembled. “He couldn’t have done anything.”
Kate bent toward the Professor and lowered her voice. “Do you mind calling Annie’s father and telling him what’s going on? He, all the men, will want to know she’s safe. They’ll want to know about Susan and Chase—and this Lotli episode too.”
As the Professor pulled his phone out and walked away, Tibbs cleared his throat. “About this kidnapping. Umm—I’ve been doing some digging. Newt’s family isn’t . . . My friend Bob told me—”
Selena cut him off. “Newt’s family is respectable. They have a summer home in Bar Harbor. His dad’s a stockbroker. Newt goes to Harvard.”
Tibbs grimaced. “That’s not exactly true. You never met his parents, have you? His father’s not a stockbroker. He runs a blog, something called Serpent Wrestler. Their summer home belongs to a friend of his. He hosts an alien conspiracy TV show. He’s the one with the deep pockets.”
Selena’s voice squeaked. “You’ve been busy.”
He shrugged. “I bought a few beers and asked the right people. You forget—you’re not the only person who grew up around here. I went to school in Bar Harbor, public school. I have a lot of friends.” His gaze met hers. “I was worried about you.”
“Oh.” A flush colored Selena’s cheeks as if she was flattered, but she pressed her lips into a firm line and scowled.