Off in the distance fairies fought with witches as they tried to penetrate the narrow access point to the peninsula. Briar was trapped, her powers fading faster as the moon eclipsed the sun; Praia, though weakened, was still strong. Sitting in the water, watching it all play out, she had the most hope of saving them.
Aborting her plan to run to the shore, she searched for a better way of helping them and found it in the sky. The other djinns were still secured by the witches atop the peak of the hill. The sound of heavy wings cutting through the air announced Praia’s chance to act. Using the same air magic that propelled her through the water, she shot from the sea and landed on the back of the dragon she recognized. It was time he gave her the ride he’d promised. “Take me to them!” She pointed to the trapped djinn when he looked at her. Rick turned his body and headed for the peak.
The eclipse was getting closer and she would only have one shot, her energy was already fading. If she could somehow stop the djinn, release them from whatever magic was containing them, perhaps they would be strong enough to resist Daegal, just as Rosie and Jinn were. When Rick got her close enough, she leapt from the dragon’s back and fell to the ground in the center of the djinn. Six were in chains, pulled to their knees in a circle around two who were standing in the center. All their eyes were smoke filled. Whatever they were seeing, it wasn’t Praia or the war around them.
Realizing there was no hope of gaining their attention, the fae pulled a knife from her back and quickly ran to the three witches that sat just outside of the circle, chanting. Her first victim felt the cold blade as it ran against her taught throat, ending her incantation with a gurgling sound. Praia moved quickly from the first to the next and drove her knife into the chest of the second witch, but before she could get to the third, the woman ran. Though the ritual had ended, and the spell was interrupted, the djinn continued their slow approach toward each other. She knew simply ending the spell wouldn’t be enough, but it was a start.
In the hands of Nitara was the Lunaire stone, and the Solaris was held by another djinn, a man whose skin was the shade of fire. Both of their eyes were closed as they moved blindly forward. As they stepped closer together, they pulled the corresponding celestial object with them. Her first attempt was a foolish one in which she tried to rip the stone from the hands of Nitara, hoping the moon stone would recognize her as the child of its source of power, and come easily. It didn’t. It was as if the stone was fused to its new owner and neither budged no matter her effort. She tried to use air to push them apart, but the effort did nothing more than give her a migraine. Frustrated and dizzied, she stopped.
“Shit!” she cried out. She had to try something else. Staring down from the peak, she witnessed Jinn as he continued his fight with Bruto, and Rosie who continued her attempts to intervene without hurting their friend. In the distance, Briar and her fairies were failing, the witches gaining more ground in the fight. Briar was restrained and forced to watch two fairies lose their lives as they tried desperately to defend their queen. So many lives had been lost, and if Praia didn’t act, more would fall. In a last-ditch attempt to change what was happening, she forced all her strength into one final move. The concentrated current of air shot from her hand, creating a lasso that wrapped around the male djinn, from the other hand, another current wrapped around a boulder perched just at the edge of the cliff. With one final peer over her shoulder at her struggling friends, she ran and leapt off the cliff, using the remaining strength to shake the earth, knocking the boulder over the edge. The weight of her fall pulled the djinn with her and the two fell to the depths. Before she crashed through the surface, she witnessed Jax snatch Nitara from the fall. The magic had pulled her right along with them. As Jax flew away with Nitara as his haul, the stones were separated, and the sun and moon withdrew. Praia closed her eyes as her back crashed into the water, and she was dragged deep beneath the surface.
Briar felt the return of her power. Looking above, she saw that the sun and the moon were retreating, and with each moment that passed, she became more fueled by the reappearing sun. Kelli and Jani were dead―their bodies lay on the ground before her, and the witches responsible cackled as they prepared another assault. This time, Mysti was in their sights. She would be damned if they killed her second. Her wrists were bound by the vines of a nearby tree. The witch in red commanded them to obey her, but unfortunately, she like the others were already celebrating a victory they had not yet secured.
Briar called to her fire, and though the response was a weak one, it was enough to burn through the restraints that held her. Without her magic at its full strength, she had to use the combat training she’d done for years. She ran across the field, dodging fireballs launched from the dragons above who were on Daegal’s side. As she ran, she lifted an abandoned sword from the ground. Raising it above her head, she landed the blade square into the neck of the woman in red, removing her head from her torso. With her death, the forestry withdrew their bindings and her fairies were freed. Back on even ground, they fought their adversaries, their battle cries echoing into the sky where the dragons continued to cut down their own set of traitors.
Large, winged bodies crashed to the ground, but Jinn kept his focus on Bruto … until he saw her, in the clutches of a dragon, being flown away. The moment was all it took for Bruto to slip away from Rosie and land a blow to his jaw that took Jinn off his feet.
“Bruto, no!” Rosie cried.
Jinn looked up to see the burly redhead standing over him. Fear and sadness intermingled in his eyes and he stared down on his friend. “I’m sorry.” Bruto lifted his hand, summoning his energy that glowed around his fist in an orange haze. Jinn prepared to defend himself, knowing it would mean the loss of one of their lives, but he could no longer avoid it. His own hand took on a blue glow at his side. Before either could draw fire, the arms of Rosie wrapped around Bruto and they vanished in a puff of pink smoke.
With the two of them gone, Jinn turned his focus to Nitara and the dragon who held her. No matter how much he searched, the sky was too active to make sense of things. Dragons fought along with other winged beings and there was no sight of her.
“Jinn!” Mike approached him, clothes torn, and body scarred. “Nitara, Daegal has her!”
“What?” Jinn yelled before he could contain his anger.
“Those damn dragons, they attacked Jax and took her!” Mike looked up. “Fucking traitors everywhere!”
“Where did they go?” Jinn demanded.
“I don’t know, man. I’m sorry. She was there one moment and gone the next.”
“Fuck!” He scanned the area; in the distance Briar still fought. “Where is Praia?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen her since she leapt in the ocean with the other fae.” Mike scanned the shoreline. “She should have been here by now.”
Jinn rubbed the medallion around his neck, hoping to connect to the fae girl, but there was no response. “Shit. Mike, I need you to find her!”
“What are you going to do?” Mike questioned the man whose hand still glowed in a blue aura.
“I’m going to find my wife.” He reached into his pocket, pulling out the small stone carved in the shape of the crescent moon. He held it in his hand, using it to connect to her, to the woman who held his heart. As it warmed in his palm, spreading the heat throughout him, he knew it had worked. He closed his eyes and left behind the ensuing battle.
“Let her go!” Jinn’s voice reverberated around them, disturbing the wildlife in the trees of the thick forest. Birds flew from their homes, escaping the catastrophe that they sensed was about to happen.
“Ah, Jinn, finally you join us.” Daegal spoke in the same sickly tenor that always coated his words. Time hadn’t changed much about the man. “All these years, I’ve searched so hard to find you. Where were you?”
“Let her go, Daegal,” Jinn repeated his demand, ignoring the attempt at distracting conversation.
“It was supposed to be you
up there with her. She the moon, you her sun, forever repelling one another, but for just a moment, coming together. It was to be your love story!” He shook his head, revealing the pale skin behind the dark hood that covered his face. The man may have been immortal, but the years had not been good to him. His skin was grey and translucent, his eyes a sickly yellow and his mouth black with rot. “Too bad, I guess this is just as good a way for the two of you to come to an end. I suppose I’ll have to figure out my world domination another way.”
“Nitara, are you okay?” Jinn asked the woman whose throat was wrapped in the long, gray fingers of the warlock.
“Jinn, you shouldn’t have come here.” Sorrow filled her voice. For the first time since he’d known her, the woman was without hope.
“You knew that I would. I could never leave you.” Jinn stepped forward but Daegal pulled back. “I could never sit back and allow this to happen.”
“Ah, see, so touching!” Daegal threw Nitara to the ground. “You two were always my favorites, and at the same time, you bring me such heartache!”
Nitara tried to run to Jinn but Daegal lifted his hand. A shadow reached out, expanding to the shape of his palm, and smacked her to the ground. The shadows continued to operate under his command and forced her to remain with her face in the dirt. The same force that restrained Nitara, knocked her husband away as he tried to run to her. His back slammed into a tree hard enough to crack the wood and send it falling to the ground. Daegal’s laughter filled his ears. He lifted his hand to cover his ears, and realized the stone was still in his grasp.
Again, he used the stone to connect with her. The same warmth spread beneath his touch, and instead of taking him physically to her, his mind reached out. Under the weight of the shadow, that refused his body movement, he spoke to her.
“Nitara, I’m here.” He was in her mind again.
“Jinn, I don’t wanna die here.” Her voice was weak, she had nearly given up. He could hear it, she was tired, and she had every right to be.
“You won’t, I promise, but we have to work together.”
“What do you need me to do?”
“He said that you are the moon, and I am your sun. When we get together, powerful things can happen. We must fight this; we need to get to each other. We are strongest together. That is why he is determined to keep us apart!”
“How? I can’t move.” Her voice, though internal, trembled with fear.
“Nitara, we are stronger than this. Our magic is no longer bound by him. You know it. Focus on your magic. Connect to your power and refuse him the same way you were before! How did you do it? In that cage where I found you, you were fighting against him. I need you to do the same thing now.”
“Jinn, I―”
“Listen, remember when we first got married?” he coaxed her. He had to get through to her.
“Yes.”
“Do you remember what you told me?”
“Yes.”
“Say it, now.”
“There is no love stronger than ours. The sun, the moon, the earth, and the stars, they wish to have a bond as strong as ours.”
“Nitara, I meant every word I said to you. You will have my heart for as long as the sun rises to kiss the sky, and for an eternity after it fades. I will not leave here without you, and I refuse to let you give up on yourself!”
“Okay. We can do this, together.”
“Always together, Nitty.”
Allowing the love that fueled his fight to reach through to her, Jinn called to the fighter inside of his wife. The bond between them strengthened as Nitara regained her hope. Even though they weren’t yet together, they were strong. Jinn whispered through their bond, “Fire,” and the forest was set ablaze in blue and purple flames cutting through the shadows and releasing them from their hold.
In a blur they ran to each other, slamming into a firm embrace. In one show of the power of their unity, Nitara’s light mixed with Jinn’s and created a blast that dispersed the remaining shadows and left Daegal with none of his minions to command. He called them to him but there was too much light, no shadow could form. The fire subsided, only burning the immediate area and leaving the rest of the forest unharmed.
Daegal shouted curses at the two, and realizing that he had no choice, he gave up on the shadows and charged the two. Even without his shadows at his command, he proved still to be a difficult adversary. His power wasn’t his own, stolen from those he’d tricked over the years. He opened his mouth and breathed a stream of ice, courtesy of the dragon, Cast. The ground beneath Nitara’s feet froze and she slipped, slamming her head against the ice.
Daegal, never one to miss an opportunity, moved again―this time with intent to kill. But Nitara had enough left in her that she grabbed hold of Jinn’s hand, again increasing his power by the connection. Jinn faced Daegal and the blue flames emerge tipped in the purple of his wife’s magic. He defended her, putting a protective circle around her body, and taking his maker head on. Daegal used the one gift that was naturally his and called to his connection to the Earth to shake the ground beneath Jinn. Expecting the move, Jinn simply lifted from the earth, floating above the chaos beneath.
“You will fall!” Daegal called out as he attacked again with stolen breaths of ice.
Jinn dodged the stream, but not entirely. He grunted as the shards of ice cut into the side of his torso. He would heal, there was no time to respond to the pain. Instead, he whipped lassos of flames at his attacker. Daegal escaped one, but the other wrapped around his legs, pulling them from beneath him, and the man fell forward. The rope tightened and spread, creating a net of flame that crept up the length of his body, covering him in flames and burning him. Daegal cried out as his skin melted away. He reached with his free hand, hoping to use his magic once more, but Jinn reacted quickly and sent more flames to further restrain him.
“It’s time that this comes to an end.” Jinn stood above the burning man and ebbed the flames back. The rope no longer blazed but retained a soft glow of heat.
“I created you! You would be nothing without me!” Daegal choked out. Though the flames had subsided, he still burned, he still suffered. Jinn wanted that to continue. He could never inflict enough pain on the man, no amount of torture could ever make up for what he had done to them and so many others.
“You took away the thing that mattered to me most!” Jinn screamed, his voice echoing in the hollow forest. “You stole my life away from me! I owe you nothing!”
“You owe me everything! I will not die here!” Daegal laughed. “You’re too weak to kill, too sensible!” There was a time when his assessment of Jinn was correct. There was a time when the man who stood above him valued life over revenge. There was a time when Daegal would have had a fighting chance at surviving. This was not that time.
“That’s where you’re wrong. See, when you turned me, you stole something else.” Jinn leaned in, and the flames flared again and stretched until they reached Daegal’s throat. “My ability to give a fuck about anything other than what I want.” With that, the ropes tightened, crushing the warlock, and cutting through his body. His decrepit figure was severed in an unfathomable number of pieces and then burned until there was nothing of him left on the ground but cold dark ash.
Back home, Jinn forgot about the rest of the world. He took his wife away from the devastation and left the fairies, fae, and slithers to clean up the resulting mess. That was never his concern. She was. Nitara. He stood over her, watching her as the sun once again left the sky, giving way to the moon she loved so much.
“Jinn?” She stretched in the bed, coming to her senses.
“You’re awake, finally.” He smiled around a grimace as he lifted from the seat near the window. His wound was healing, but he would be sore for a while.
“Yes. Is he …” She looked around the room, as if expecting Daegal to pop out of a corner and attack her again.
“He’s dead. I made sure of it.” He made it to her side where he sat next
to her and pushed stray hairs from her face. “You don’t have to worry about him.”
“I don’t know how I could ever thank you.” She smiled at him, and for the first time since he saw her locked away in the cage, a prisoner to a lunatic, she relaxed.
“You don’t have to thank me for anything, Nitty. If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t have been in this mess.”
“You can’t keep blaming yourself.” She shook her head. “I could have left you when I realized just how foolish you could be.” The small sound of her laugh warmed his heart.
His soft chuckle responded to hers. “I’m glad you didn’t.”
“So am I.”
He leaned in, ready to plant a kiss on the full lips he’d missed for centuries, but she pulled away from him.
“Jinn,” she pushed back further, “I’m sorry, I can’t.”
“What?” He straightened, giving her space. Had he done something wrong? Was she hurt?
“I’m so grateful that you came, and that you saved me, but I can’t be with you.” Large eyes teared as she spoke the words she hoped she would never have to speak.
“What are you saying? What do you mean you can’t be with me?”
“It’s been a long time without you. And for so long, I held on to the hope that you would come back, that you would take me away from all of this.”
“I’m here, Nitara.” He grabbed her hands, pulling them into her own―his hope that the contact would make her understand. “That is what I’m doing now.”
Djinn Rebellion Boxset (Books 1 -30: A Post-Apocalyptic Fantasy Page 19