Djinn and Tonic (31 page)

“Good afternoon, Abdul,” the older Englishman begins in clipped English. “It is good to see you. I see you brought company with you, this time. Who is this lovely young lady?”

“This is my daughter, Nadira.” Father waves his hand, dismissing me. “You had a successful journey, I presume, Captain?”

“Very. Best yet, in fact. Although I fear things are growing tense here in Alexandria. I might be forced to avoid this particular port until things settle down somewhat, politically speaking.”

“Nonsense,” Father says, puffing on his hookah mouthpiece. “It will all blow over in time. It’s just the nationalists at it again. They make this noise every so often, but it never comes to anything. The Suez is too important to your government and to the French to allow a fool like Urabi to threaten it. Urabi won’t last.”

The captain waves his head from side to side, fingering his mouthpiece but not sucking on it. “I don’t know if you’re correct, actually. I think Urabi is a worrisome threat already. I think we’d all best be on alert. Don’t take offense, Mr. Nasri, but you’re so often shut up in your home that I doubt you see the unrest in the city. The people listen to Urabi. My countrymen won’t abide him, you’re right about that much, and neither will the French. If he seizes control, we’ll all be in trouble.”

I hear the question leave my lips before I can stop it. “Why are the people upset?”

The young blond man answers the question, much to the annoyance of Father and the captain. “It’s not everyone, it’s the nationalists, led by Urabi Pasha. He wants Egypt to be controlled by Egyptians and he wants us Europeans out. The problem is, we’re too heavily invested in the Suez to let that happen.”

“What’s the Suez?” I’ve heard of it, of course, as it is a name on everyone’s lips, but I’m not sure exactly what it is. Something to do with the European boats, I think.

“It’s a canal,” the blond man answers. “A big ditch cut between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea. It allows boats to travel from Asia to Europe without having to go all the way around Africa.”

“Well, why is that so important? Is it enough to start a war? That’s what you mean, isn’t it, when you speak of unrest?” I can’t help the questions from tumbling out.

“Well, it
is
that important, because it cuts the trip in half, which cuts costs to merchants and—”

“What does it matter to you, daughter?” Father cuts in. “I did not bring you with me to interrupt my conversations.”

“Oh, it’s no problem, Mr. Nasri—”

“Brock, I think you should—” the captain begins, but Father speaks over him.

“It
is
a problem, Mr. Branscombe, and it is
my
problem.”

The young blond man, Brock, nods, chastened, but I see irritation in his downcast gaze.
 

“But Father,” I say, tugging on my veil, “I’m simply curious—”

“If you’re curious,” Father says in Arabic, “you will speak to me in private, not when your betters are having a conversation in public. Do not embarrass me.”

“My
betters
?” I shoot to my feet, shaking with anger, speaking in Arabic now as well. “My
betters
? Just because you’re
men
does not make you better than me—”

“Enough!” Father says, not yelling but hissing, which is infinitely more threatening.
 

He raises a hand and snaps his fingers once, a sharp
crack
in the quiet café. An Arabic man in traditional white robes and a red-and-white checked kaffiyeh emerges from the shadows.

“Escort my rude and disobedient daughter back home,” Father says in Arabic, speaking in an undertone. “And see that she remains there until I return.”

The man nods once and takes my wrist in a firm but gentle grip, tugging me to my feet and escorting me out of the café. I struggle, but don’t scream; if I embarrass Father in public any more than I already have my punishment will only worsen. I curse floridly in Arabic as I’m hauled out of the café, drawing stares from the proprietor and the patrons, eliciting an offended huff from my escort.

“Watch your mouth, girl,” he whispers harshly in my ear. “You’ve already angered your father enough. Do not make things worse for yourself.”

I jerk my hand free. “Let go of me, you ugly ape. I’ll see myself home.”

“I’m sorry, mistress Nadira, but that is not possible.” He takes my wrist again, this time holding tighter, but still not enough to hurt.
 

I curse at him again and jerk my hand yet again. “I said,
let go
. Do not presume to touch me again, you stupid baboon. I do not answer to you.”

The man isn’t fazed by my insults. He merely captures my wrist yet again and this time squeezes hard enough to grind my bones together, eliciting a whimper of pain from me. “I answer to your
father
, as do you. Do not fight me, or it will go poorly for you, mistress.”

I shove him with my free hand, tugging at my pinioned wrist. “What will you do? If you harm me, my father will peel your skin from your bones. Now for the last time,
let go!
” I slap him as hard as I can with one hand and rip my other wrist free, startling him enough to let me dart away.
 

He catches me easily and when his hand is latched onto my wrist this time, I hear a low rumble like a distant avalanche. My wrist burns, stings, and aches, and then I feel my entire arm being encased in cold and unforgiving stone. I look up at my escort and see his eyes roiling brown and bright, the color of a mudslide, blurring with inexorable power. I force my gaze away from his eyes and down to my arm, and stifle a scream: my entire arm from fingertips to shoulder is sheathed in gray granite, heavy and hard and icy. I struggle and push and pull but can’t break its hold. It’s a subtle thing, what Father’s man has done. My arm is swathed in black fabric and is invisible from the outside. The only evidence of my imprisonment is a flash of stony gray at my fingertips.
 

“I’m sorry, mistress. I have been tasked with seeing you home, whether you wish my company or not. Please do not make a scene, or it will only go the harder for you.” He pulls me into a walk, muttering to himself, “Allah save me from troublesome children.”

*
 
*
 
*

I watch ships ply the vast harbor from the balcony of my room, their fat-bellied sails snapping in the wind, high prows proud above the azure waves. I lean against the elaborate marble scrollwork of the railing, wondering what it would be like to be on a ship like that, wind in my hair, freedom boiling in my veins. I can almost feel the roll of the deck beneath my feet, almost taste the brine spray on my lips, almost hear the creaking of the ship like the complaints of a beast of burden.
 

I wonder if the handsome blond Englishman is on one of those ships, hauling on a line, his broad shoulders straining, forehead furrowing in exertion.
 

“Brock Branscombe.” I speak his name out loud, tasting the foreign twist of the syllables. “Brock. Brock.”
 

His name sounds strong and hard like I imagine his hands and muscles would be. I see his eyes when I say his name, steel blue-gray like the barrels of the rifles his redcoat countrymen carry. He’d stood up for me, both to his own captain and my father, which means he is either very brave or very foolish. Probably both.
 

I turn away from the view of the harbor and the dozens of cargo ships, as well as from thoughts of Brock Branscombe. He is likely long gone, and even if he isn’t I’ll never see him again. Father will see to that.
 

My stomach rumbles noisily, reminding me that I’d refused both lunch and dinner in protest. In hindsight, however, refusing to eat had been petulant and childish. I’d just been so angry at Father and at his stupid autocratic nonsense that I’d lashed out the only way I could think of. I’d only managed to hurt myself in the process, of course. My door is locked from the outside, and the day is ending, which means no one will come to my room to bring me food until tomorrow.
 

The thought of going hungry all through the night makes my blood boil in anger. How dare they treat me like a child? Just because Father and the captain are men doesn’t mean they’re my betters. Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I’m not curious as to what is happening in my own city. I deserve to know, don’t I?
 

And Brock had been chastened unfairly as well. All he’d done was answer my questions, after all, so why should he be publicly embarrassed simply for speaking to me? It was all so unfair.

My stomach growls and gurgles again, and I flop down onto my bed, trying to calm my anger. Getting upset and working myself into a tizzy won’t help; I need to
do
something about it. Something useful, something productive. This is the nineteenth century, after all, not the ninth, and I won’t just sit here locked in my room like a naughty little child. I’m a grown woman, eighteen, already considered old by many. I am the last among my friends to remain unwed. Aziza is pregnant already and she is a year younger than me. Many of my other friends have been married for a year and some of them even for two or three. I, at eighteen, am one of the last girls I know who is still a maiden. Yet, here I am, a grown woman locked in my bedroom in my father’s home.
 

And not just a grown woman, but a
djinni
, no less. My race has lived among the humans for thousands of years, unnoticed and hidden. We possess magic as well as elemental birthright powers. We don’t just control the wind or fire or earth or—as in my case—water. No, we
are
that element. We are long-lived, capable of living hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Djinn, in fact, are the source of the human myths surrounding “genies”, a bastardization of our true name.
 

Here I am, a member of an ancient and powerful race of nearly-immortal beings, and I’m locked in my room like a child?

It is embarrassing and infuriating; I’ll just have to take matters into my own hands, then.

I stride confidently to my door and stand in front of it, focusing my attention on the lock. I have received at least rudimentary training in the use of my birthright powers, so I should be able to accomplish
something
. It’s just a lock, after all, a hunk of dead metal. How hard can it be to force it open with my powers?

Mentally steeling myself, I turn my focus inward, gazing down deep into the corners of my soul where the power awaits. I grab for the core of energy, but it eludes my grasp. It is slippery, like wet stone. It is like trying to grip a handful of seawater. Calming my frustrated nerves with a few deep breaths, I try again, this time slowly and gently, as if approaching a skittish bird. My eyes are closed, the darkness of the inside of my eyelids shutting out all distractions, the sounds of the cawing of seagulls, the chatter of voices from the streets below, the clatter of wheels on cobblestones.
 

The darkness slowly begins to recede, although my eyes remain firmly closed. Black turns gray, and gray turns blue—subtle navy at first, then deep sapphire, and then a gradually brightening azure, then the brilliant, scintillating blue of sunlit ocean water.

At first, I wonder if perhaps I’m looking down at a pool within myself, an impossible sea of liquid somewhere in my body or mind. Then as the glow encompasses my mental vision completely, I come to the realization that it isn’t merely a pool I’m diving into, or a bath in which I’m submerging, but it is, rather, a sea vast and endless and not merely within me or around me, but an ocean that
is
me.
 

Always before, with the various djinn instructors I’ve had, I have only ever managed to create a brief spurt of water from my fingers, enough perhaps to douse my younger brother, enough to play with, but that’s it. I’ve always pretended to be in control in these situations. Indeed, the amount of control I have over the liquid I was able to summon was always impressive to my tutors, but I always felt I was merely scratching the surface, merely dipping my pinkie finger in the true depths of my potential powers.
 

Now, surrounded by the glow of power, I realize I am right; if I can just grab hold of this rippling sea and learn to wield it like a scimitar, I will be unstoppable.
 

I
have
to learn to control this, have to learn to summon not just a puny little jet of water, or create icicles on my bedroom ceiling, but actually learn to
control
it, all of it.

I reach a mental hand forward, imagining myself grasping a tendril of the power, picturing it like a rope coiled from the larger whole.
 

My efforts are rewarded by a thrum in my veins, a buzz of vibrating power in my blood and bones. I open my eyes and breathe a curse of surprise in Arabic. Instead of the normal, bland view of my bedroom door I see a thousand, million bluish-white streams of liquid, a web of watery threads surrounding me and wavering and rushing in constant motion, fluttering in the gust of wind from my open balcony door, drifting in the currents of air, weaving around me and twining into knots and coils and bunches. The edges of my body, my fingers and the tips of my hair and the tops of my ears, my bare toes peeking out from underneath the hem of my skirt, the curve of my waist and the mounds of my breasts, all this seems to fade and drift and undulate with the motion of the streams of liquid all around me as if my body wishes to join the play of currents.
 

With a breath of awe, I slip a hand outward into one of the currents and watch as my fingers turn from tan flesh to cerulean water, the glow spreading from fingertip to knuckles to palm to wrist until I mentally stop the spread as it reaches my elbow, panic fluttering low in my belly.
 

What would happen if I let the glow spread all throughout my body? Would I ever return to normal? Could I return my arm to flesh and bone now that it is transformed? I have no answers for these questions, but I push the fear away and return my attention to the problem at hand: getting free of this room.