Fallen

Chapter 2

Chapter Two

We decided to keep the device running behind the front desk. From there, it would cover most of the downtown area — not that Taos had exactly what you’d call a downtown, but there was the plaza and the shops clustered around it, and then the commercial businesses along Highway 68, including the all-important Smith’s grocery store. Lauren promised to keep an eye on the box, since Lindsay had to assemble a team to help her scrounge whatever solar equipment and supplies might be available in the area.

Not that any of us were too worried about someone touching the innocuous-looking little black box, since at the moment it was the only thing keeping us all alive.

Jace and I commandeered a big Super Duty pickup truck, figuring the bed would be big enough to haul a couple of generators back to the resort. We’d get the fuel on a separate trip. At least the weather was cooperating; the clouds from earlier in the morning had mostly disappeared, and the sky was a pure sapphire blue. The snow on the mountains seemed to positively sparkle in the sunlight.

On a day like this, it was difficult to remember the threat we all faced. But it was out there somewhere, even if that horde of hostile djinn appeared to have gone much farther away than the mile radius the device’s field of effect afforded us.

After we’d climbed in the truck and I had pulled out of the resort’s parking lot, I asked, “Where did they go?”

Jace didn’t pretend to misunderstand. A brief glance out at the clear skies all around us, and then he shrugged. “A djinn doesn’t have to be precisely here. We have our domains beyond this plane of existence, worlds that exist next to this one, impossibly far away, and yet so close you could reach out and touch them, if only you knew how to pierce the veil that separates them.”

That sounded like something right out of science fiction. Then again, he’d already told me that the djinn had come from a different world than ours, a place where the rules of nature weren’t exactly the same as they were here. I’d had to believe him, because his people were obviously just as real as anyone else, and yet they weren’t human, no matter how much they might appear to be.

“And so when I turned on the device and drove them back — ”

“They would have returned to that plane,” he said absently, staring out the window. “So it’s not as easy as keeping a watch to make sure they’re not lurking around somewhere off in the distance. In a sense, they are still here, only in a world that Miles Odekirk’s device can’t reach.”

“Comforting,” I remarked dryly. Meaning we didn’t dare switch the thing off for even a second, or they would be right on us. But what concerned me even more was the question I had to ask next. “Jace…why? You had an agreement with them. What in the world would make the other djinn change their minds about leaving the One Thousand and their Chosen alone?”

“Ace Hardware.”

I blinked. “What?”

“There’s a hardware store. A good place to look for a generator?”

I supposed so. Having never shopped for one, I had no idea, but I figured we’d better go check. I pulled into the parking lot, which still had a few dusty-looking vehicles sitting in it — older-model sedans and compact cars, all of which apparently were beneath the djinns’ notice. Like the Los Alamos survivors, the Chosen here had gravitated toward late-model SUVs and trucks with four-wheel drive.

We stopped in front of the store, in the fire lane. That was the most convenient spot. Besides, I didn’t think the Taos P.D. would be by anytime soon to give me a ticket. Then I said, “You didn’t answer me.”

His fingers had been resting on the door handle of the truck, but at my remark, Jace let go of it and turned back toward me. Dark eyes met mine, grave and unwavering. “I didn’t answer because I have no answer for you. I don’t know. As far as I can tell, nothing has changed, or at least, Zahrias has had no indication of an alteration in their intentions.”

“I’d say what happened this morning is a pretty good indication.”

A small breath escaped Jace’s lips, almost too faint to be called a sigh. “Yes, it would appear that way. As frightening as that was, though, it wasn’t as if all the djinn who were not part of the Thousand participated.”

“How many, then?” I asked. True, nineteen thousand djinn were an awful lot, and I doubted there had been that many swirling in the skies above Taos. Far more than we had in our little community, but still…maybe a couple hundred?

It seemed my guess wasn’t too far off, because Jace replied, “I can’t say exactly, but more than a hundred, and less than five. It’s possible there is a subset of djinn who don’t agree with the majority’s decision and have attempted to take matters into their own hands.”

While I doubted anyone would find such a pronouncement exactly encouraging, it did make me feel a little better. If Jace was right, then that would mean not all the djinn were against us. Not that I knew what we could possibly do to fight off a few hundred rampaging elementals, except keep Odekirk’s shield operating and hope for the best. But several hundred was a lot less frightening than nineteen thousand.

“Do you think Zahrias will reach out to the other djinn?” I inquired. “I mean, the ones who probably are keeping the agreement.”

Jace’s reply was a small, sad smile. “How can he, when his powers are being cut off by the device? And even if they wanted to communicate with him, they would be equally constrained. The field the device projects is invisible to you, but to us djinn looking in from the outside, it is as if everything beyond it is obstructed by dark glass. And…it is painful to go through it. That was another of the experiments Margolis had Odekirk perform on me. They would shut off the device for only a few seconds, not long enough for my powers to return, and have one of their men push me through the edge of the field. It was like receiving electric shocks all over my body. That is why the djinn turned away so quickly. They would have no idea that passing through the field was something they could actually survive.”

“My God, Jace.” I knew that he’d been through hell, but every revelation like that made me want to go back to Los Alamos and inflict a little torture of my own on the commander.

“It’s in the past.” Unbelievably, Jace shrugged, as if all the suffering he’d gone through meant very little to him. “In the meantime,” he went on, “we should look for that generator. I’m sure Phillip will be relieved if we can get the food protected, if nothing else.”

“We’ll all be relieved,” I said. “Everybody’s gotta eat — even djinn.”

Jace grinned — a real grin, like the kind he used to flash me back when I still thought he was Jason Little River. “That’s for sure. So let’s make sure we can keep on doing it with minimal difficulty.”

We got out of the pickup truck and went into the store. Its windows seemed intact, so I assumed no one had attempted to loot it. Well, Jace had told me there weren’t many survivors in Taos, most likely because the town was so small. They’d probably moved on before they could even think about raiding the hardware store, and of course, up until now, the djinn and their Chosen hadn’t needed much from it.

Since we’d been on these sorts of scavenging missions before, we’d thought ahead and brought flashlights with us, although we’d decided to get more when and if we found them. Candles would help to light the resort at night, but they weren’t inexhaustible. Flashlights and battery-powered lamps for camping would make a good supplement, depending on what the hardware store had stocked.

The flashlights and spare batteries were easy; we put a dozen flashlights and twice as many packages of batteries in the shopping cart we retrieved from the front of the store. Toward the back, we located the camping section, and gathered up three of the lanterns we found there.

“Good thing the Heat struck in September,” I said. “At least the stores hadn’t put their camping gear away in the stock room for the winter.”

I’d expected Jace to nod, but instead he went still, staring down at me with a sad expression in his dark eyes. “It would have been better if it had never occurred at all, but we were not given that choice, unfortunately.”

A protest rose to my lips. At the last second, though, I stopped myself from speaking. I’d wanted to say that if it hadn’t happened, then he and I would never have been together. But that was a terrible thing to think. I loved him and couldn’t imagine being without him. However, I could never say that our love was worth the deaths of millions of people.

Billions, I corrected myself. That “B” is pretty damn important.

Jace seemed, in that way of his, to pick up on what I was thinking. I wouldn’t say he was psychic exactly, but very good at reading my expressions, my silences, the things I didn’t say clearly just as important as the things I did.

His voice was soft as he said, “Yes, the thought of not having you is not a pleasant one for me, either. I suppose I had a dream of still being with you, of coming to you as those of my kind had done with other mortals from time to time in the past.”

“Would that even have been possible?” I asked. I’d wondered about it here and there, mostly because of his somewhat oblique references to other djinn/human pairings. From what I could tell, our relationship — and the relationships of the other elementals in Taos and their Chosen — didn’t seem to be unprecedented. If the notion of such relationships had been completely alien to the djinn, then the Thousand would never have tried to save any of us.

“It would have been possible for us to be together. But not easy.” He ran his flashlight over the shelves in front of us. “Is there anything else here that would be of use?”

I could tell he didn’t really want to talk about the situation. But these were the very subjects we needed to discuss. Yes, we’d spent months together, but it was only at the very end of that period when I’d learned what he really was. Now I felt as if I needed to make up for lost time.

Still, it would be rude not to answer his question, so I quickly looked over the camp stoves and sleeping bags, then shook my head. “I don’t think so. They’re going to retrofit the ovens to run on propane, and beds and bedding are two things we really don’t have to worry about. So let’s keep looking for those generators.”

Jace seemed relieved that I hadn’t pushed the subject, and maneuvered our shopping cart down another aisle as he headed toward the rear of the store. Not looking at me, he said, “There’s a question burning in your mind, isn’t there?”

“Yes,” I replied simply.

“Then ask it.”

Well, he had once told me that I could ask him anything. And he’d always been truthful with me, once his djinn heritage had been revealed and he no longer felt he had a terrible secret to hide. It was something, knowing I could trust him in that.

“Would you really still have chosen me if you had the whole world to pick from, instead of only a few Immune?”

At once he let go of the shopping cart and came to me, taking my hands in his and pulling me close. His fingers felt cool against mine, but at least they weren’t cold, and his grip was firm enough. I could almost convince myself that nothing was wrong, that Miles Odekirk’s device was having very little effect on him after all.

“Beloved, there never would have been anyone but you. I felt the resonance of your soul with mine from the time you came of age, and I mourned, because even then I knew what humanity’s fate was to be, that the time of reckoning was only a few scant years off. But then I learned from the creators of the disease that you would be one of the fortunate few who would be immune, and I laid claim to you as soon as I knew.”

My heart leapt at those words, and something in me relaxed a little. He had always wanted me, had feared I wouldn’t survive the Heat. “How would that have even worked?” I asked. “I mean, it’s not as if we’re exactly from the same backgrounds. My parents had issues just the few times I dated guys who didn’t go to college.”

He didn’t smile, even though I’d tried to keep my tone light as I asked the question. “Not so very differently from the way we met. That is, I would have approached you as one of your own, made sure you were comfortable with me before I told you the truth.”

“And then?”

Bringing one hand to his lips, he kissed my fingers gently before releasing them. “That would have depended on you. Whether you would have accepted what I was telling you, whether you would have made that very great leap.”

Would I have? Of course I wanted to think so. I wanted to believe that what he said wouldn’t have changed the way I felt about him, that I could have accepted the truth of his heritage, but it’s easy to imagine the best of yourself when you’re considering a hypothetical situation. “So…would I have gone to your world, if I had made that leap?”

He shook his head. “Such a thing isn’t possible. We djinn can live there, but we much prefer it here. And a human being, even one under our protection, granted advanced life and powers of healing, couldn’t survive for more than a few hours on the plane where the djinn made their home, once the earth was taken from them. No, we would have lived our lives here, moving on when it began to become obvious to those around us that we weren’t aging normally. It isn’t the easiest of lives, but there are a few who’ve managed to do it successfully.” Something flickered in his dark eyes, a shadow that I could barely catch because of the bad lighting in the hardware store. But because I knew Jace, I did see it.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. It was the first question that popped into my mind, although I couldn’t stop myself from also wondering about that reference to having this world taken from them. “Did you — were you with someone like that?”

Another head shake, this one even more emphatic than the last. “No. I wasn’t with anyone before you. That is, there were brief…liaisons…from time to time, but that’s all. Nothing lasting, nothing important. No, I was thinking of Zahrias.”

I could actually feel my eyebrows shooting up. “Zahrias? He was with a…mortal?”

“Yes. For quite a few years. But in the end, she was unable to live with the reality of her existence, that she would go on, and on, and that everyone she knew and loved would die around her, save her djinn lover. So she took her own life. Even though she had the healing abilities that we gift all our partners, if someone is determined enough to kill themselves, they can still succeed. As she did.”

“Oh, my God,” I whispered. That shocking revelation answered a few questions. Why Zahrias didn’t have a Chosen, and possibly why he had come to be the leader of the group in Taos. Maybe he wanted to make sure his fellow djinn had the happy ending he’d been forever denied.

“It was a terrible thing for him.” Jace moved closer to me and brushed a strand of hair away from my brow. A simple gesture, but something about it made me want to weep. Maybe it was his way of reassuring himself that I was there, that I certainly had no plans to go anywhere. “I worried that Evangeline’s death would make him less likely to look on mortals with any sort of kindness or compassion, but he surprised me. He offered to lead the community here, when no one else seemed inclined to take on the challenge.”

“And he’s doing a good job of it, too,” I said. Strange how your feelings about a person could change so much, once you knew the truth. Yes, Zahrias still seemed far too formidable to me, and I was so very glad that I was Jace’s Chosen and not his, but in that moment I realized I wasn’t afraid of the djinn leader. Not anymore.

“I’m glad you think so.” Something in his expression changed then, and he stepped a pace away from me before aiming his flashlight toward the back of the store. “But we should probably keep looking for those generators. Dark comes quickly at this time of year.”

Yes, it did. Too quickly, although I’d begun to notice the gradual lengthening of the days. Spring was coming, even though it was still more than a month away. How long would we have to wait for it here in Taos? I had a feeling it would be slow in arriving, no matter what the calendar might say.

The rear of the store was a jumble of various items that the owners obviously had dumped there because they didn’t really fit in anywhere else. That sort of casual chaos would never have flown in Albuquerque, but in Taos, the locals were probably used to it. Chaos or no, we did find two sturdy-looking generators back there, each with multiple outlets.

“Those should help a lot,” I said. “At the very least, they’ll keep the refrigerators going. But with an output of 5,500 watts, they’ll probably do more than that.”

“Success,” Jace replied, offering me a smile. Something about it looked a little wavery around the edges, though, and I put a hand on his arm just as he was reaching out to take the handle of the generator closest to him.

“Are you okay?” I asked. “Tell me the truth.”

For a second he didn’t say anything, only watched my face, as if hoping to find some indication there as to how he should reply. Then, “I’m fine, Jessica. Yes, that device is hammering away at me, tiring me, but I can manage. In fact,” he added, “I believe that tonight I’ll have to prove it to you.”

A flicker of heat stirred deep within me. “Oh, really?” I responded, trying to keep my tone light, teasing, just in case he was also teasing me. In the back of my mind had been the fear that the device was taking so much of his energy that he wouldn’t have anything left for me, but if he was serious, then apparently that wasn’t the issue I’d thought it would be.

“Well, you might have to be on top….” He slanted a sideways glance at me, and despite everything, I couldn’t help laughing.

“I’m willing to take that ride,” I said, still chuckling, and then he smiled, a real smile, the sort that made a pleasant little shiver run down my spine.

Maybe there was a way we could manage to get through this after all.

We hustled the generators out to the truck, then went back into the store to find a ramp we could use to wheel them up into the bed, since at the moment Jace wasn’t strong enough to lift one on his own, and I never would have been strong enough. Luckily, we found what we were looking for on the loading dock. We were just closing up the truck’s gate when we heard a voice that was halfway between a whisper and a moan.

“Jessica….”

As one, Jace and I whirled. I couldn’t help noticing the way he moved forward, placing himself between me and the owner of that voice, even though I was probably in better shape to take on an adversary at the moment than he was. But then when I saw who was speaking, who it was slumped against the wall of the store, I realized we weren’t facing an enemy at all.

The man speaking was Aidan, one of our missing hunters.