by Marie Hall
“Damn air’s too low again,” someone muttered, but never glanced back. Never stopped to think they’d walked right through her.
Her nurse was at the head of a bed. A very small body lay hidden within the deep folds of the blankets. Flowers were strewn all across the room, get well cards bedecked the walls. Children’s pictures graced every square inch of the place.
Hands were ripping the sheets off.
“Code Blue. Code Blue,” was repeated over and over and over, until the room seemed crammed with bodies desperately trying to revive the child.
Squeezing her eyes shut, Paz walked away. She couldn’t watch this. Death wasn’t as painful as she’d always feared (if this even was death), but watching a child transition from there to here wasn’t something she relished either.
She moved away, not really paying any mind to where she walked. So long as she stayed away from the end of the corridor she was fine.
She’d already seen a few bodies not make it. But not once had she seen someone else like her. Except for Jinni, and he hadn’t returned since she’d talked to him last.
Suddenly she stopped, gripped with a desperate desire to turn around. Heart thundering, or at least the memory of that emotion, flickered like a bright flame inside her. She turned and frowned.
A body lay in there. But this one wasn’t bruised, swollen, or dead looking. Without realizing it, somehow she’d found her way to his side, and stared at the face that she’d almost forgotten.
“My Todd,” she whispered, feeling the first faint echo of a smile tug at her lips.
She traced his face, hissing at the warmth of it, reveling in the texture of firm skin for as long as she possibly could before she became too tired and had to pull away.
“You are so beautiful.” The words spilled from the depths of her soul.
Thick black brows shaded a pair of eyes that were closed, but that when opened sparkled deep whiskey brown. His strong nose and square jaw covered in bristle made her pulse flutter for the merest second in time.
“Look at me,” she pleaded, feeling a hard lump work its way up her throat when he failed to do so. “Please, look at me. I’m so lonely.”
An awareness of something reached out-- like the gentle touch of a lover’s hand-- across the nape of her neck. Paz turned and then smiled a huge, wide grin.
“Where have you been?!” she demanded, uncaring that she sounded like a jealous girlfriend. Jinni was back, staring at her with his soulful black eyes, liquid blue face creased with a gentle frown. She rushed to meet him. “Why did you leave me?”
He stared at her, only stared. And for a moment she worried that he could no longer hear her either. Fear gnawed at her gut, but then pleasure blossomed like a rose opening up to morning dew when he shrugged.
“I did not know if you would want me around. I did not wish to bother you.”
The lyrical inflections of his voice did strange things to her spirit. She tingled, every inch of her. Even her lips burned, as if she’d been kissed, and kissed thoroughly.
“Why would you think that? You’re the only one who can see me. The only one who knows I even exist.”
Everywhere his eyes touched her face, it was like a feather light caress.
“I am sorry, Paz. I just did not know what to do.”
She swallowed, glancing down at her bare toes. In this form she still had her toenails, though they were no longer painted. The hospital gown draped across her body, flapping as she walked like a ghost moving through a still graveyard at night.
She laughed.
He frowned. “What is so funny?”
Shaking her head, she threw up her hands. “I was just comparing my hospital gown to a ghost. Which is ironic, right? All things considered.”
It took a second, but a flicker of emotion ticked swiftly across his brow. Then his lips curved at the very corners and she knew he smiled with her. “Ironic indeed,” he drawled.
She sighed. “You have such a nice voice.”
He did smile then. A fully fleshed out one and she couldn’t help but return it.
“So do you,” his deep voice made her breath hitch.
“Really?”
He drifted closer, so close she felt the pop and buzz of his energy roll through hers.
Breathless, she asked, “What does mine sound like?”
“What does mine sound like?” he asked back, cocking his head. He had black curls, thick and sleek, glinting like onyx in flame. Her fingers twitched, wishing she could touch it.
“Like the blue of the ocean floor, or the inky black of a midnight sky.”
His eyes narrowed ever so slightly. “You think in color?”
“I’m an artist.” She remembered the body with the bloated face and her shoulders sagged. “Or I was.”
A burst of static traced the line of her jaw. She glanced up as he pulled his hand away.
“You sound like my Kingdom. Like the golden brush of fairy light dancing through the night, the iridescent jade of a beetle’s shell in the moonlight.” His eyes searched hers.
“Where are you from that you see fairy light?”
“A place not of Earth. A place of fairy tales and magic.” His smile was self-effacing. “But I’m sure you do not believe me.”
“I’m half dead, Jinni. It’s not so hard for me to believe in the impossible anymore.”
His face was calm, nearly devoid of any type of emotion, save for the briefest twitch of his eyelid.
“Where did you go before?” she asked again. “Why did you leave me? Aren’t you bound to this place like I am?”
He shook his head. “I am not dead.”
She cocked her head. “Then why can I see you? Why can you see me?”
For a moment she didn’t think he’d answer. Taking a deep breath, he said slowly, “Because I am not bound by this world’s rules, I am a being made of magic. Though there is one similarity between us.”
“What?”
“I am dying. Just like you.”
Chapter 5
Jinni paced the length of his cave. The constant howl of the winds outside, normally so soothing, now irritated him like the constant drip of a leaky pipe.
He was angry.
But he didn’t know why.
He stared at his empty cave, at the pit of fire that burned perpetually in the center of the dirt floor. He stoked the flames, never letting them die, knowing they wouldn’t-- couldn’t-- warm him. That nothing could ease the icy chill that encased his soul. That nothing could break his antipathy. Each day an unbearable torture because it wouldn’t end. Because he was still here. Still existing in a realm outside of happiness, joy, life.
Back and forth.
Back and forth.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
He gnashed his teeth. She called to him, wakened something in him. A sleeping dragon with claws that’d slumbered for an eternity, now opening languid eyes with curiosity… and maybe something more.
Something volatile and violent.
“Why are you here?” the shrill voice of she interrupted his internalizations.
“Go away, Danika,” Jinni glared at the miniature, innocent looking fae.
She. His nightmare, his bondage, and constant reminder of what he’d lost. What he’d sacrificed so long ago. And for what?
For something as fleeting and inconstant as a vapor.
Danika quirked a pale blonde brow. She preferred the guise of a frail old woman. Doddering, and well past her prime. Most godmother’s did. He could never understand why. Did they assume it was because you’d trust them more that way?
But he was as dangerous as she. There’d once been a time, when his might could have quashed even hers. He could see the monster lurking beneath the mask of civility she’d worked so hard to cultivate, because he’d once worn one himself. For a time.
His soul trembled.
Danika’s blonde curls bobbed gracefully around her head as her lips twitched, as
if she knew a secret he did not. A frothing swirl of fury burned his gut.
“What?!” he demanded louder.
Her grin only grew wider. “My, my, my… is that… anger?” She tapped her jaw, the silver tips of her nails glinting like jewels as the fire reflected off it. “Surely not my Jinni. Why, I thought antipathy was your friend now. Now tell me truth, honestly, why are you here and not there?” She flitted closer, dragonfly wings shimmering with pale threads of blue.
“I did all you commanded of me, master,” he sneered the last. “You told me to stay until the girl arrived. I’ve done that.” Forcing a grim smile to his tight lips, he sidled closer, until the electricity of his form crackled like static against her magic. “Are you here to demand I return?”
She licked her lips, then with a loud sigh crossed her arms and legs and floated before him, looking as dangerous as a gnat. “I’ve never demanded a thing from you. Not one thing, Jinni. I’ve always wondered about you?”
It was bait and he knew it, but he couldn’t help but ask, “How so?”
Danika toyed with the edge of her fingernail. “Why you hate me. Why you direct such venom at me when I never asked to take you.” She paused for a moment, as if waiting for him to speak, say something. But there’d be no words from him.
What could he say anymore? Though the memories were fresh and sometimes painful, it’d happened so long ago that it seemed pointless to care. Most days, he didn’t.
She shrugged. “I asked Betty,” she supplied, “and I’m fairly certain she’s got you dead to rights, as my Alice would say.”
Scoffing, Jinni laughed. “Betty? Gerard’s woman? Gerard has the mental capacity of vermin, what could she possibly--”
Danika narrowed her eyes, a terrible blue glow infused the depths of her cobalt orbs and her lips set into a tight grimace. “Mind your tongue,” she hissed, “I’ll not hear a foul word uttered against the girl. And aye, she did have some most insightful thoughts as to our,” she stressed, “current state of affairs.”
“Then by all means,” he genuflected, “do share, starflower.”
Refusing to rise to the bait, she ignored him. “You’re not mad at me. You’re mad at yourself. Mad at what you did. What you allowed to happen.”
Each uttered phrase was worse than a blow to his heart. Jinni couldn’t help but flinch, nostrils flaring as the horrible truth clawed at his skull. He did not know Betty. How could she have such insight into his psyche? Just who were these women Danika had found for them?
Who was Paz?
His soul thumped as if it were the fluttering beat of a skipping heart.
Danika nodded. “Your silence is answer enough. She is correct.”
Jinni turned his face aside as the memories, those awful, hated memories, tried to break free of the darkness he’d stuffed them in the night he’d been banished from his Eastern realms.
A cool ripple of power brushed against his cheek. He turned to look at Danika, allowing his plea, his pain, his grief, but mostly his fear, to reflect in his gaze.
“Betty is a doctor of the mind. Feelings.”
It was hard for him to refrain from snorting, but Gerard’s Belle had exposed him. Somehow, she’d exposed him without ever meeting him.
“She said you have to let the girl in.”
He closed his eyes. The girl. Paz. The dark-haired, dark-skinned beauty who shimmered with a pearlescent splendor. How was it that being in her presence could bring him such fear and excitement?
In centuries he hadn’t felt much of anything. Then he saw her, a strange woman in a strange land, and something terrible inside him quaked. A demon he thought he’d buried long ago.
“How can you say that to me?” he whispered. “You, who knows why I was ousted. I cannot trust again, Danika. I cannot allow her close. The last one cost me everything,” the last tailed off in a whisper so low he wasn’t sure he’d spoken it aloud.
He felt raw, like a jagged exposed nerve. Part of him wanted to rail and roar, demand his way. But another part, a shameful one, wanted to roll up into a ball in the corner and die. Jerking out of her reach, he once again paced the length of his cavernous chamber. If he continued to look her in the eye, continued to see the sorrow in her bright blue gaze, he’d do one or both.
“I will not go back to her. I will not go down this path again.”
Danika flitted in front of him, halting him with her hand. He didn’t have to stop. He could phase right through her now.
“You must. She is dying, Jinni.”
“Why? Tell me why? I am not a good man, Danika. You know my past. You know why I am here. Why subject her to me? Let her die. There is peace in death. I only envy that she can feel it so quickly.”
Her eyes were like cleavers, ripping through his words and exposing them for the wicked lie they were. To think of Paz dead, to think of that beautiful smile forever gone, made his insides hurt. He didn’t know her, but already he felt something. Curiosity, pleasure…
“A mortal ghost is like a delicate bloom. They need a tether, a reason for being, or else they vanish. I cannot bring her back if she does, your only hope for salvation and for meaning in this life is through her.”
“A woman cannot give me meaning.” The words were hollow and bitter, dripping with scorn.
He’d believed like Danika once. Believed he’d found his purpose within the arms of a doe-eyed temptress whose seductive ways had blinded him to her ruthless thirst for power and greedy ambition. He’d betrayed all he’d ever been, all he’d known for passion, only to discover in the end that her honeyed tongue had spun nothing but a silken web of lies.
Though his words spoke scorn, in his head he chanted for Danika to save him. To show him truth, purpose, life, to give him hope. He bit his lip, ache filling his throat with quiet despair.
She sighed. “She is your soul mate, of that I have no doubt. She will bring you back, but the choice is yours. She fades quickly, Jinni. Time is short, so you must choose.”
“Why is that golem there?” he asked before she could fade.
Danika’s face was solemn as she stared at him. Finally she said, “You know why. You worked that magic once before.”
Jinni stayed where he stood long after Danika faded into the ether. Staring out of the cave, at the darkness that engulfed like a shroud beyond. The violent whistle of the wind mingling with the jaggedness of his thoughts made him feel more alone than ever before. Slowly the fire died, until all that remained was the blackness.
In a corner of the cave rested the two necklaces Danika had given him. If he took them, if he acknowledged them, then he knew he’d never look back.
Could he do this?
Dare he trust her?
Not only Danika, but Paz?
The spot in his soul where his heart used to be bled raw imagining a world without Paz in it. Closing his eyes, he sealed his fate as he forced the energy to roll down and gather in his limbs. Floating to the necklaces, he picked them up and using a small bit of the magic still left to him, sealed it within his person.
The stones flared bright and hot, seeming sentient and joyful, as if a friend saying hello.
Before he could rethink this madness, he cracked open one of a million dream stones hidden within Kingdom-- a stone to give him the ability to travel swiftly through dimensions-- and opened a portal to her.
***
Paz huddled on the floor next to the corner of her bed, shivering and next to tears. He was gone again. She didn’t know why.
Why would he leave again?
Was she a bad person?
Terrible to talk to?
Boring?
“Is she going to be okay?” Richard asked the nurse standing next to him.
His voice was raw, rough, as if he’d been crying for hours. Which he had. Her brother had looked better. His skin was waxy, his eyes bloodshot and purple. His hair disheveled.
Paz rocked methodically back and forth, hugging her knees to her chest as the cold, cold f
loor seeped into her cold, cold soul.
“We’ve done all we can,” the nurse said softly.
But it didn’t hurt to hear it. She was dying. Which should have probably made her sad, but all she felt was relief. She was tired of existing in this weird place where nobody knew her, heard her, or touched her.
No, it didn’t hurt her at all. But it was killing her brother. Richard hiccupped, trying hard to stay composed, but Paz knew him. Knew he was seconds from completely losing it and if the nurse had any kindness left in her, she’d walk away before he bawled like a baby.
Paz should feel terrible for him. A part of her recognized that things that’d once mattered so much in life, the love of her family and her artwork, meant very little here. A restless desire to go was blooming in her heart.
She stared at the body that had once been her. The swelling looked better.
Maybe.
The hair was matted, greasy, probably smelled gross.
Paz touched her still silky hair and then frowned as it dawned on her that her sense of touch was further diminished. She didn’t know how long she’d been here already. A week? A year? Richard was losing weight, his sweater hung on him funny. So probably a week. He was drinking a lot of coffee too.
She knew that because she’d started counting the cups piling up in the trash bin of the body’s room. First time he’d started drinking there’d been three. Then there’d been six. Now, he was on cup fifteen and the day was only half over.
She stared out the window, startled to note the sun was already down.
It’d stopped freaking her out how time spun out of control here. What she thought she knew, she didn’t know, and what she hadn’t known, she now knew.
Like the fact that she kept seeing a lit tunnel glow at the end of the corridor, and that tunnel waited for her. And that now she could go further down the corridor than ever before, that at the end of the hallway waited a tunnel that smelled of a million different flowers and that warmth emanated from inside. That inside that place was joy and she desperately wanted to go.
“I want to go,” she muttered, shocked for a second to hear the scratchy tenor of her unused voice. “I want to go,” she said again, this time a bit more forcefully.