Fallen

Chapter 1-2

True, especially if we were going to have to start looting the immediate area for any useful items. I began to nod, then stopped, my free hand going to my mouth.

Jace’s fingers tightened on mine. “What is it?” he asked.

“The hunting party,” I said. “Aidan and Clay and Martine. They went out a couple of hours ago. Have they come back?”

Zahrias and Jace exchanged a single unreadable look, and Jace shook his head.

“We’ve heard nothing of them,” Jace said quietly. “But I was speaking with Zahrias when the attack began, and so it’s possible they returned and we simply heard nothing of it.”

“It will be easy enough to find out,” Zahrias added. He c****d his head to one side, eyes narrowing, and then his lips pressed together. Something had clearly annoyed him, although I couldn’t begin to guess what.

His next statement clarified things a little.

“I cannot call her this way any longer,” he said. As my eyebrows went up, he explained, “Lauren. She is not my Chosen, but she is with my brother, and that created a close enough bond between us that in the past I could easily summon her with my mind. Now, though, with my powers suppressed….” The words trailed off, and he gave an eloquent lift of his shoulders.

She’s not your lapdog any longer, I thought. But maybe that was a little harsh. After all, I hadn’t gotten much indication that Lauren minded being Zahrias’ executive assistant, so to speak.

“I’ll see if I can find her,” I offered. “Actually, I’m kind of surprised that she and a whole lot of other people aren’t here already, banging on the door and demanding answers.”

That remark earned me a very thin smile. “My people know better than to force their way in where they are not invited.”

Well, that was one big difference between humans and djinn. I didn’t argue the point, though, but only lifted my own shoulders.

“I’ll be back as quickly as I can,” I said, then went up on my toes to kiss Jace on the cheek before I let myself out of Zahrias’ audience chamber…that is, conference room.

The hallways appeared deserted as I headed out. Maybe no one was going to come and ask Zahrias what the hell was going on, but I knew we mere mortals tended to come together in times of crisis, which meant I had a pretty good idea of where I could find everyone.

A babble of voices echoed down the corridor when I approached the open restaurant area that the Taos group had been using as its communal dining room. Apparently, even the lush plantings there weren’t enough to muffle the noise. To my surprise, I saw Lindsay standing in the middle of a large and agitated group, her hands waving in the air as she appeared to describe what she’d seen less than an hour earlier.

As I hesitated at the edge of the crowd, she seemed to realize I was there, and stopped abruptly. “Ask Jessica,” she said. “She was at the shop with me.”

Everyone swiveled in my direction, djinn and mortal together. Right then I thought that they’d never appeared more alike, as they all seemed to be wearing similar expressions of worry and dismay. Also, the djinn were clearly struggling with the effects of Odekirk’s device — they looked pale and tragic, and more than one of them was clinging to his or her Chosen as if the other person was the only thing holding them up.

Although I felt for them, for the drain on their energy they were currently suffering, I still hated being the center of attention like this. I’d never been the sort of person who liked speaking in front of other people, or doing anything that would attract the notice of others — sexy Halloween costumes notwithstanding. Those had been my friend Elena’s idea anyway.

But now? I stood rooted in place, gaze scanning the crowd for Lauren. Damn it, where was she?

Since everyone there was staring at me, obviously expecting an answer, I knew I had to say something. After clearing my throat, I replied, “Well, I don’t think what I saw was too different from what Lindsay saw. A dark cloud of djinn. Angry-looking djinn. At least, I think they were angry. It’s kind of hard to tell when someone’s hovering a thousand feet or so above your head.”

“Where’s Zahrias?” someone else demanded, a man probably around my age or a year or so younger. He had his arm around the waist of a wan-looking djinn woman. I didn’t recognize either one of them, but I’d only been in Taos for a few days, and had spent most my time with Jace or with Lindsay in her makeshift lab. Socializing hadn’t been too high on my list of priorities.

“In his room, talking with Jasreel,” I said calmly.

“He should be out here with us,” the man shot back, blue eyes blazing.

“Maybe he should,” I said. “But I’m not his keeper. I’m just looking for Lauren.”

The man grumbled something. At the same time, to my relief, I saw Lauren step out of the crowd and come toward me, her djinn partner Dani stumbling along behind her. This was the first time I’d really had a chance to study his features, although I’d met him briefly before. There was something in the shape of his mouth and his brows that recalled Zahrias, although in a gentler, kinder-looking arrangement. This djinn would have been a lot less scary to find on your doorstep, telling you that you were his Chosen.

At the moment, though, he just looked ill, eyes shadowed, breathing labored. I hated that they all had to go through this, but, as I’d pointed out to Zahrias, death was a lot worse than discomfort. And more final.

“Zahrias needs me?” Lauren asked.

I stepped closer to her and lowered my voice, since I really didn’t want the whole crowd listening in. “Have you heard anything about the group that went out hunting earlier? Aidan and Martine and Clay? They might have been — well, I’m not sure they were close enough for the device to have protected them.”

In an echo of my own gesture from a few minutes before, Lauren’s hand went to her mouth. “s**t. s**t. No, I’d — well, I’d completely forgotten, what with everything that’s been happening.” She glanced back at Dani, whose shoulders went up infinitesimally. I didn’t know if that was all the comment he was willing to make on the subject, or whether he simply didn’t have the energy to give a larger shrug. “But they always check in with me when they come back, so I know they’re not here.”

“s**t” was right. Aidan was the only one of the group I knew beyond attaching a face to a name, but I liked him. And even if I didn’t, there had already been enough death, enough people lost. Even three more was too many.

“If we go to look for them — ” I began, but Lauren shook her head.

“We can’t. It’s not safe.”

And that was the worst part of it. The best we were able to figure, the device could only protect an area of about one square mile. It had to stay here in Taos where it could do the most good. For all I knew, the rogue djinn were lurking right there on the periphery of its field of effect, just waiting for someone to step over the line.

Jace would never allow me to take such a risk. Aside from that, I knew I wasn’t brave enough to attempt that kind of stunt. Anyway, sacrificing myself on a hopeless mission wouldn’t help anyone, least of all the people I was trying to save.

“So…what? We just sit here and wait?”

Dani spoke for the first time then. His voice was almost as deep as Zahrias’, but softer, not as harsh around the edges. “What else can we do? This demon device you’ve brought among us is the only thing protecting us. To leave this resort would certainly mean your death.”

I was a little startled by the compassion in his voice. True, I’d already noted a number of differences between him and his brother, but even so, I hadn’t expected him to be that concerned about a Chosen woman who wasn’t his.

“Jace would never let you risk yourself like that,” Lauren added.

As much as I wanted to argue with her, I knew she was right. Hell, he hadn’t even wanted me to put myself in harm’s way while trying to rescue him. So no way would he let me go running off to save a group of people I barely knew.

“I hate this,” I muttered, and to my surprise, Lauren reached out and laid a hand on my arm.

“I know. We all do. We’re all scared, and worried, and — ”

Evony’s voice cut into the conversation. “I’ll go.”

Startled, I glanced away from Lauren and Dani to see that Evony had approached us while we were talking, and was standing a foot or so away. Her face was stony, blank, and it was obvious that she had been addressing Lauren, not me.

Lauren seemed to recognize that as well, because she said, “Evony, it’s way too dangerous.”

A lift of her shoulders. “So what? It’s not like I have all that much to live for.”

I couldn’t help myself, even though I knew I should be staying out of this. “That’s not true — ”

“Isn’t it?” Evony looked back over at Lauren, effectively shutting me down. “Anyway, none of you get to tell me what to do. You’re not in charge here.”

“No, but I am,” said Zahrias, his voice cutting through our conversation. I’d been so focused on Evony that I hadn’t even seen him arrive. Jace stood next to him, equally grim-faced.

If I’d had someone like Zahrias staring me down, I didn’t think I would have been as openly defiant as Evony. But she merely jammed her hands on her hips and glared up at him.

“In charge of all these poor bastards,” she retorted, waving one hand in the general direction of the assembled djinn and Chosen. “But I didn’t sign up to have you be the boss of me. You don’t get to tell me what to do.”

Zahrias stared at her. One muscle in his cheek twitched, and I had the incongruous thought that the twitch had actually come from suppressed amusement, not anger. Maybe he just wasn’t used to people standing up to him, let alone some mortal barely more than a girl, someone who didn’t even reach his shoulder. “Young woman, since you are now a member of this community, I do get to tell you what to do. Just as I will tell everyone else what to do as well.”

As she gazed at him, open-mouthed, he swept past her with a passable imitation of his old assurance. God only knows the effort it cost him to stride so strongly, to keep his chin up while Odekirk’s device was sucking away at the very essence of his powers.

Everyone else seemed to buy his performance, though, maybe because they were so busy trying to manage their own exhaustion and worry that they didn’t have the energy to dissect Zahrias’ behavior. He made his way to the front of the group, then raised his hands. All the murmuring that had begun with his arrival ceased.

When he spoke, it was without preamble — no “my friends” or “my fellow djinn” or anything like that. “We have suffered — if not precisely a blow, since the device protecting us now did prevent any sort of actual damage — at least a shock. We thought we were safe here. We thought our fellows would honor the truce and allow us our sanctuary. These two mortals” — he nodded first toward Lindsay, and then toward me — “witnessed the very beginning of what would have been an attack, but we all felt it. We knew our brethren were gathering, although they managed to hide their intent from us, almost until it was too late.”

“Why?” asked one djinn, a tall man with dark red hair and amber eyes. “We have done nothing to provoke them.”

Zahrias shook his head. “I cannot say why. They have not communicated with me, nor anyone else, so far as I can tell.”

“But what of our own missing?” another djinn asked, this one a woman, curvy and dark. I noticed she stood alone, and that her eyes seemed to glitter with unshed tears. Something about her appeared vaguely familiar, and then I realized she was Aidan’s partner. Well, that would explain the tears. She must be out of her mind with worry. Or at least, I assumed she must be. Jace would, if their situations had been reversed. Voice shaking, she added, “Are we to do nothing?”

When he replied, Zahrias’ tone was gentler than I’d been expecting. “Lilias, I fear there is very little we can do. All we can do is hope that the djinn who attempted to attack us were thrown enough off-balance by Jessica’s deployment of the device that they had no thought for hunting down any mortals who might have been outside the safe zone.”

“That is not much of a hope,” Lilias said. One of the tears that had shimmered in her dark eyes finally fought its way free from the tangle of her heavy lashes and began to roll down her cheek.

“But it is still a hope. We cannot allow ourselves to give up. Not this early.”

As he spoke, I began to see why Zahrias had been given this post…or had requested it. I wasn’t sure which was this case, since I still knew nothing of his history. Maybe soon I’d finally get a chance to ask Jace, but I knew that time wasn’t now.

I flickered a glance over at him, wondering why he hadn’t come to stand next to me. Then I realized he was rooted in the center of the hallway, arms crossed, as if to block anyone from going out that way.

Not anyone. Evony. He’d heard her outburst, and knew he had to do what he could to prevent her from going out and committing suicide while using the rescue of the hunting group as her excuse.

I love you, I thought at him then.

His mouth curved into a faint smile, quickly disappearing, as if he didn’t want anyone else to see it. And I love you. Because of that, I will do what I can to save your friend from herself.

It may not be enough, I said sadly.

I know. But if she sacrifices herself, it will be in spite of our efforts, not because of them.

A quick nod, and then I had to return my attention to Zahrias, because he was speaking again.

“This is not the only trial we face, unfortunately. Our powers are gone, and so we no longer have the ability to provide the comforts we’ve been enjoying here — adequate heat and light, power to run the various electronic devices our Chosen have used.”

Another murmur arose from the crowd. I could tell none of them had thought about that — the dining hall had a large fireplace at one end, and it was always kept blazing, possibly for atmosphere more than anything else. But because it had been lit, and because the room was so crowded, it was entirely possible no one had noticed it was a little cooler in here than usual.

Zahrias lifted his hands again, and the mutters subsided a bit. Not all the way, but enough that I could tell they wanted to hear what he had to say next. “I must ask our Chosen to come to our aid now. For tonight, that only means making sure we have enough wood to stock all the fires, and to help us gather bottled water and food so no one goes hungry or thirsty.”

“We’re going to lose everything in the freezers,” Phillip said, his face tight with worry. Since he’d been acting as the community’s chef, it made sense that our stockpiles of food were the first thing he’d thought of.

“Not right away,” Lindsay replied. She still looked troubled, but now that she had Rafi next to her, his arm looped around her waist, she seemed a bit more composed. “If we keep the freezer doors shut, they’ll retain their current temperature for a good while. Especially since we don’t have central heat anymore. It’s cold enough that they should hang on for longer than you’d think.”

“Good,” Zahrias said. “One night should suffice, and in the morning, we’ll have teams go out to collect generators and fuel.”

“Don’t forget about solar panels,” Lindsay put in. “I’m not a solar engineer, but I interned at a solar design firm a couple of summers ago, and I know enough that I’m pretty sure I can cobble something together for us.”

I reflected then that it was a good thing some of the pretty faces the djinn had selected as their Chosen also had some brains behind them. Otherwise, we would have been in far worse shape than we were now.

Apparently, Zahrias seemed to think the same thing, because he nodded, and even managed to smile at Lindsay. “That is a very good idea. I will let you focus on that, and then perhaps Jessica and Jasreel can help coordinate the search for getting us the generators and fuel. If we all work together, then we should be up and running in no time.”

Everyone seemed to be in agreement with that sentiment; I saw nods and even a few smiles from the crowd. Amazing how they all seemed to be focused on making life comfortable again. No one was even asking what Zahrias planned to do about the apparent change of heart of the rest of the djinn.

Then again, maybe that was exactly what he’d intended.