Thin Air

A shattered Djinn bottle. Bad Bob's slave freed. My quest for Lewis. Meeting a stranger on the road, a vagabond named David I couldn't quite resist.



A blur of events that I couldn't even separate, ending in more destruction, more death, my own transformations.



Blue sparklies. A hole in the aetheric. Demons. The fate of the world, again, on our shoulders.



Human again. Faces flashed by at an increasing rate, because I could feel the tension of the Demon on the end of the memory chain, pulling back, and I couldn't stop now to even try to comprehend what I was seeing.



A glimpse of Jonathan, ageless and cynical and passionate about what he loved.



Fighting for my survival in a flood, and rising in the arms of my lover above the foaming, deadly currents.



The Mother of Storms taking notice, at last, and coming to end the cycle of violence.



Imara conceived. Imara born. Imara-



The memory chain shattered into a million crystalline fragments, and I lost my hold.



It all started to go away. I was losing it. No!



The Demon didn't waste time with my trauma. She cut to the chase and plunged her hand into my chest, just like she'd done with Rahel.



If she couldn't be me, then she was going to damn sure make sure I wouldn't be, either.



The sensation that raced through me was horrifying. I'd been through bad stuff; this was beyond. I'd felt it through Kevin's memories, and it was even worse this time, because there was no escape.



She simply bored her way through me, ripping apart whatever she didn't need, and I felt my connection to the aetheric suddenly cutting off. It was like the sun disappearing during a total eclipse, and something in me screamed, trapped and terrified and suffering.



It couldn't live that way for long. I couldn't.



Although I felt like there was less and less of an I. It was draining away from me, like sand out of a broken glass, slow but inexorable. I was losing my childhood again. My mother's face was fading away. I lost the memory of my first date, and the nervous excitement of buying my prom dress, and the scratchy elegance of the corsage my date had bought me. I lost the memory of his name, too.



Evil Twin didn't care about my troubles. She let go of me, but I didn't move. Didn't speak. Hair blew across my face, obscuring my view of her, but it didn't matter. She could see. I didn't need to, because now I was fully, completely under her control. I couldn't fight, because I needed every ounce of strength to slow down the steady erosion of my past.



She was simply going to drain me dry, and then I'd be gone. Erased. Finito.



The Wardens were circling us, trying to decide which one was the good Joanne, which the bad; the problem was that the deck was now stacked, and they were screwed no matter what choice they made. Kevin and Cherise were hanging back, watching with identical expressions of sick horror; more than anyone else, they understood what was happening to me. Not that they could help me.



Not that anyone could.



The Demon accessed my Warden powers, blew a hole through the peaceful, artificial shield of Seacasket, and accessed a huge draw of power from the aetheric. She used me to do it. My control shattered, and the memories dissolved faster.



I lost my college years. I lost Lewis, swept away in a tide of oncoming darkness.



I felt the clouds gathering overhead, a soft gray pressure turning rapidly dark, and under the Demon's direction I rubbed air molecules together, creating friction, heat, driving the engine of a tiny but incredibly concentrated storm. Not my choice, but definitely my fault. The storm broke with a snap of lightning, and drenched a square-block area of sidewalk, catching nearly every Warden in its path.



As soon as they were standing in a thin layer of water, she forced me to slam a lightning bolt down and electrified the whole block.



The Wardens went down like ten pins in a bowling alley, many stunned, a few maybe even dead. I wanted to stop. I wanted to scream.



Instead I turned and walked, under the Demon's control, into the gates of the Seacasket cemetery.



"There used to be guards here," E.T. said, as if we hadn't just lashed out against everything I knew and loved. As if I weren't dying as quickly as she was coming alive. We were strolling along the path like two sisters, hand in hand. "There were Djinn guards. You remember?"



It was a new memory, not yet pulled apart by the ongoing destruction. I remembered. They'd nearly killed me and Imara. Ashan had been here, too.



"I won't let you win," I said. I couldn't stop her, and she knew it, but she at least allowed me the fantasy of saying it. "You don't have to do it this way. If you want to go home, we'll find a way to send you home. But you're not killing the Oracle. You're not ripping open any doorways. If I don't stop you, the Wardens will. The Djinn will."



"And yet," she said, with the same cockeyed smile I'd felt on my own face so often, "that's exactly what I'm going to do. And you're going to help me, until I don't need you anymore."



Gravel crunched under my shoes. Part of me was shrieking in agony, battering at the container that she'd stuffed it into. "I'm fading," I said. I couldn't even work up emotion about it, because she controlled my body, even down to the endocrine level. "No good to you if I'm dead. Slow down."



"You'll last long enough." She shrugged. "I need you, because I won't be able to open the door, not alone-the Oracle will know me for what I really am. I could have used the combined power of the Wardens to blast it open, but you've ruined that for me. Now only a Djinn will do-or someone who's been one before. You."



We passed some leaning, picturesque headstones. A cracked marble bench. A tree that showed evidence of having sustained some fight damage in the past.



And we arrived at the mausoleum.



"No," I said. My body couldn't hear me. It was following a completely different set of instructions as my arm lifted, touched the marble door, and then reached for the inset metal knob. "No. No, no, no!" Memories flared, burned, and dissolved. Bad Bob. Storms. My car spinning out on the road. The Djinn-hot flash of David's eyes. Lying in his arms, gasping.



My time was running out.



I traced the roots of my power to where E.T. had placed a black stranglehold on them. I couldn't free myself-no chance in hell-but I could focus on one tiny opening. It was like breaking the pinkie finger of someone choking you-possible, but of doubtful use.



I did it anyway. I focused everything I had, all three forms of power, through the lens of my desperation, and came out with a white-hot stream of pure energy that burned a hole straight through the black cage holding me prisoner.



Something reached through to me. It came in a slow, warm flood, like syrup...the thick, condensed power of the Earth. It was trying to reach me.



Not enough. I couldn't use it; the opening was too narrow, the cage too confining. No leverage. I screamed inside, trying to cling to the last memories as my hand turned the doorknob, and I fell into another place, one with no up, no down, just stone and an ever-blazing fire too hot and brilliant to approach...



And E.T. was able to come through, too, because she was holding my hand, and physically she was identical.



Part of the cage in my mind cracked. I ripped at it with everything I had, frantically widening the gap, and the power poured in like water through a hole below the waterline. Filling me up.



She felt the change, and she tried to pull away, but I had control of at least part of myself now, and I body-slammed her down on the rocks with one hand around her throat.



"No," I gritted out. "No, you don't. You can't have my life!"



Heat rose up through my body. A wave of fast, tingling fire, a cooling whisper of air and water, then the slow, whispering power of the Earth, the gift of my daughter, Imara. I sensed her now, calm and utterly focused. It's okay, Mom, she whispered to me. We can do this. The three of us. Just hold her still. That's all you have to do.



The three of us? Was she counting Evil Twin?



No. She wasn't. I blinked sweat out of my eyes and looked up as the door opened again, and a Djinn formed out of the darkness, moving fast. His olive-drab coat swirled around him, and he blazed like new morning here. Djinn were children of fire, more than any other element, and he burned-oh, God-he burned so magnificently bright.



David took a bottle out of his coat pocket-a thick, ancient, cloudy thing, sealed thickly with wax and dust. A complicated knot of ribbons and more wax dangled from the neck of it. I recognized it. He'd nearly popped the cap on that thing back in the forest, when he'd thought I was the Demon.



There were more Djinn with him, stepping out of the walls all around us. Silent, powerful, angry. Merciless.



With the last core of my being, I recognized one of the newcomers standing near me-pale, silver hair, eyes as vicious as a wolverine's. Oh, he hated me. Not the Demon...me.



Ashan. Still human.



A little girl in a blue dress and white pinafore stood next to him, her hands folded primly in front of her. Blue eyes shimmering with ageless power.



"Hurry," she said to David. "If you want to save her, yield."



David faced Ashan. I was caught between the two of them, with the Demon writhing around and trying like hell to get me off of her. Luckily, her ability didn't include superstrength, and she'd lost her hold over me. Still, all she had to do was wait. I was losing myself fast. She was draining it all away...



David said, "I yield." He said it to Venna. To Ashan.



And then I saw a swirl of fire erupt out of the pit, wrap around him, and I heard him scream.



"David!" I couldn't let go. If I did, the Demon would destroy us. "David, no!"



Whatever was happening, it was ripping him apart. I could hear the agony, feel it resonating in the stone all around me. I could hear a distant groan, as if the whole world had felt it, too.



And then the flames leaped from David over my head to engulf Ashan.



And he burned. Venna didn't move, even as he shrieked in agony, but I saw perfect crystal tears trickling slowly down her cheeks.



"What are you doing?" I screamed at her. She was watching Ashan, watching the tornado of fire that he'd become.



I felt some fundamental balance shift, and in an instant the flames just...went out.



David went to his knees, gasping. Ashan...



Ashan was perfect. Hard as alabaster, inhuman and burning with power.



Oh, my God. What had David done?



He looked up, eyes burning copper-bright. "What are you waiting for?" David gasped. He was fire to Ashan's cold, frozen steel, and the two of them looked inhumanly strong as they glared at each other. I could feel the violence gathering in the air. "You've got what you wanted. Keep your promise, you bastard."



Ashan's smile was as thin as a paper cut. "Perhaps I'll wait a bit."



David's voice dropped almost to a whisper. "Now," he said. "You've cost me enough. We have a truce. Don't test me."



Ashan's smile disappeared, not that it was ever real to begin with, and the two of them locked stares in that hot, airless place, with the eternal pale fire burning just steps away. This was a place of power, and it was full of very scary Djinn. I didn't know what could happen, but it wouldn't be good.



Venna said mildly, "Ashan. You did promise." She said it with no particular emphasis, but it sent shivers down my spine. Venna-was that her name? I no longer knew her, or the black-skinned Djinn with cornrowed hair, staring at me with burning golden eyes. Or the well-dressed one with the chestnut brown hair, cold and elegant. There were dozens of them, and they were all riveted on me, on the Demon, or on Ashan and David.



Ashan abruptly reached out and put his hand on the back of my neck. I yelped at the cold shock against my sweating, hot skin, and then felt the ice sink in like winter.



"This will hurt," he said. That wasn't a warning. That was a promise.



And then I came apart, screaming, in a red haze, and he rebuilt me, cell by cell, neuron by neuron, in a brutal, fast, cruel process, and I felt every single nanosecond of it like an eternity.



My memories returned with it.



Every one.



I heard the Demon cry out and knew that what she'd stolen was being ripped away, leaving her the shell, making her the excess baggage of the universe, and even though I hated her for what she'd done (and tried to do), I couldn't help but hate Ashan more.



Because he was enjoying it.



He let go and stepped away, wiping his hand fastidiously against his gray coat. "That fulfills our bargain," he said, and met David's eyes with absolute menace. "Finish this, or I'll finish you."



And then he just...left. And half the Djinn disappeared with him. The ones who were left seemed to take a collective breath, as if they'd been dreading the outcome of all that, and even David looked a little relieved. Just for a second.



Then he crouched down to eye level with me and touched my face. "Trust me?"



I nodded, but I really didn't have a choice. And if he had to destroy me to end this, well...then I knew he'd do whatever was necessary. Because David had responsibilities that were greater than his love for me.



I love you. No matter how this goes, that doesn't change. His words to me on the plane, and they were echoing in the stark, primitive confines of this place. I couldn't stay here much longer; the heat was suffocating, and the flames blazed hotter every moment, sucking moisture out of my fragile human body, flirting with igniting my hair into a fireball. I didn't have the time or concentration to spare to protect myself, and I wasn't sure, with this fire, that I'd be able to in any case.



I blinked sweat from my eyes and managed a smile. "Of course I trust you," I said. "Do whatever you have to, but she can't leave here. She can't live."