Alaskan Fury (9 page)

As the djinni hissed and tried to
yank his arm away, she held him in place with the strength of her Third-Lander
demon as she ran her palm over the wound, pushing her blood into his body. 
Harnessing the ancient language of the Furies, she forced through a
fear-tightened throat, “By my blood, I gift this djinni my mastery of the
shadows until such time as he gifts it back.”  It was a simple wartime trick of
her order, one usually performed by shield-mates or sword-sisters or other
beings that trusted each other implicitly.  Here, she had to make do.

An instant later, she felt her
awareness shift, felt a trickle of her energy sliding away, down her arm and
into the djinni.  At the same time, the djinni gasped above her, his black forearm
stiffening under her like iron.  Then, as if a light had been switched off in
her mind, the world lost part of its depth, and Kaashifah could no longer sense
the shadows.  She could still
see
them, but her mental command of them
had simply ceased.

Suddenly, quite thoroughly, she
had left herself defenseless.

Oh gods above me
, she
thought, staring at her tawny fingers, light against the jet of the djinni’s
arm,
what have I done?
  Her pulse was suddenly a rushing thunder in her
ears, her lungs unable to get enough air.  She heard him let out an unsteady
breath and her heart became a thunderous pounding in her chest, a thousand
hammers from Hephaestus’s forge slamming against her ribs.

For a long time, she stared at
where her small hand touched the djinni’s big forearm, wishing she could take
it back.  “Gods,” she heard him say, a strangled sound.  She slowly pulled her
fingers back, too afraid to look up at him, too horrified to retreat to the
river to begin her ablutions.  He moved away from the portal to the firelands,
then, and Kaashifah took a step back, automatically, panic rising like pangs of
acid through her veins.

Only afterward did she realize
her mistake.  She, a Sword Maiden, had retreated.  It was all the excuse the
djinni needed to step closer, until his chest almost brushed hers.  Without her
usual methods to deter him, Kaashifah kept her head down, fighting despair. 
He’s
going to touch me,
she thought, miserable.  Already, she could feel his
taint in the wound of her hand, a throbbing ache as blood dribbled from her
clenched fist to the frozen pebbles at her feet.  She looked away, biting back
tears.

In her periphery, the djinni fell
to one knee before her.  “Mon Dhi’b.”  It was a whisper.

At least he wasn’t defiling her
with a touch.  Daring to lift her head to meet his gaze, she was stunned to see
utter, open-faced gratitude in the djinni’s eyes.  Still, she was not prepared
for the djinni to grab her, to heft her body against his chest and tighten his
arms around her, lifting her until her feet dangled as he laughed.  “Oh mon
Dhi’b, mon Dhi’b…”  He
kissed
her then, even as she tried to twist away,
pressing his lips to her cheek, her chin, her forehead, her
ear
…

“Enough!” she cried, struggling
to pull herself from the iron bars that were his grip.  “You dirty me with your
touch, ‘Aqrab.”  But the djinni just held on, his naked skin hot against hers,
like a rock that had been left too long in a fire.  Pulling her so tight to his
massive chest that she began to have trouble breathing, he dropped his head to
her shoulder and laughed against her neck until his breaths devolved into
something that sounded like sobs.

It was the pathetic wrenching of
his chest against hers that stopped her struggles and made her stare. 
He
was as miserable as I was,
Kaashifah realized, stunned.  She had always
thought his nasty quips and constant barbs to be an indication of his innate
malice, but she began to wonder if perhaps she had read him wrong, if perhaps
he had simply been weaving his spite as a tapestry to hide his despair.

The djinni held her for what felt
like hours, until they had both gone silent, and the djinni was simply
releasing slow, easy breaths against her shoulder.  His extra body warmth, that
which came from being a demon of the flame, was even enough to overwhelm the
dirty feel of their skin contacting, the corruption of a male touching a
Warrior-Priestess of Horus.

“Enough, ‘Aqrab,” she finally
whispered.  “You defile me.”

She felt the djinni’s grip harden
around her, and for a moment, she thought he would ignore her and try to
continue the hold.  Then, reluctantly, the djinni pulled away and wiped his
face on a big arm.  He caught her eyes for a moment, and there was pain etching
the tears on his cheeks.  “An embrace doesn’t defile, little wolf.”

“It does if it comes from a man,”
she growled.  “You know what I am, djinni.  Respect that, for once.”  As it
was, she would have to spend hours in prayer to rid herself of his taint.

‘Aqrab continued to meet her
eyes, his gaze fierce.  “And you know what
I
am, little wolf.  I am no
ice maiden.  I have gone three millennia craving the human touch.  Humor me.”

She felt her lips twist to tell
him she’d rather roll in the filth of swine, then, at the desperation in his
face, hesitated.  By gifting him her shadows, she had accepted his truce.  Only
now was she was learning the terms.

He couldn’t spear her, but he still
wanted her.  It was as clear as the color of the sun.

Kaashifah glanced down at his big
black hands and considered whether she would ever be allowed inside the temples
again.  To allow him to continue to touch her…  That she was even considering
it left her in despair.  Three thousand years truly had worn on her.

For a moment, there was nothing
to break the silence except for the sound of her blood, dripping a near-black
against the frosty stones.  She watched the djinni look down at the deeper darkness
of her blood against the pebbled beach.  He frowned, thankfully twisting the
conversation from its former direction.  “Let me see,” he commanded, holding
out a big hand.

Though Kaashifah would rather put
her hand into Hephaestus’s furnace than into the djinni’s palm, she reluctantly
did as she was asked.  Knowing she could no longer cow him with shadows took
much of her well-cultured disdain from her façade, while at the same time, his
boon gave her the confidence to hold steady.  While still unable to take her
birthright form, she was once again a Fury in spirit.  And a Fury feared no
man.

‘Aqrab took her hand gently. 
Once she had opened her fist for him to see, the djinni tisked and stroked an
ebony thumb across the wound.  As he did, she felt the tear she had given
herself with the Third Lander’s teeth sealing under his touch, the cool-prickly
sensation leaving her with a ragged pink scar. 

‘Aqrab held her hand much longer
than necessary, and eventually Kaashifah raised her head to look at him.

“Three thousand years, mon
Dhi’b.”  Even in the dying light, she could see the tears brimming his eyes. 
“In three thousand years, you’ve never willingly held your hand out to me.” 
Uncomfortable all over again, Kaashifah tried to pull away, but ‘Aqrab held her
firmly.  In a whisper, he added, “Yet you do it twice in one night.”

“You said you need not touch me,”
Kaashifah growled, trying not to imagine the taint that was even then seeping
into her being.

“I’m a djinni, mon Dhi’b,” he
offered softly, his gaze locked to hers.  “Passion is in my blood.”

Unnerved by the sudden change in
the conversation’s direction, she quickly growled, “Your self-made wishes are
none of my affair.  You cursed yourself to celibacy.  It is not my
responsibility to console you for your stupidity, when you so flagrantly use
others’ words against them every chance you get.  You said you could do without
my touch.  Then do so.”  She jerked her arm in an attempt to free herself of
the djinni’s grip, but he simply held fast. 

“Mon Dhi’b,” ‘Aqrab said, softly,
“…tell me you will let me touch you again?”

“Your healing is appreciated,
djinni, now release my hand before I
rip it off
,” Kaashifah snapped. 
She twisted, intending to walk past him, but he failed to release her.

Behind her, the djinni moved on
his knees to face her and whispered, “Mon Dhi’b…” 

Realizing he wasn’t going to
release her, Kaashifah’s heart started hammering with brutal force as she
reluctantly turned back to once again meet his eyes.  The djinni’s raw need was
there, utterly exposed for her to see, his soul bared and vulnerable. 

She knew she could have hurt him,
then, could have scored him with her words until he never thought of defiling
her body again, and forever kept his distance.  Instead, however, she found
herself lost in his gaze, wrenched to the very core by his inner fire.

“Please,” he whispered, still
holding her.

She found she could say nothing,
could only stare at him like a rabbit caught in a hunter’s snare.  A thousand
things raced through her mind, but she could no more force them from her throat
than she could wrench her hand from the djinni’s grasp.  Still kneeling, the
djinni leaned forward and reached up with his free hand, to touch the back of
her head.  She felt his body slide closer, like a warm cocoon to shelter her
from the cold, and
heard
his heart hammering like thunder in his chest. 
Too late, Kaashifah saw the ardor in the djinni’s eyes, and realized his big,
hot palm was slipping against her scalp, steadying her head as he brought his
face to meet hers…

The tree beside her head exploded
in a blast of bark and wood chips, followed by the booming retort of a
high-powered rifle echoing across the river.  Snapped from her paralysis,
Kaashifah instinctively threw the Third Lander from his cage and used him to
power her limbs as she shifted to wolf and ran.  The djinni, likewise, twisted
to the Fourth Lands.

On the river, a boat filled with
black-clad men and women roared from its hidden niche across the water. 
Nearby, black shadows moved low and fast through the trees, murmuring orders
into little microphones against their throats.  More gunfire slammed into the
cranberry and currant bushes as Kaashifah lunged the riverbank and bolted.  She
felt one hit her hip, felt the silver start paralyzing the Third Lander there,
and surrounded it with her magic, forcing the corruptive heat of the silver
back to the bullet. 

“Silver’s not working!” she heard
someone hiss from behind her.  “The damn wolf is getting away!”

With her senses now receiving the
full benefit of the Third Lander in her blood, she heard the strange, soft
whisper of, “
It’s the demon we’re after, Imelda.  Figure out how the wolf is
controlling it.”

There were
too many
of
them, Kaashifah realized, veering suddenly to the left when she saw more of the
black-clad soldiers moving through the brush ahead of her.  Dozens.  Maybe even
hundreds.  She banked hard and dove into the deeper forest between two startled
black shapes.

“Yella-bellied bitch ain’t even
fighting,” a man with a Texan accent laughed.  “Runnin’ like a scared rabbit.” 
The sounds of gunfire followed his words, and little bursts of shredded moss
exploded in little
thumps
around her feet.

Another bullet hit her, this time
in the back leg.  Kaashifah gasped and stumbled, rolling through the brush to
slam into the base of a birch tree hard enough to knock the wind out of her. 

They’ve got me
, Kaashifah
thought, too dazed to make her body move as the men came to a running halt
behind her and raised their rifles.

Then, suddenly, a blast of fire
between them lit up the darkness, half-blinding her with its intensity.  Men
screamed and backed away as a massive spruce tree burst into flames from the
djinni’s heat, its resins lighting up the night for hundreds of yards.

The air was suddenly awash with a
frenzied static of screams and orders.  Nearby, someone shouted, “Got it in the
open.  Fire, fire!”

But the djinni had already
slipped back to the Fourth Realm, leaving nothing but a roaring column of
flames in his wake.

“He keeps slipping Realms,” a
black-clad woman was saying.  “He must be tied to something here.”

“Figure out what it is and
bring it
back,
Imelda, or a report of your incompetence will reach the
Inquisidor Grande,”
the whisper replied.

“The wolf is wearing something
around her neck,” one of the black-clad warriors said into the mic as she
closed in on Kaashifah’s position.  “A talisman of some sort.”  It was the tall
brunette in jeans, Kaashifah realized.  The one who had thrown the dart to take
down the wereverine.  The Spaniard.

Kill the wolf and bring back
the talisman for the Great Commission to evaluate
, the whisper snapped
back. 
And be quick about it.  This place is crawling with otherkin.  Jacquot
found another knot of them a few miles downriver.
 

Kaashifah was already crawling
back to her feet, blotting out the pain, narrowing her attention to
speed
. 
Overhead, she heard an odd thrumming sound, and looked up just in time to see a
helicopter—sleek, bullet-shaped, almost completely silent, unlike any
helicopter she’d ever seen before—sliding overhead.  Behind her, the women in
black made no effort to follow.

“Got the wolf on infrared. 
Djinni is nearby, fifty feet south-southwest of your position.  Fucker lights
up like a flashlight.  He’s circling to the wolf.”

“Ground crew clear,” Kaashifah
heard the Spaniard say.  “Make it rain.”

Make it…
rain
?

And suddenly the world began to
flare and explode with heavy gunfire.  Kaashifah threw up a defensive wall
around her just at the last moment, stopping liquid-oozing bullets in a hazy
bubble of shield-magic.  She threw energy to her wounds, sealing off the silver
to the best of her ability, and then bolted.  She knew that she would quickly
outpace the djinni, but his soul-bond would not allow him to be more than five
hundred cubits distant, so he would simply be dragged by their link until she
slowed enough for him to walk.  She hoped he had the good sense to flip back to
the Fourth Realm, though she wasn’t about to slow down long enough to find
out.  She ran, weaving a barrier of invisibility through the layer protecting
her from the bullets, until it was difficult to see through the shimmery blur
that she had created.