fast-burning as this illness was, it would be devastating in the context of a town, or a city. Priya might already have appeared there, beautiful as a burning star, to deliver that deathly touch. She could have gone
anywhere
, far beyond my reach, far beyond the capacity of humans to fight her unless an Earth Warden was standing right in front of her.
This was what the Earth would become: fields of the dead, cities of silence, where lonely music played unheeded. It took my breath for a moment, and for the first time, I felt fear. Real, bone-deep
fear.
We were butterflies in an avalanche, and what could we do, really do, to stop it?
“Steady,” Luis murmured. His hand gripped mine, strong and warm. “Bright side: This stuff isn’t airborne, or we’d already be dead. It’s contact only, which means it’s containable.…”
“Not if she spreads it in a city,” I said. “Or an airport. Or—”
I caught a flash of movement from the corner of my eye, and spun around… to find a pale, glowing hand outstretched toward me, a single finger pointing at my forehead. Behind the hand, the face of Priya, her Djinn-fired eyes burning into me with unseeing intensity.
I stumbled back, and Luis grabbed her forearm.
“No!” I screamed, but he ignored me. His whole focus was on Priya, who turned her gaze on him, as emotionless as a machine. She didn’t attempt to break free of his hold, or move at all. I reached out for him, but Luis shook his head sharply.
“Don’t,” he said. “I’m already infected.” He sounded so
calm.
So sure. “I can do this, Cass. Just stay back.”
He couldn’t. A human, even a Warden as powerful as Luis, couldn’t defeat a Djinn one-on-one in that kind of single combat… not when she was pouring infection into him, rotting him from within. He needed me, he needed someone to amplify and direct that power with fine control, like a laser. I could do that. I could help him hit her where she was most vulnerable.
But instinct told me to back away. Stupid, ingrained human instinct that demanded I preserve my life at all costs, even the cost of the ones I loved…
I am not a human. I am a Djinn.
Djinn!
I gasped in a breath and lunged forward, adding my grip to his where it wrapped around her arm. “Together,” I said. “We’re stronger together, Luis. Let me help you!”
He let out a strange, wild little laugh, and closed his eyes. Priya wasn’t trying to pull away from us; she simply stood like a hot, burning statue, not quite flesh, not quite spirit. Exalted by her mission, and hardly noticing us at all, any more than a star might notice the ants crawling far below.
The sickness was already eating its way inside Luis, and the most difficult thing for Earth Wardens to do was to heal themselves; I channeled his energy out, and back in, burning the infection away, and then helping him drive back against the source. Priya was a teeming, seething incubator of the plague; she had been hollowed out, filled with this blackness, and set in motion. The Priya I had known was gone, as surely as those who’d inhabited the dead around us were no more. And that struck me hard, the grief of it; Priya had been an immortal, and she had been thrown away to become a vessel for destruction.
She had been my sister once.
Iclosed my eyes and threw myself into the fight, rising into the aetheric to more clearly see the struggle. Priya’s body was no longer the beautiful, harmonious form it had been; it was distorted, rotted, cancerous with the poison she carried inside. Luis glowed bright as a star, tinted with a fire’s edge of glittering orange from his rage and fear, and as I watched, his fire burned clean the portion of Priya’s arm he held. I poured my own strength into him, careless of the cost, and guided his Earth Warden instincts into the pathways inside her body, carrying his purifying fire deeper. Each second was a bloody, costly
anywhere
, far beyond my reach, far beyond the capacity of humans to fight her unless an Earth Warden was standing right in front of her.
This was what the Earth would become: fields of the dead, cities of silence, where lonely music played unheeded. It took my breath for a moment, and for the first time, I felt fear. Real, bone-deep
fear.
We were butterflies in an avalanche, and what could we do, really do, to stop it?
“Steady,” Luis murmured. His hand gripped mine, strong and warm. “Bright side: This stuff isn’t airborne, or we’d already be dead. It’s contact only, which means it’s containable.…”
“Not if she spreads it in a city,” I said. “Or an airport. Or—”
I caught a flash of movement from the corner of my eye, and spun around… to find a pale, glowing hand outstretched toward me, a single finger pointing at my forehead. Behind the hand, the face of Priya, her Djinn-fired eyes burning into me with unseeing intensity.
I stumbled back, and Luis grabbed her forearm.
“No!” I screamed, but he ignored me. His whole focus was on Priya, who turned her gaze on him, as emotionless as a machine. She didn’t attempt to break free of his hold, or move at all. I reached out for him, but Luis shook his head sharply.
“Don’t,” he said. “I’m already infected.” He sounded so
calm.
So sure. “I can do this, Cass. Just stay back.”
He couldn’t. A human, even a Warden as powerful as Luis, couldn’t defeat a Djinn one-on-one in that kind of single combat… not when she was pouring infection into him, rotting him from within. He needed me, he needed someone to amplify and direct that power with fine control, like a laser. I could do that. I could help him hit her where she was most vulnerable.
But instinct told me to back away. Stupid, ingrained human instinct that demanded I preserve my life at all costs, even the cost of the ones I loved…
I am not a human. I am a Djinn.
Djinn!
I gasped in a breath and lunged forward, adding my grip to his where it wrapped around her arm. “Together,” I said. “We’re stronger together, Luis. Let me help you!”
He let out a strange, wild little laugh, and closed his eyes. Priya wasn’t trying to pull away from us; she simply stood like a hot, burning statue, not quite flesh, not quite spirit. Exalted by her mission, and hardly noticing us at all, any more than a star might notice the ants crawling far below.
The sickness was already eating its way inside Luis, and the most difficult thing for Earth Wardens to do was to heal themselves; I channeled his energy out, and back in, burning the infection away, and then helping him drive back against the source. Priya was a teeming, seething incubator of the plague; she had been hollowed out, filled with this blackness, and set in motion. The Priya I had known was gone, as surely as those who’d inhabited the dead around us were no more. And that struck me hard, the grief of it; Priya had been an immortal, and she had been thrown away to become a vessel for destruction.
She had been my sister once.
Iclosed my eyes and threw myself into the fight, rising into the aetheric to more clearly see the struggle. Priya’s body was no longer the beautiful, harmonious form it had been; it was distorted, rotted, cancerous with the poison she carried inside. Luis glowed bright as a star, tinted with a fire’s edge of glittering orange from his rage and fear, and as I watched, his fire burned clean the portion of Priya’s arm he held. I poured my own strength into him, careless of the cost, and guided his Earth Warden instincts into the pathways inside her body, carrying his purifying fire deeper. Each second was a bloody, costly
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