Текст книги "Total Eclipse"

Автор книги: Rachel Caine

Соавторы: Rachel Caine
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Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 18 страниц)

Following him was a tall, thin, pale woman with hair as white as the Djinn on whom Venna had just been munching. She had skin to match, coloring that missed albino only by the shade of her eyes, which were an unmistakable shade of green. They werent a Djinns eyes, not anymore, but they once had been.

That was Cassiel, the Djinn whod been locked into human form. And her partner, Luis Rocha.

Sorry were late, Rocha said, and jumped down the rest of the way to land with a solid thump next to me. Madre, you dont go halfway when you blow shit up, do you? Theres enough rads burning in here to barbecue lead. We cant stay here long.

We have to, I said. Howd you get here?

We were close, and Cassiels hell on wheels with moving fast. Hey, Cass, you remember Joanne?

Cassiel inclined her head, just a little. She didnt smile, or look at all excited to see me again.

That took a turn for the worse as she looked at her fellow Djinn. Theyre hers, Cassiel said. They wont stop coming for you. They know you hurt her.

I know that, I snapped. It was kind of the plan. Here. Rocha, take this. Try to bind one of them.

Try to what? He looked shocked, as I pressed a bottle into his hand. What the hell are you talking about?

Two Djinn came for us before I could answer. David took one and got body-slammed into a pile of broken rock and bent rebar, and I felt suddenly sick at the damage he was taking, for me. I raised up wind and began whipping it around the chamber, vicious eddies and currents that pulled at the Djinn and flowed through them. Unless they commit completely to human form, Djinn often wear shellsbodies that arent quite completely stable.

Wind is their enemy, and I shredded several of them apart into vapor. They tried to reform. I kept hitting them with blasts of air.

The ones whod taken on entirely physical forms came at us in a rush, and I realized, belatedly, that the one whod been heading for me had disappeared. Hed veered off course, and was lunging for Cassiel, who had grabbed the bottle from Luiss hands.

Be thou bound to my service, she shouted, and had just enough time to repeat it two times before his fist slammed into her chest. She staggered under the blow, but it was nowhere near as deadly as it could have been, because the Djinn was dissolving into mist when hed made contact. He siphoned into the bottle, and she corked it and tossed it to Rocha. Then she took a deep breath and grabbed another bottle.

He stared at her with utter disbelief as she bound another Djinn. She shoved that bottle into a pocket and grabbed yet another emptyonly that one turned out to already be occupied. Rahel misted out of itthe Rahel I knewand took a look around at the chaos. Then she flashed me a reckless, shark-toothed grin and threw herself into the fight.

Cassiel raised an eyebrow and put that bottle in another pocket, and kept on binding Djinn in a terse, methodical way until the only one left was the one David was fighting.

Luis finally decided to join in, and bound that one.

Silence.

I dropped to my knees again, shaking and sweaty, coated in my own drying blood, and I realized the enormity of what wed just done. Wed enslaved the most powerful of the Djinn, and if anything was going to make the rest of them come screaming after us, that was it. Well, Lewis had wanted me to be bait. I didnt think hed expected me to achieve it on this level of success.

What did we just do? Luis asked nobody in particular. Fuck.

We did what we had to do, to survive, Cassiel said, in her cool, uninflected way. But we wont survive long if we dont leave this place. The radiation is too high even for Earth Wardens.

I nodded, and climbed painfully to my feet. I neednt have bothered; David swept me up in a carry position, and I reflexively threw my arms around his neck for balance. Youre hurt, I said. Let me walk.

Im not the one wearing the entire contents of my veins as body makeup, he said grimly. Shut up, Jo. Let me help you.

Feeling him against me was better than morphine, and I couldnt find it in myself to argue with him, not now. God, I didnt realize how much Id missed him when hed been gone. A voice on the radio, a presence in an avatarthose things werent David. Thiswas David.

Dont everdo anything this stupid again, he told me, as Cassiel led the way up the treacherous rocky tunnel. I rested my head on his shoulder and sighed.

If I had a nickel for every time somebody said that . . .

Jo, Im serious. Im not letting you die for them. Let himdie for the Wardens for a change. By himhe meant Lewis. There was more than a bite of anger and jealousy in there. Although he and Lewis had always been friends, they were also always rivals. Frenemies? This is out of control. Im sorry I had to do that.

Do what?

Bring the bottles. He looked at me bleakly. The last thing I wanted was to enslave my people, again.

Starting with yourself.

It was the only way I could come here and protect you. If you hadnt claimed me, Id have been one of them. Id have come after you, and you know I couldnt live with that. Not if I He didnt want to say it. We climbed in silence. It was a brutal angle, and uneven footing, and I was pretty sure that Id never have been able to manage it on my own after all. Even David slipped from time to time, and Cassiel and Rocha were helping each other along.

I looked back over my shoulder, but there was no sign of the Djinn following along, other than Rahel, standing at the bottom of the tunnel. Rahel? I called.

She shook her head. Im not walking, she called up, and clicked her long fingernails together. See you on top.

She misted away.

Man, I wished I could do thatalthough I felt the burn inside me as she pulled power from me, just as David had to do to continue this grueling climb. He probably would have preferred to blip out, too, but he couldnt take me with him, and I could tell he wasnt about to leave me on my own, even with two other Wardens to help.

We didnt speak the rest of the way, but I took huge comfort in just being with him. For now, at least.

We arrived at the top, and Luis Rocha collapsed toward the ground in a fluid crouch when he got there, breathing hard. Cassiel, who was only lightly windedthe bitchsettled down next to him. Damn, Rocha wheezed. Next time remind me to angle my tunnels better.

You were in a hurry, Cassiel said, as if all this was the most normal thing in the world. She began taking bottles out of her pockets and setting them out in front of her. Luis added his, and I gave up all of mine except for the one that contained Venna. There was no way I was risking her getting out, not until we had some way to control her.

I looked around. The buildings were toast, shattered and leveled, and black smoke still poured out of some of the holes that were left. Id done a good job of directing the initial damage from the blast; pretty much the entire compound was gone, but only inside the fence. Even the guard towers seemed to still be okay, although I wouldnt go climbing them without good reason. A gleaming Harley-Davidson motorcycle was parked just outside of the fence, as was the Boss, which no longer gleamed; it was covered in layers of grit and grime. As dusty as it was, it could have been there for years.

I saw no signs of anyone else. I guessed that Dr. Reid had finally come down on my side, and hustled the skeleton crew off the base and into total evac mode. Good. I would have shouldered the burden, but I was so, so glad I didnt have to do it.

Were not the only ones who were headed this way, Rocha said, and accepted a bottle of water from Cassiel out of the pack she was carrying. I hadnt noticed before, but she was dressed in white motorcycle leathers. They were immaculate, even after all the scrambling around down and up the tunnel. She passed me water as well, and took the last bottle for herself.

It wasnt until the liquid hit my tongue that I realized how incredibly parched I was, and I sucked down the bottle so fast that the plastic crackled in protest. I drained the whole thing in a rush, then had to sit down as it filled my stomach. Right, that was too fast. I kept it down, but it was a struggle.

Once the discomfort faded, I looked down at myself. Ugh. Notpretty. My body was mostly healed, but there was no helping the filthy coating of blood and dirt I was wearing, or the ragged clothes. The lab coat had helped, but it was shredded and so bloodstained I might have been an extra in a chain saw massacre movie. A dead one.

It occurred to me, belatedly, what Rocha was telling us. Who else is on the way?

Cops, fire, every federal agency still in business, probably. Maybe the military. This wasnt some small-time target, you know. Its going to get a lot of attention.

Well, thats what Id intendedjust not from the human world. So I suppose the smart thing to do is . . .

Seal up the tunnel, contain the radiation, and get the hell out of Dodge? Yeah. Thatd be it. Rocha was taking his time with his water, which I wished Id done, but he was almost finished. He tipped it back and drained the last mouthful, then tossed it down the tunnel.

Bad recycler, I said, and tossed mine in with it.

Jo, you brought down the whole fucking complex. I dont think water bottles really count at this point.

He held out his hand to Cassiel as he stood, and she rose to match him. Their hands linked, and I felt the low hum of power start to build.

We should help, I said to David. He shook his head.

No, you need to rest. So do I. Let other people do the work for a while.

Not really my style, but I could see his point. While they were filling in the tunnelI could feel the rumble under my feetI rooted around in Cassiels pack and found another bottle of water. Probably wasteful, but I stripped off the lab coat and then my shirt underneath, which wasnt quite as filthy. I used it as a washcloth to swipe blood and dirt off my face, arms, and hands. Short of calling up a gully-washing rain, there wasnt much I could do to get any cleaner until we reached civilization. Or at least a bathroom.

Dust plumed out of the collapsing tunnel, but we were out of line of the blast, luckily. I felt the long burn of the radiation through the soil, but even that was dialing back to a low background hum as Rocha and Cassiel put their blocks in place. It took about five minutes, and I heard the distant call of sirens in the distance before they were finished.

Funny, Id have thought it was laterit seemed like days had gone bybut the sun was just now slipping toward the horizon, turning the whole landscape a fierce blood red.

I used the lab coat to wrap up the Djinn bottles, and stuffed them into Cassiels pack. Try not to fall on that, I said. That would be bad.

She looked at me with those odd green eyes, and cocked an eyebrow. Very Mr. Spock, it seemed to me, although she probably didnt even know what that would mean. As Djinn went, she was very much out of the pop culture loop.

Do you imagine I like enslaving my own? she asked. Having done it, do you think I would like for them to win their freedom and come after me?

I hadnt really considered it, but Cassiel was a Djinn through and through, in every way except her physiology, which was stone-cold human . . . except that she couldnt survive without a Warden partner to replenish her energy stores. Shed never liked people, and she reallyhad never liked Wardens. So this had been a dramatic step for her to take, and one that indicated how human she was really becoming.

Right now I was pretty sure that she loathed it.

I inclined my head to her without another word, and after a long stare, she looked away, toward the horizon where there was a distant glitter of fast– moving vehicles. We need to go, she said. Now. The Djinn will be back on us soon, and we dont need the entanglements with humans.

I thoughtbut didnt saythat we were actually in a much stronger position now, with all the bottled Djinn at our command. Some of them would be royally pissed, and would do everything in their power to sabotage us, but I thought most of them would understand why wed done it, and how vital it was for them to put aside their personal issues until we could put Mother Earth back to a sound, restful sleep.

Thenthey couldand probably wouldkill us just for the principle of the thing. The absolute last thing the Djinn wanted was Wardens getting their hands on bottles again. The cooperation the Djinn had originally given, thousands of years ago, had come back to bite them in a big, big way; many of them, David included, had suffered through centuries (or even millennia) of harsh servitude at the hands of Warden masters.

Theyd kill to prevent it from happening again, and now Cassiel, Luis and I were a big risk to them.

One problem at a time, I said. Lets get the hell out. Any ideas where to go?

Rocha shrugged. Its all pretty much apocalyptic, so take your pick. We were going to head to Sedona.

Fate seemed to want me to go there, but Imara had very clearly said dont. I couldnt understand why, but I was willing to take it on faith; my daughter had risked a lot to come help me here, even for a few minutes. I didnt want to put her in even more danger.

David? I looked at him for a suggestion, and he smiled a little.

Trouble finds us, he said. Lets head for where the Wardens are gathering. Thats where they can use us, and the Djinn you claimed.

He was hiding it well, but I could tell that he hated the whole claiming thing even more than Cassiel. He was angry with himself, because hed been the one to think of it. The one to find the bottles and deliver them.

He could rationalize it, but hed never be able to excuse it. I knew David way too well. Like me, he took on too much and felt too much. His predecessor as Conduit for the Djinn, Jonathan, would have been able to shrug it off as necessary, and that would have been the end of the story. Not David.

I ached for him, but in this, I agreed with my imaginary Jonathan: it was necessary. Wed release them as soon as we could, but for now, it was the only way to keep any balance to this fight.

Cassiel picked up her backpack, and we ran for the vehicles. The ground was pitted and treacherous from the blast, but we made good time and got to the fence just as David blew it open for us. David and I piled into the car, and foundto neither of our surprisethe Djinn avatar sitting at the wheel, ready to go. Cassiel and Luis mounted the motorcycle; interestingly, she was the one driving. I wondered how thatnegotiation had gone.

Drive, David told the Djinn, and no sooner had he spoken than the engine fired up and the car leaped forward, spitting sand as it dug in and raced for the road. We hit asphalt a few seconds later, and when I looked back I saw the motorcycle turning in behind us. Whitney!

You rang, boss? She sounded just the same as before, amused and none too concerned with our lives. That was a rock-stupid thing to do, you know. And now Im stuck back being the damn Conduit, because you went and got yourself claimed. Again.

It was that or end up on the Mothers chain, David said. Ill take a slightly limited version of freedom.

Youd better hopeits slightly limited. Whitneys voice cooled, and all of a sudden her rich Southern accent dropped completely away. Let me make it clear, both of you: Im not standing for Djinn being stuck in bottles. I know why you did it, but its filthy betrayal and Im going to see you burn for it. Understand?

Of course, David said. I need you keeping a look-out for Djinn coming in for us.

Maybe, Whitney said. And maybe Ill just think about it, boss man.

That didnt sound good. Whitney was crazy but consistent, and if she meant what she said, we had a fifty-fifty chance of her just washing her hands of us and letting the Djinn in without a fight.

Granted, we had resources, but I didnt like losing Whitneys support. We were in enough trouble as it was.

Please, I said. Its my responsibility, Whit. Take it out on me if you have to.

Whitney made a sound that I found particularly irritating. Oh, I will, she said, and the Southern accent crept back into her voice. Believe me.

Whitney, David said. Hide us. Now.

Oh, all right. I felt something pass over us, like a shimmer of heat, and I knew that shed done as he asked. From now on, we were traveling unseen by anyone without Warden powersand probably by most who actually had them. It wouldnt fool someone of Lewiss quality, but it would serve to get us past any roadblocks, helicopters, and sharp-eyed patrols.

We zoomed past a road five miles out where several shining military-style vehicles were parked in neat lines. I got a flash of Dr. Reids face as he spoke to a group of people. Hed done it. Hed evacuated the compound.

That made me feel better, and also, oddly, very tired. Maybe the anxiety had been keeping me alert, but now I felt like I was dropping fast toward exhaustion. Not too surprising. It had been a big afternoon, what with nuclear explosions and getting shot and bleeding out.

I must have yawned, because David smiled and pulled me close. He felt better than one of those memory foam mattresses.

Do you want to sleep somewhere more comfortable? he asked, and touched his lips gently to the skin just beneath my ear. I couldnt work up much in the way of sexual excitement, but I shivered a little and gave him a weary smile of my own.

Im going to dream about hotels. Fancy ones, with the nice fluffy bathrobes and slippers and expensive soaps. None of this window-unit air conditioner crap. I stopped and thought about it for a second. Does that sound self-absorbed, given the ending of the world and all?

Maybe a little, he said. But I understand. And I wish I could give it to you. The best I can do is the backseat, for now.

I sighed. Thatll do.

And truthfully, a fabulous hotel would have been wasted on me, because after Id climbed over the seat and pulled Davids warm, long coat over me, I was asleep before a mile passed under the fast-turning wheels.

Id like to say I didnt dream, but I did. It was vivid, and shocking, and it felt, well, real.

It felt like Id stepped out of a dark place and into a bright, harsh sun, and I raised my hand to block out the glare. Only it wasnt the sun at all.

It was a giant, vaguely man-shaped form stalking toward me, and everything it touched in its wayrock, trees, fleeing animals, a car full of peopleburst into instant and immediate conflagration. It was the Fire Oracle, but pulled out of his hidden sanctuary and made subject to the will of the Mother.

It was burning everything.

I watched from my frozen, helpless spot as it stalked toward a town in the tree-lined valley below me. That was when I got a sense of scale, and realized that this glowing, terrifying creature was towering hundreds of feet in the air, taller than any building in the modest downtown. I could hear the screaming coming up out of the town, like birds sounding an alert. I could see tiny forms of people running, but there was nowhere to hide. The Oracle walked, and everything, everythingturned to slag and ashes. It left behind nothing alive. Thiswas what the Djinn and the Wardens had feared for so many thousands of years.

The extinction, without mercy, of the entire human race, done systematically and thoroughly.

I was watching tens of thousands of lives end, and I knew it would happen over and over and over, and it was so neat, so clean. Nothing left to bury. The charred land would heal itself, as it so often did; nature would take over the abandoned ground. Animals would return, free from being hunted out of existence by humans.

I felt a hand on my shoulder, and turned to face . . . myself. No, it was my daughter, Imara. She looked haunted, the way her father did. The way my own face appeared now, seeing this horror unfolding in front of me.

Imaras face was mine, but her eyes were different, more like Davids. She was dressed as she was when Id seen her in Sedona, in a dress made of shifting red sand. It flowed around her, constantly in motion, and flashes of her bare skin showed through. It might have seemed somehow flirtatious, but instead, it was stunningly beautiful. There was a peace and power that radiated from her the same way that heat radiated from the Fire Oracle, or menace from the Air Oracle.

She silently put her arms around me, and I felt the sand move around both of us, whispering secrets.

Baby, I said, and felt the hot pressure of tears. Oh, sweetheart. Thank you. I wanted to see you.

I know. I wanted to see you, too.

I looked back over my shoulder. The town was still dissolving in flames and screams, and my entire body ached with the intensity of the horror I felt. Imaras arms tightened around me.

No, Mom, dont try. You cant stop it. You cant help it. This is why its so important for me to stay where I am, and not let anybody close. I know you didnt mean to do it, but you breached the Fire Oracles barrier when you broke out of there. You weakened it. And once you did, the Mothers influence got through to him. He lost himself. Thats why I need you to stay away from Sedona, and Im so sorryI know that sounds terrible, and I wishI wish Imara took in a deep breath. I wish I could keep you safe with me. But I cant.

Is all this happening now? I asked. The smoke and flame and screams kept rising, and now I started dreading the moment when the screaming would stop. Is this a dream, or is this really happening?

Mom

Tell me.

Imara looked at me with pity in her eyes, and said, Its why the Wardens needed you to distract those of the Djinn you could. And you did; you took out some key players. But its not going to be enough.

My fists clenched, and my nails dug in deep enough to burn and cut. The Wardens have to do something!

They are. But this isnt something Wardens can fight. It isnt even something the Djinn can fight, although if you command them, theyll try. Elemental powers are walking the planet now, and theres no reasoning with them. No clever tricks or last-minute reprieves. The games over. Humans have lost. She said it so gently, and with so much compassion; I knew shed lost her humanity when Ashan had killed her, but I liked to think that through me, she retained some memory of it. Some sense of the magnitude of what was happening right in front of us.

But what I saw in her was a distance that I couldnt cross anymore. She was part of the Earth, and the Earth had rejected my species as flawed and failed. So no matter how much Imara still felt for me, she couldnt bring herself to feel it for all those suffering and dying below us.

I swallowed a hard lump in my throat and managed to ask, Then why are you here?

Because I can help you, Mom, my daughter said. I can help you become something else.

A Djinn? Been there, done that, not doing it again. Im human. I likebeing human.

But youll be alone. The only human left. I can keep you safe, but onlyyou. No one else. Is that what you want?

No, I said, and then said it more loudly, because the screaming down there was drilling into my head like a vicious power drill. No! Dammit, Imara, you have to help us!

Id like to, she said, and it sounded genuine. I wish I could. But I dont have any way to do that, and even if I did, maybe its for the best, Mom. Maybe this is what needs to happen, so things can start over. Cleanly.

I dont believe that. I backed away from her and stood several feet away, fists clenched. I will neverbelieve that.

When things die, you have to let them go, Imara whispered, and I saw eternity in her eyes. You let me go, didnt you? You accepted it. You have to accept this, too.

I couldnt even speak. My mouth had gone dry, my throat tight, and all I could manage was a violent shake of my head.

Imara sighed and folded her hands together. Im sorry, she said. Now I have to go.

You saved my life! You can save theirs, too!

I did, she said. But life isnt a permanent condition. You know that.

And the sand hissed up over her, whipped into a blinding ball, and then it blew apart in all directions, stinging my skin as it landed.

Imara was gone.

I looked down at the valley. The Oracle was reaching the far edge of what remained of the town. There was a large building there. I could just make out the word HOSPITAL in lights at the top before the power failed.

I grabbed hold of a tree that fluttered its leaves in the hot wind, and watched with dry, aching eyes as the building melted and burned. I thought about the patients in their beds, the babies in their cribs, the doctors and nurses staying at their posts despite the destruction coming at them.

Then I held up my arms and summoned storms. Not the carefully constructed sort that Wardens are supposed to wield, oh no. I slammed together air and water with careless disregard for the balance, the consequences, for anything that Id ever been taught. I needed rain, a lot of rain, and I needed it fast.

I put together one mother of a hurricane, and I did it in under ten minutes. The clouds were thick and black and stuffed with death, and I unleashed it right over the Fire Oracle as it reached the borders of the town. Water poured down with a vengeance, and I saw steam rising from the Oracles body. The destruction of the town cooled, but the Oracle kept burning, and burning, and burning, no matter how much rain I threw at him.

Then the Oracle turned and looked at me, really saw me, and I woke up as suddenly as if someone had slapped me across the face. I jerked upright, and realized I wasnt standing halfway across the country watching that terrible march; I was in the backseat of the Mustang. I was sweaty, hot, fevered, and scared, and fumbled for some of the supplies that Cherise and I had bought what seemed liked ages ago. Water. I needed water.

David said nothing. He didnt even ask me what Id been dreaming about. Maybe he knew.

I choked on the lukewarm liquid, but got it down, and gasped, Its true, isnt it? The Fire Oracle. Hes walking.

David slowly nodded.

Cant you stop him?

No, he said, and I heard the infinite regret in his voice. For the first time, I also heard resignation. Oracles cant be stoppednot by you, not by us. Once theyve been unleashed, they wont stop until the Mother tells them to stop.

There has to be something we can do. David, I saw it.I saw a townI saw peopleI saw

He grabbed me and held me as the Mustang plunged on into the night. Stars overhead, cold and precise and uncaring. David didnt try to tell me it would be all right, and he didnt try to promise me that wed find a way to survive. He didnt promise anything at all.

I sensed desperation in the way he was holding me. He didnt believe that we could make it.

No, I said shakily, and swiped at my eyes with my hands. No, well make it. Were going to find a way to stop this. We have to. We cant give up.

Its not about giving up; its about facing facts, David said. You think we can fight the Mother. We cant. Shes judged, shes made up her mind, and theres no changing it.

I couldnt accept that, I just couldnt. It didnt make any sense to me that we couldnt somehow fix this, make the Earth understand and see humanity as her own.

I pushed it aside, because there wasnt any point in arguing with David about it. Where are we? There was a glow on the horizon, a big one, and since it was due west of us, I didnt think it was sunrise.

Las Vegas, he said. Lewis brought the unassigned Wardens here. Theyve been working with the Maat to fortify the town.

Vegas would be a prime target, I realized, purely for the fact that it existed in such defiance of the natural order in the desert. So many people, so much artificial water, so much energy being consumed.

I remembered the town Id seen destroyed, and multiplied that times the huge population of Vegas, and felt shaky all over again. All right, I said. Its as good a place as any to make a stand. Plus, we might get in a Cirque show and some time at the roulette tables.

I didnt think they let Wardens play roulette. Or slot machines.

The casinos in the know certainly didnt. An Earth or Weather Warden could jinx a roulette wheel as easy as snapping fingers, and put a Fire Warden near a slot machine and forget about it. Look, if the world is going to end, Im going to win all the money I can. Just because. They say you cant take it with you, but really, has anybody tried?

Vegas sounded good to me for another reasonaccommodations, and shopping. I desperately needed a shower and new clothes, and even though I could ask David to magically clean me up, it wasnt the same thing at all as sinking into velvety hot water, scented with lilacs, and floating. . . .

I was fantasizing about a peaceful afternoon and a hot bath the way perverts fantasize about porn.

Hell, maybe Id throw in some shopping. Id always loved the clothing stores in the big casinos. Nothing like hitting couture when youre depressed, and if youre going to certain death, why not go out wearing Valentino or Prada?

Even the best fantasies have to end, and mine didnt last long. I went up into Oversight and got the lay of the land. It was unnaturally still, locked down on all fronts. I could see the restless fury of the land and the air, but the Wardens were keeping tight controls on everything, for now. With the amount of energy building, though, it was going to be impossible to hold it off forever.

I checked the rearview and found that Cassiel and Luis Rocha were still behind us, keeping a steady, patient distance. I supposed theyd also received their orders to join up with the other Wardens, or else they had business of their own, though what could possibly be more important than the end of humanity was impossible for me to guess. I supposed it was a matter of perspective.

Suddenly, the Mustang gave a surprised little cough and sputter, and the engine . . . died. We had just crested a hill and gotten a view of the incredible display of Vegas lights shimmering below, like some opium dream about living jewels.

Please tell me that we threw a rod or something, I said as the Djinn glided the car off to the side. I heard the harsh blatting of Cassiels motorcycle catching up to us, and then it, too, cut off without warning. She coasted the bike to a halt behind us and set the kickstand, and she and Rocha jumped off and got ready for trouble.