| |
GEORGIE WOKE IN A COTTON-headed state, icy cold, with a low grade pounding at her temples. Connor cradled her in his arms. He smiled as her eyes opened.
“Where are we?” she croaked.
“A place called Siberia Woods. Would you like to put your feet down?”
She put them down in a foot of snow. Once again she gave thanks for her trusty leather pants and work boots. “I guess we got away. Where’s Iksander?”
“Reconnoitering above the trees. What happened, Georgie? Why did you have that seizure?”
Before she could answer, the sultan’s smoke form streaked down and solidified. She guessed she was getting used to that. The main thing she noted was how grave his expression was.
And that he seemed reluctant to meet her gaze.
“You’re awake,” he said. “Good. We can reach the palace from here. Your spell caused a big blackout. We should take advantage while we’re able.”
“I was asking Georgie why she passed out.”
Something in Connor’s tone told Georgie he already knew the answer.
Okay, Georgie thought. I guess we’re getting into this now.
“Luna showed me where she was. Made me feel what she was feeling.” She turned her gaze to Iksander. His green eyes tensed warily. The look in them confirmed her suspicions. Where Luna had been and why was no mystery to him. “Taytoch wanted her to suffer, didn't he? Because she enslaved him and his crew. He had Pink maneuver me into cursing her with my wish.”
“Yes,” Iksander admitted. He sighed briefly and went on. “I realized what the ifrit intended ahead of time. I wanted him to help us get to the djinn dimension, but I confess the thought of Luna’s agony didn’t bother me overmuch. She’d harmed so many innocents. I concealed that knowledge from you even after he aided us.”
Georgie nodded. She didn’t approve of him making her an unwitting accomplice, but she supposed she understood. Sort of, anyway. It took a damn hard person to condemn another living being to what Luna had gone through. Yes, Luna murdered his wife by similar means, but Najat’s torment had ended a lot sooner.
She thrust her tangled thoughts away. She couldn’t sort them out right then. Luna was still suffering. She had a choice to make.
“If I use my final wish to kill her, will it cause trouble between you and Taytoch?”
Iksander shook his head. “I didn’t promise the demon captain I’d keep the secret forever.”
“Then I do wish it.” She drew breath and squared her shoulders. “I wish Luna Praetorius dead. I don't want her torment to continue.”
Connor’s head lifted as the icy air blew a message only he understood.
“She’s gone,” he said, his hand tightening around hers.
Relief coursed through her, followed by a strange sadness. Luna had played more tricks with Georgie’s existence than she could count—all to further her thirst for power and her vendetta against Iksander. She’d been cruel and self-serving beyond belief, but she’d also been a person Georgie knew. For six not-miserable years, she’d been Georgie’s guardian.
My deadly dangerous guardian, she reminded. I had no choice but to play judge and jury and executioner. She couldn’t have been trusted loose for two minutes.
She had these thoughts while studying the snow her boots were swallowed by. When she raised her head, Iksander’s gaze waited. She had a feeling his eyes revealed substantially less than hers.
“Are you ready to try to break into the palace?” he inquired carefully. “Our prospects are better while the power is down.”
Was she ready? She guessed she had to be.
“Uh oh,” Connor broke in, drawing their eyes to him. “Okay, you two better let me handle this.”
She didn’t know what he meant until he pointed. Between the pine trunks, where spindly saplings poked through the crusted snow, darkness too thick for shadow had collected. With a shudder, she recognized what the darkness was. The demon cloud had found them. Two baleful, pale yellow eyes shone within the seething black that formed its miasmic face. Georgie’s hand flew to the medal around her neck. As her thumb rubbed its golden surface, fresh fear burst in her chest. The coin was smooth, no longer engraved with charms.
Breaking Luna’s magic at the plant had undone the protection.
Had Connor picked up on this already? Was that the reason he stepped in front of her and Iksander? To shield them from danger?
“Connor,” Iksander said, his arm jostling Georgie’s as he moved to her side. He caught her wrist in cold fingers. “Be careful.”
Though Connor must have heard the warning, he didn’t alter his behavior. Without the least evidence of fear, he stared calmly into the demon’s eyes. “Have you come to say goodbye?”
The demon didn’t like the question. Its smoke pulsed and contracted. “I am hungry,” it rasped. It formed an arm that pointed exactly like Connor’s had. “That one must feed me. She is connected to the one who created me.”
“Luna wasn’t the only one who created you,” Connor said.
The demon’s booming laugh made Georgie jump. “You’re right. Lots of people helped. I am the greedy ones’ darkness. Now I shall swallow them.”
“I don’t think so. In any case, you’ll have to get to them through me.”
The demon’s shadow face turned surly. “I’m not interested in you. I don’t think you taste good.”
“Nevertheless, I won’t let you pass.”
The demon surged up into a monster shape: an apelike body with clawed hands. The seeming loomed over their serene friend. “You are alien. You don’t belong in my world.”
“I belong anywhere I choose to go.”
The demon pressed even closer—too close for Georgie’s nerves. The pair was practically nose-to-nose. Their eyes beamed dueling glows, sickly yellow to heaven blue. Though Connor appeared unmoved by the demon’s threat, Georgie’s throat constricted. When she tried to go to Connor, Iksander gripped her wrist tighter.
“Wait,” he said, so low she barely heard. “The angel knows what he’s doing.”
“I understand what’s happening to you,” Connor said gently. “Don’t you want me to explain it?”
“No, I don’t,” the demon snarled.
Connor’s celestial eyes shone brighter. The demon seemed fascinated, unable to look away any more than a light djinni. “I think you do. I think you’re tired of being angry and confused. You feel yourself getting smaller, which worsens your bewilderment. The machine that formed your essence has been destroyed. No more of you can be created by that means. You’re weakening and dissipating. That can’t help but frighten you.”
“I am the monster! I will feed. I will grow. I will frighten the others.”
“You won’t be able to. You’re dying already.”
The ape form puffed up and crossed its arms. “I am forever. I cannot die.”
“All things die,” Connor said. “Or, rather, they move from one state of being to another. Allow me to help you transition. I promise it will be peaceful and involve no pain at all.”
“I have just begun to be!”
As if it were a child and not a monster, Connor clasped the protesting demon’s face. Georgie twitched with panic, but the contact didn’t turn him into a mummy.
“You will still be,” Connor said. “Simply not in this reality.”
The demon’s eyes blinked at him. “I will still be?” it asked in a plaintive voice.
“You decided to Become. My Father doesn’t lightly erase that.”
The demon’s mouth twisted skeptically. It stared at Connor a moment longer then shook itself. “Very well. I accept your offer.”
~
THE ANGEL HAD A KNACK for astonishing Iksander. Scarcely a second passed between the cloud accepting Connor’s offer and it disappearing in a literal puff of smoke. Iksander couldn’t doubt it was gone. The atmosphere in the woods felt more wholesome, the tension that gripped his muscles relaxing. He let his breath explode in relief.
He hadn’t been quite as confident as he pretended for Georgie’s sake.
He wagged his head in Connor’s direction. “You’re not short of courage, are you? Was the demon really dying, or did you hypnotize it to think so?”
“I am capable of deception, but in this instance, I told the truth. I do prefer that. As does my other half. I believe it prompted me what to say.”
“Thank you,” Georgie said. “I hardly dared hope we could destroy that thing. I wasn’t looking forward to leaving it to prey on people while we got away scot-free.”
They hadn’t got away scot-free yet. Rather than mention this, Iksander rubbed his bristly jawline with cold knuckles. “We really ought to move along. Shall we carry Georgie between us?”
“Oh yes,” Connor said, his smile breaking out. “I enjoy doing that with you.”
Georgie and Iksander both laughed beneath their breath. Connor truly was a happy soul.
They took to the air without delay. No one being around to stop them, the flight was short. Because they’d never seen Mordent Palace from the outside, they circled it curiously. The prison, where they’d initially been housed, was concealed underground. Aboveground, the royal residence was imposing, though its snow-covered grounds weren’t huge. Forest bordered the open acreage, a smooth, two-lane road curving through the trees toward the capital. To Iksander’s surprise, both grounds and road were empty.
If he’d ruled here, he’d have assumed an invasion was underway. He’d have been mounting a defense, sending out squadrons, establishing alternate means of communication between city and provinces. None of that seemed to be happening.
Georgie’s grip on his waist tightened. “I don’t remember that geodesic dome.”
The enclosure was glass and metal. It topped what he had thought was open space. “That’s the courtyard’s sky, I believe. The magic must hide the structure from underneath.”
“It’s the only thing lit up.”
“We’re lucky it is. If your spell had knocked out the portal nexus, I don’t know how we’d recharge it.”
“I didn’t think of that. I didn’t mean to shut down the entire grid.”
She sounded sheepish. “Every choice carries risk,” he said. “Good soldiers—good generals, for that matter—deal with consequences as they arise.”
The kiss she pressed to his smoky cheek wasn’t soldierly. The buzz of her lips surprised and warmed him. His gratitude that she was with him, and that Connor was as well, hit him forcefully. No doubt he’d face a reckoning for deceiving her at some point. For now, their alliance held steady.
“Will the frame support us?” Connor asked from Georgie’s other side. “If it’s strong enough, we could land and peek in.”
Because this seemed worth a try, Iksander followed the suggestion.
The faux sun floated at the dome’s apex. They settled farther down, where the lower rim met the roof. They were less likely to be spotted there if the sky-seeming slipped. Iksander couldn’t tell if the illusion were active. From outside the glass, the dome was transparent and nearly free of snow.
Fortunately, their landing didn’t set off alarms.
“Damn,” he said as he surveyed the area under them. “I should have expected this. The courtyard is full of people. Including the regents. I guess Eleanor recovered from Connor’s sleep whammy. The court hangers-on have gathered here for the light. Either their personal magic is wiped out or not rising to the challenge.” He clucked his tongue. He spotted a large security force: both the black garbed soldiers and the froufrou-y guards in striped pantaloons. “Too bad we can’t count on being missed if they shoot this time.”
“This time,” Georgie repeated. “We were shot at?”
“You slept through that part. The guards at Hodensk lost their night vision from your spell, but their weapons retained their charge.” Iksander shrugged. “Perhaps this city’s firearms carry extra protection.”
“Something’s happening,” Connor said, drawing their attention back to the scene below. “It looks like the courtiers are confronting Henri and Eleanor.” He leaned closer and turned his ear toward the sound. Apparently, he’d absorbed the trick of sharing abilities. Though he didn’t do a spell that Iksander noticed, suddenly—despite the barrier of the glass—they could hear clearly.
“This is too much,” a tall female declared. Dressed in ruffled sleep attire but poised like a battleship, she stood at the forefront of her colleagues. “We’ve given you our loyalty. Toed every line you drew. Why have you taken our power away?”
Cool as rain, Eleanor flipped butter yellow locks behind one slim shoulder. “What nonsense. Of course we didn’t take your power away. This is a temporary problem. An accident blacked the grid, or perhaps an agent of our old enemy moves against our great empire. We’ll find who’s responsible and squash them.”
“If you believe our enemy is responsible,” the djinniya challenged, “why are the soldiers here, protecting you?”
Iksander smiled at the woman’s logic, but Eleanor had an answer for this as well. “Should we not protect ourselves? What is the empire if not Henri and myself?”
Henri took her hand and nodded in support. “We shield you by doing this.”
“Convenient!” another emboldened courtier declared, striving to match the first’s brashness. “You make a virtue out of covering your asses.”
“Watch yourself,” Henri warned. “You forget how luxuriously you live here, how we’ve graced you with our presence and showered you with gifts. Remain calm now and you’ll enjoy that bounty again.”
His argument stole the wind from his opponents’ sails. The last thing most of them wanted was to give up their privileges. Though more dissatisfied murmurs rose, Iksander sensed the resistance losing momentum.
“They’re not going to fight them,” Georgie said, echoing his conclusions. “Don’t they see they’ve been played? Most of the ‘gifts’ Henri and Eleanor hand out are stolen, including from the courtiers!”
“They’re part of the system,” Iksander said. “They benefit more—or believe they do—from leaving the status quo in place.”
Georgie grimaced but shook off her annoyance. “Okay, what is, is. We need to do something to drive these folks from the courtyard. If we don’t, we’ll be killed trying to get in.”
“I think we can access the portal from here,” Connor said, “without sneaking through the palace. If we climb the dome and remove the pane above it, we could slip through the hole. I know flying around would make us a target, but maybe we could drop straight in.”
Georgie turned to Iksander. “Could we do that? We wouldn’t plummet to the floor?”
“The portal will suck us in if we drop near enough. The challenge is getting sucked where we want to go. Guaranteeing that could take a few minutes.”
She frowned as she mulled this over. “If that’s the case, we’re still better off emptying the courtyard. What about . . . You saw the demon cloud up close. Could you impersonate it in your smoke form? That’s something they’re afraid of. Even the soldiers probably, considering the corpse we found in the conduit. With the power mostly out, they might believe the demon could get past the protections.”
Iksander saw the irony of making the lie this city was taught the truth. Luna and the regents had demonized him—casting him rather than themselves as their people’s worst bogeyman.
“Hold on,” Connor interjected. “What will happen to Iksander if the soldiers fire into his smoke form?”
“That’s a lesser concern than insuring the portal is keyed correctly,” Iksander said. “I can survive more hits in my smoke form than if I were physical.”
“More hits—” George said in alarm.
“Don’t forget how fast I am in that state. Your idea is good, and we don’t have a better. I shall put it into action.”
“But—”
He bussed her cheek and then checked Connor to make sure he was on board. The angel appeared uncertain but didn’t object more. Iksander smoked before he could lose his nerve. As best he could, he assumed the demon cloud’s monstrous appearance.
“Blacker,” Connor suggested, studying the result. “And maybe spread out so you look bigger.”
“I’ll do that once I get inside.” Iksander drifted toward the pane he wanted to go through. Despite the general power outage, magic was lingering there. “Georgie, could you place your hands here and send out energy? I’d like you to make a hole in the anti-infiltration charm.”
After a brief hesitation, she laid her palms flat on the surface. No matter her occasional doubts, she was gaining confidence. Her human influence pushed the ward aside neatly.
“All right,” he said. “As soon as the crowd is distracted, you two monkey up the dome. Odds are, the portal is already programmed to reach my city. The patrols who were searching for Luna’s body would have no reason to reset it. I think it’s best if you’re prepared to drop in on short notice.”
“With you,” Georgie clarified.
He wondered how his demon face looked smiling. “If at all possible.”
“Good luck,” Connor said.
Creator willing, he wouldn’t need too much of that.
His smoke vibrated with heightened edginess. As ready as he was getting, he dropped through the opening Georgie made. Unseen as yet, he spread out and blackened and raised threatening demon paws. He began to cast a shadow the sun’s rays couldn’t penetrate. As people saw it, heads turned upward in alarm. When he had a quarter of the crowd’s attention, he clarified his threat.
“Feed me,” he roared in the cloud demon’s rasping voice. “Feed me or be damned to you!”
His brief experience at the Variété must have given him a touch of the acting bug. Causing the courtiers to shrink back was satisfying. Faced with his frightening visage, Henri and Eleanor were no braver than the rest. Their mouths formed O’s, their already pale faces graying with terror.
Deciding he might as well throw himself into the performance, he amped the glare of his yellow eyes and dashed at the crowd again.
~
“WHOA,” GEORGIE BREATHED as she watched Iksander swipe and snarl at the frightened djinn. She’d have cowered if she’d been down there. “He’s really convincing.”
Eleanor thought so too. She reached for her protective medal, jerking with fresh horror when she discovered it missing. The shock that rippled across her face said she might have deduced the handsome man she tried to make her lover had stolen it.
Henri was too busy with his own fear to notice his twin’s reaction.
“Shoot that thing,” he cried in a high quaver to the guards. “Shoot it, you idiots!”
Georgie flinched as two separate streaks of lightning shot upward toward the sultan. “Shit. Their weapons are working.”
“Hahaha,” the Iksander-demon laughed. “I’ll eat all your life force for that!”
Were the soldiers buying it? Their aim was wild, but they hadn’t turned tail yet. Iksander evaded another volley. Mostly anyway. A couple wisps of his cloud form were smoking.
“Come on, Georgie,” Connor said, giving her sleeve a tug. “Iksander will be smart. We can’t sit here watching.”
He was right, but it was hard to tear her gaze away.
“Up,” Connor urged, tugging her again. “And watch where you put your feet.”
That advice was also sound. If this had been a salvage job back home, they’d have worn safety harnesses. As it was, she simply tried to be careful.
The metal was cold enough to make sweaty hands stick to it.
She pulled her sleeves down to shield her fingers and clambered upward behind Connor. The ersatz sun was too bright to see past. Being blind made the bursts of fire and screams that much more unnerving.
Then again, as long as the djinn were screaming, Iksander was still scaring them.
As she climbed, she scanned the metal frame that held the panes in place. Big steel screws secured each triangle’s points. When she reached the top, she braced over a stretch of glass as tall as she was. More or less balanced, she pulled the chain with Eleanor’s stolen and otherwise useless medal off her head. Breaking the pane—assuming they could—risked drawing attention. Her plan was to free a strut using this as a makeshift screwdriver.
Her first attempt to turn the screw nearly gave her a hernia.
“Ah,” Connor said, noting the task she was grunting over. “Shall I do that? I think my arms are stronger.”
She didn’t argue, just handed the coin over. He strained too but with better results than her. Pretty soon he was lifting off a long metal length. Georgie climbed around to help him slide out the glass. Once it rested atop a neighboring pane, they swung their legs into the opening. Uncomfortably aware of how high up they were, Georgie gripped the frame two-handed. Only then did she lean to look at the bright portal.
From this distance, the pretend sun was as big as a minivan. It wasn’t hot, fortunately, and they certainly wouldn’t be able to miss dropping into it. That was a leap she wasn’t looking forward to. The way the orb spun and sparkled dizzied her. She didn’t realize how much until Connor caught her elbow to steady her.
“The screaming has stopped,” he said.
He was right. Silence reigned in the space below.
“Iksander?” she called softly.
“Maybe he’s chasing them down a hall. Let’s say a prayer while we wait.”
She let him choose one. Her mind was too jittery. The words calmed her enough that she didn’t fall off her perch when Iksander suddenly popped into being beside her, fully physical once more. Inexplicably—to her, anyway—singe marks smoldered on his court costume.
She hoped this didn’t mean his body was burned as well.
“I finally broke their nerve,” he said breathlessly before she could ask if he were okay. “They ran like Iblis was after them. The courtyard is clear.”
“Should we drop into the portal now?” Connor asked.
“I think we’ve got a minute for me to ensure it’s coded the way we want. I’m going to hover over it. Don’t jump until I signal you.”
He puffed out of physical again. Georgie told herself this probably meant his power reserves were fine.
~
IKSANDER HOPED HE HAD sufficient juice for the task ahead. He’d taken more magical hits than he wanted to dwell on.
Focus, he ordered. His remaining strength would serve him better if he marshaled his mental force.
Because his smoke form didn’t have lungs, he imagined drawing a calming breath. He tried not to fret over his previous attempt to code a portal. He’d landed in Georgie’s world in a place he hadn’t intended days too early to join his friends. Back then he’d let himself get distracted. This time he had practice.
He sent his senses toward the glittering sun, picturing his city as it likely appeared now—bright and balmy, minarets gleaming, palms waving gracefully above Victory Park. Though it was painful, he visualized statues too. If he pictured his citizens walking, he risked arriving before Luna turned his populace to stone. Admittedly, the chance of that happening was small. Unlike the departed empress, his magic was too humble for lengthy time travel.
Iksander cursed as he realized his thoughts had wandered off track again.
Think of the park. It was one of his favorite places; his people’s too. They were proud of its verdant beauty, and that every rank was welcome to stroll its paths. Iksander knew how the sun hit the Arch of Triumph where it straddled the avenue. He knew how the grass felt beneath jeweled slippers or a coarse wool blanket at a picnic. The scent of the flowers that bloomed there was as familiar as the faces of his friends. God grant they meet in the park again. Iksander missed Arcadius and Joseph especially. Arcadius was his city’s guardian, Joseph its chief magician. In the years they’d lived and worked together, he’d grown so used to relying on their strength he wondered he’d got along without them.
He hadn’t got along alone, of course. Thanks to Georgie and Connor, he’d accomplished useful things—enjoyable ones as well. Simple fun had become foreign to him. Certainly, he hadn’t expected to experience it while trying to save his people. What would his old friends make of his new? Joseph would be fascinated, especially by Connor. Arcadius might disapprove at first, but the upright commander would come around. Human or not, angel or not, Georgie and Connor were lovable. In the end, Iksander’s friends would love them as completely as he did.
His heart flared brighter within his energy. He loved them. He loved Georgie the human, and he loved Connor the angel. The epiphany made him feel wholer, not just happy but strong again. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t perfect or that he’d made mistakes.
He was good enough to deserve this good fortune.
He didn’t scold himself for his straying thoughts. In truth, he couldn’t. He had a distinct impression of clicking into place, of every particle of his being occupying the state it was meant to. He was the key to coding the portal. Turn him, and the door would lead where it ought. He looked back at his dear new companions, their legs dangling through the hole in the frame above. Georgie gnawed her lip nervously, but Connor beamed at him. Behind Iksander, the portal pulsed differently. No longer spinning, its rhythm matched his heartbeat.
He didn’t have a shred of doubt what that signified.
“The portal’s ready,” he said. “Hold hands and jump together. You’ll push me in with you.”
~
CRAP, Georgie thought, wishing she felt ready.
Connor took her trembling right hand. “We’ll be fine, Georgie. Just remember to grab Iksander on our way down.”
We won’t plummet to the floor. We won’t—
Fearless per usual, Connor scooted forward on the strut, grinning. She scooted too, sucked a deep breath, and jumped with him.
They dropped straight into the glare. She’d flung her left arm out, possibly to grab Iksander or maybe in a forlorn hope of balancing. Luckily, his smoke hand caught hers. They continued falling together, first through a suspended silver hoop and then into black silence. That was startling. Georgie had braced to be disoriented. She hadn’t anticipated she’d suddenly be nowhere. Though weightless, she remained physical. She felt the others’ hands in hers, floating beside her invisibly.
To the best of her recollection, her previous journey through a portal only lasted a few seconds.
“Uh,” she said. “We’re still in the portal, right? We haven’t gotten where we’re going.”
“We’re still in the portal,” Iksander said. “I suppose Luna designed hers differently.”
Georgie would have preferred he not suppose. “Are we moving? I feel like we’re just hanging.”
“I believe we are,” Iksander said with the same unsureness as before.
“I’ll call up a light,” Connor volunteered.
A small blue glow ignited in his palm. Seeing what it revealed made her gasp so hard she choked. They were moving all right. Though she’d felt like they were floating in place, a twisting tunnel’s black shiny walls whizzed by them. Ebony scales covered the curving sides—not quite stone but not quite animal either.
“Whew,” Iksander said, so she guessed this surprised him too. He shook himself. “I’m pretty sure nothing’s wrong, but we should probably keep a tight grip on each other.”
Georgie was fine with that. She gritted her teeth to hold back cries of fear. The portal’s snakelike turns were a water slide from hell . . . one with no speed limit. Now that she knew they moved, closing her eyes increased her anxiety. She tried to watch every curve so she could prepare for it—a pointless exercise, since whatever magic ran the tunnel shunted them powerfully by itself. She tensed. Something flashed to their right and was gone.
Something white.
Something shaped like a person.
“Stop,” she said, the word hoarse with strain. “Stop. We have to go back. I think I saw someone. A woman. She might be in trouble.”
“Can we stop?” Connor asked.
“We can try,” Iksander said. “Turn around and see if flying works.”
It took the men’s combined will to buck the fierce current, a difficulty made greater by dragging her between them.
“There,” Connor panted. “Georgie’s right. Someone is clinging to the wall up there.”
The female was tall and slender and stark naked. Her straight long hair was silver and flapping like a flag. That and the alabaster hue of her skin explained why she’d caught Georgie’s eye. She’d dug her fingers underneath the scales on the wall, apparently to forestall being blown farther through the portal.
As they drew even with her, Iksander sucked in his breath sharply.
“Is that—?”
“No,” Connor said. “It looks like her, but it’s not really a person.”
Georgie didn’t understand what they meant until the woman slowly turned her head toward them. Once seen, her distinctive features were unforgettable.
“Luna,” Georgie said softly.
This wasn’t the likeness she was most familiar with. The guardian she’d grown up with bore the face of a human she’d possessed. This female’s striking visage belonged to Luna’s original form. Georgie had seen an illustration of it in a djinn children’s book.
On second thought, though, it wasn’t identical to that either. This woman’s eyes were entirely glacial blue—no pupils and no whites. Shiny and mechanical, they showed no spark of life. Connor was right. This wasn’t a real person.
“You’re not Luna,” she said to it. “You’re something Luna made.”
The being blinked spiky silver lashes. Maybe it couldn’t talk.
“It’s the embodiment of Luna’s curse,” Iksander said in a tone of discovery. “The one she used to petrify my city. She imbued it with so much death magic it must have developed a crude existence—like strong thought forms do sometimes. My God, what is it doing here?”
“It’s here because Luna died,” Connor said. “It’s supposed to be winging to your city, to end the curse Luna laid.”
That caused a race of startled thoughts inside Georgie’s head. She hadn’t known wishing Luna dead would break the curse. If she had known . . . Ending the empress’s suffering was a simpler choice than killing her to benefit others. Stunned, she glanced at Iksander’s smoke profile. No. He couldn’t have known this would happen. He’d have saved his people without delay—no matter how sharp his thirst for revenge against his wife’s killer.
“I didn’t know,” Iksander said, apparently reading her expression. “My friend Joseph had a theory killing her might help, but none of us knew for sure.”
“Iksander—”
The being could speak after all. At the sound of Iksander’s name, its shiny blood red lips parted. “Sultan Iksander is my enemy. His people deserve their bondage. I will not go. I will not end it. None of them should be free.”
Georgie shivered at its strange voice. Connor being Connor, he answered.
“You can’t prevent it,” he said. “Eventually the current will tear you from your handhold. You’ll reach the sultan’s land and disintegrate.”
The being clamped its jaw stubbornly. “I know my purpose. I will not go.”
Georgie decided she’d had enough of this.
“Pry its fingers off,” she said. “Break them if you have to.”
Iksander knew she meant for him to do it. Connor wouldn’t want to be that ruthless. Though the being was frightening, she’d have done it herself. The current that beat against them prevented her. Unable to fly, Georgie couldn’t let go of her companions.
“All right,” Iksander said. He shifted Georgie’s grip to his leg then extended his arms toward the not-quite-alive creature. It snarled at him, gnashing pointy teeth like a piranha. Fortunately, those teeth weren’t in biting range. Only its clench-knuckled, anchoring hands were close.
“It’s time,” Iksander said, almost as kindly as Connor. “Perhaps you and your maker will be together in the Beyond.”
The creature struggled desperately, but Iksander wrenched it loose. It ripped off, screamed in fury, and was speedily swept away.
“Well,” Iksander said as it disappeared in far pinpoint. His face was calm, considering what he’d just accomplished. He turned to her and his smoky mouth curved gently. “Perhaps we should be going too.”