The jeweler’s glasses Mr. Abuzzahab wore to examine my camel’s eyes were weird miniature binoculars attached to his regular glasses. If he wasn’t so intense, he would have looked totally ridiculous. In fact, add the glasses to his round body, long gray beard, bald head, and big nose, and you’ve got a cross between a space telescope and Santa Claus. But he handled what was left of my camel with great care. I liked him.
His East Lake Street jewelry shop was tiny, but Oliver told us he was the best person to talk to about pearls. Of course, Oliver would say that—Mr. Abuzzahab was his uncle. Werling, Oliver, Ben, and I crowded around his cluttered worktable in the back of his shop.
Mr. Abuzzahab tipped my camel’s head this way and that and shined a light on its eyes, careful not to let stuffing leak out. He gently pinched material away from the pearls to examine them. He looked to me and said, “May I remove them?” He held my camel’s sad head and made like he was plucking an eye out.
I hesitated. There was not much left holding them in place. I nodded.
He put on thin, white gloves and carefully took the pearls out and put them in a felt-lined tray.
Soldering irons and blowtorches sat next to the tray on the wooden table. Spidery clamps held jewelry repairs. Shelves of bracelets and necklaces surrounded us. He adjusted a lamp to shine onto the eyes. It made a special pool of light in his dim back room.
“Well, Uncle?” Oliver said, but Mr. Abuzzahab held up a hand for quiet and gave the camel’s eyes an even closer look with a magnifier. We all leaned closer, too.
Mr. Abuzzahab finally sat back. “Where did you get these?”
“My dad sent them to me from Baghdad,” I said. “In the camel, like you see.”
He hummed and rubbed his eyes. “And you think they are the Yetima and the Heart?”
I looked at Ben, who simply shrugged. I said, “Well, we don’t know, not really. I mean, we don’t have a certificate or anything. We thought maybe you could tell.”
He jiggled his head and snorted. “I think you’re joking with me.”
Oliver spread his hands out and tried to show his honesty. “We’re not joking, Uncle. You can see they are pearls.”
“Yes, they are pearls, valuable pearls, but the Yetima is a legend. It’s a story, a parable.” But Mr. Abuzzahab picked up the magnifier and lowered his head for yet another look.
“Do they fit the descriptions of the Yetima and the Heart?” Ben asked.
Mr. Abuzzahab filled his lungs and whistled. “Without a doubt, they could have been made for the story. But still . . . I will have to check for size and roundness. The Yetima was absolutely perfect. Even so, from what I see here, you have two exceptional pearls. Baghdad to Minneapolis, huh? Well, stranger things have happened. Archaeologists in Israel just found a pearl earring dating back to Roman times. It was under a parking lot next to the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. It was a fantastic find. These . . .” he pointed to the camel’s eyes. “These, I have no way of dating. But, judging by their size and beauty, there must be some record somewhere. You are a very lucky young lady.” He gave me a warm smile. “I’d be happy to make inquiries on your behalf.”
I didn’t feel particularly lucky, but I smiled back.
“We appreciate your offer, but right now we don’t want to draw attention,” Ben said.
Mr. Abuzzahab looked at each of us in turn. “You honestly believe they are connected to the pearls of old? The Yetima?”
“We don’t know,” Ben said. “But someone broke into our house.”
“Call the police,” he said.
I said, “And tell them a genie on a flying carpet tried taking them? Not likely.”
“A what?”
Ben grimaced at my goof, but Werling jumped in, “It’s complicated, Mr. Abuzzahab.”
“Well, I can lock them in my safe if you need a place to keep them. You don’t want to leave them lying about.”
“Wendy?” Ben said. “They’re yours. What do you want to do?”
I picked up my poor camel and looked at its empty eye sockets. I thought of my dad. “Please put his eyes back.”
Mr. Abuzzahab did so and handed me my camel. The eyes gave me a strange sense of strength, just like Dad used to. What made him send this to me? I wished I understood. I wished I understood why he left Mom and me to go back to Iraq. But I’d always felt calm and strong holding my orphan camel. Locking it up in a cold, dark safe didn’t feel right.
“I think the pearls came to me for a reason. I’ll keep them until things make sense. Thank you, Mr. Abuzzahab.”
Mr. Abuzzahab nodded and pulled at his beard for a moment. “Perhaps you are right. You apparently know the story of the Yetima. But do you know the fabled power of Iblis?”
“No,” I said.
“Shaytaan, he is called—king of the bad jinn. He is a sorcerer, and he hates humans. He brings forth all that is evil in the jinn.”
“Why?” I asked. “Why hate humans?”
“According to legend, the jinn were created first, before man. Both jinn and humans were given the power to choose their own way—good or evil. God asked the jinn to accept man as equal and some jinn felt they were better, as if they should be first in God’s eyes. Those jinn refused.”
“All of them?” Werling asked.
“No, but Iblis fanned the flames of conceit in many. They have hated humans so long they have forgotten that we are their brothers and sisters.”
This was all too bizarre. Nobody said anything for a time, and I wondered if Mr. Abuzzahab believed the tale more than he let on.
Werling spoke up. “Shaytaan? Sounds like Satan.”
“It’s not a coincidence,” Mr. Abuzzahab said. “Christians have their own stories of the fall. Iblis is the king of the jinns. In his pride, he opposed God’s will and was called Shaytaan ever after. The good jinn shun him and want nothing to do with him. He teaches the bad jinn sorcery. A scholar of Islam might understand more. I am only a poor jeweler.”
“Thank you, Mr. Abuzzahab,” Ben said. He sounded anxious to leave, and I agreed with him one hundred percent. The dark, tiny room was now distinctly spooky. We all said goodbye.
Mr. Abuzzahab stopped us with a raised hand. “A warning,” he said. “The legend of the Yetima said the pearls were the treasure of a pious man who chose to reject Iblis, so they may have power against evil. But your burglar is cunning. If he is jinn, he would not give up. And he would use tricks and force. You must beware.”
Mr. Abuzzahab’s front door bell jingled. “Ah. I have a customer. If I’ve answered your questions, please, let me walk you to my door.”
Werling started to follow, but Ben pulled him back.
“What the . . . ?” Werling started, but Ben held him.
“Thank you, Mr. Abuzzahab. If you don’t mind, we’ll stay back here and think about what to do.”
“As you wish.” He looked puzzled but passed through the opening.
I peeked around the corner. If Mr. T had twin brothers, they’d be in front of Mr. Abuzzahab’s jewelry counter, looking impatient. They both had Mohawk haircuts, wore leather vests and tighter-than-tight pants. Huge loops of gold hung from their ears. These guys didn’t look totally human.
Oliver peered over my shoulder and whispered, “I have a bad feeling.”
Werling took a quick glimpse. “Take away their poor fashion sense and they might be okay . . . but probably not.”
“Is there a back door?” Ben asked Oliver.
Oliver said, “Yes.” He pointed to a hall that led back, past file cabinets.
Out front, Mr. Abuzzahab said, with surprising warmth, “Gentlemen, may I help you?”
We quietly made our way down the hall. The steel door at the end had three deadbolt locks, a crossbar, and no window. Oliver unlatched the locks and raised the bar, but Ben stopped him from swinging it open, and cracked the door a fraction of an inch. On tiptoe, I looked over his head. The genie twins from our front yard, the ones that chased us, stood in the alley, arms crossed, luckily looking away from the door. Five or six hellhounds were with them. Ben softly closed the door again and muttered, “Genies.”
We relocked the door and headed to the front.
Mr. Abuzzahab was telling the two strange customers about rings. They had to be genies themselves. I figured if they knew we were there, they would get around Mr. Abuzzahab and come for us. One of the guys had a high nasal voice with a Scottish accent and wanted to know about diamond rings. Fitting a ring on his sausage-sized fingers would be a major job.
“These genies figure they can get in a little shopping while on the job?” I whispered. Ben peeked out at them some more.
Mr. Abuzzahab slipped back into our room and poked around on a shelf. Ben tugged on his sleeve and drew him away from the door. “Mr. Abuzzahab. We need to get past those two out there.”
“Past them? What do you mean? Is there a problem?”
Werling said, “Those jinn you were talking about . . .” He slanted his eyes to the front counter and the jeweler’s customers.
Mr. Abuzzahab watched his pantomime with a puzzled expression. Then it clicked for him and he laughed. “You are worried about Bruce and Nigel?” He really laughed at this. “You don’t have to worry about them.”
“What’s so funny back there?” either Bruce or Nigel, I couldn’t tell which, called from the counter.
Mr. Abuzzahab laughed so hard he had difficulty talking. “Come. Come out, and I’ll introduce you.” He herded us all out in front of him.
Bruce and Nigel looked as confused as Mr. Abuzzahab had at first. Four red-faced teenagers and a laughing jeweler must have been an interesting sight. Mr. Abuzzahab caught his breath, wiped his eyes, and introduced us. Then he explained our suspicions about them being evil genies. Bruce, who had the orange Mohawk, rolled his eyes and laid his huge paw on Ben’s shoulder. “That’s priceless, mate.”
Nigel patted Bruce’s arm. “Does this big boy look like he’d fit in a bottle?”
I felt pretty stupid. But on the other hand, he had not said he wasn’t a genie.
* * *
We hung around the shop with Nigel and Bruce. They seemed totally concerned with finding the right rings and I got into their enthusiasm, admiring their ring choices, or making suggestions. They were getting married.
Ben and Werling were not into rings or weddings, and went to look out the front window. Oliver helped his uncle by running samples back and forth, while I admired Nigel’s choice of a design that would have to be hammered into a ring the size of a drain gasket. The two guys were seriously excited about getting hitched, and I couldn’t help but like them. Werling and Ben talked in whispers.
The gloomy mood of a few minutes earlier seemed gone. I joined Ben and Werling and said, “We might as well go before the Bobbsey twins in the alley out back decide to come around front.”
“Wendy, they’re merely watching the back. I suspect we have the larger variety already out front.”
“I don’t see anything,” I said.
Werling ignored me and said, “I thought I saw something strange across the street.”
“Come on, guys. Let’s go. I’m hungry,” I said. My camel suddenly vibrated strangely. The last bits of sawdust drifted to the floor. We watched them settle and Werling looked at Ben. “That can’t be good,” he said.
“Nigel and Bruce are not human,” Ben said, and gave them a glance. “I’m not getting a bad feeling from them, but their being here is no coincidence. Something is up.”
Three somethings was more like it. Across the street, the giant genie from our front yard came out of the laundromat with two friends. He was normal-sized, if one would called the Incredible Hulk normal-sized. At least he was better dressed today, in white pants and a tight t-shirt. With him, on either side, were two similar genies and half a dozen jackals. I was no longer hungry.
“More jackals,” I said, pointing at two scruffy dogs that joined the others. My mouth was parched, and I held my camel tightly. We didn’t stand a chance. Traffic passed right by the genies and jackals without noticing them. I wondered if we were seeing what everyone else was seeing. “Do you think they know we’re in here?”
The biggest genie pointed at us, as if he saw into the dark store. He pulled my burnt marble bag from his pocket and shook it, then smiled directly at me.
“That answers that,” I said. “What are we going to do?”
“I’m open to suggestions. At the moment, there’s nothing we can do,” Ben said. “The question is, what are they going to do?”
“Think they know about the pearls?” Werling asked.
Like he heard Werly from outside and across the street, the big guy passed his brown hand over the marble bag. He’d somehow put my dad’s face there. With a sudden toss, the bag flew up and exploded in blood-red flames. The marbles scattered and broke on the sidewalk.
Werling put his arm around me, but I pushed him away and said, “The pumped-up jerk!” The marbles might as well have exploded in me. I lunged for the door. All the shock and rage came back from the day I found out about my Dad—the sergeant and chaplain in the apartment living room; mom hugging herself, small and crying; the form letter.
Ben and Werling pulled at me. I struggled to break their grip. “Let go of me!”
“Wendy,” Ben gasped, trying to get a better hold on me. “He’s doing something to you. You can’t go out there.”
“I’ll protect you,” Werling said.
With a terrific twist I broke free, knocking Werling down and breaking Ben’s hold. Most of all, I wanted to tear the head off that grinning genie.
Outside, the sun shone, the sky was blue, but the air felt thick and dead. The passing cars turned hazy and moved in slow motion. They sounded far away. I struggled to cross the sidewalk to the street, to get at the genie, but I couldn’t. It was like I was stuck in thick syrup.
In front of the genies, jackals crouched in the gutter, hackles raised along their backs. They snarled. I still held my crumpled camel, trying to catch my breath.
The biggest genie laughed. I hated him.
Behind me I heard Cathal. “Not meaning to slow you down, lass, but I’m afraid the jinn and his ugly friends are not here to play games, you ken? You’ll be wanting to go back inside.”
Eddy, I mean, Her Ladyship and he were on either side of the jewelry store door. They must have done something that kept me from running across the street. “Let me at him,” I screamed.
Old-fashioned swords, axes, and spears leaned against the storefront beside Her Ladyship. They gleamed in the strange sunlight. They were huge weapons; I doubted I could lift one. Her Ladyship was decked out in her flowing white gown over fine golden armor. She looked regal, like a queen, beautiful but indestructible. A sword was at her side.
“Give me a sword,” I cried.
Cathal slowly transformed into his horse shape. If Cathal and Her Ladyship wanted the pearl, too, I was screwed. But they watched the genies, not me. Ben, Oliver, and Werling rushed out, followed by Nigel and Bruce, muscles bulging and eyes narrowed and mean—Nigel and Bruce, that is. Ben, Werling, and Oliver looked tiny and confused, like me. Nigel and Bruce bowed to Eddy. Bruce took a double-bladed axe and Nigel a broadsword. The change in them was amazing. The joking, warm Goliaths were now all business. Nigel swept his sword in tight figure eights and smiled at the genies across the street. Bruce tested the edge of his axe with his thumb.
“Wendy,” Ben said. “Come back in.”
Mr. Abuzzahab pushed past him before I could answer, looked at the swords and genies, and cried, “No. You can’t start a war in front of my store. I forbid it.”
Without taking an eye off the genies, Eddy turned to him and said, “Would you like to ask them to pick a more convenient place?” Eddy pointed her weapon across the street. “Be my guest.”
Swords and axes had appeared in the hands of the boss genie and his pals. He grew another twelve inches.
Mr. Abuzzahab shrank back. “No, Your Ladyship.” He ran back into his shop and slammed the door.
I moved to take a sword nearly as tall as me. Eddy held out a hand to stop me. My anger turned around and around with nowhere to go. My head filled with fury. The eyes of my camel flickered and I knew, somehow, I was not here to fight. All the weapons made me sick.
The biggest genie looked straight at me, then my camel; his eyes widened and his dark face became eager. I remembered now, Eddy had warned us about a battle. The genie raised his thick arms and clapped his hands. Thunder crashed and three of the jackals leapt forward, completely over a passing car. Their enormous fangs glistened, their fur turned to flame. Their shrieks were horrible, and so loud I hardly heard Werling behind me.
“Wendy, look out!”
I was knocked forward into the gutter and only got a glimpse of Werling before the hellish creatures landed on him instead of me. The crash as they hit was terrible and a huge flash blinded me. I was dazed. “Werling!”
I rolled away and saw silhouettes of Nigel and Bruce hacking at two jackals, their Mohawks bristled with rays of light. The world appeared in blurry black and white. I propped myself up on one elbow and rubbed my eyes. My hip hurt where I landed on the curb. The camel was still in my hand.
Cathal trampled the third jackal, and gore covered the sidewalk. From across the street the three other beasts leapt, landing in front of me. I raised my arm in defense. Eddy and Cathal drove two off, but the third sank his flaming teeth into my right arm. Burning razors of pain stabbed my forearm. Eddy cracked the jackal’s head with the pommel of her sword and kicked it away.
My arm was on fire. Eddy kneeled beside me and dowsed my flames with her gown. The evil genies, huge and towering over the cars, now sped across the street to us. A pickup truck hit one and its fender crumpled in slow motion, hardly slowing the genie at all. The truck rolled to a stop and another car banged into it just as slowly. Horns honked from what seemed like miles away. The genies kept coming.
“Benjamin!” Eddy shouted. “Get your humans back into the shop.” She lifted me to my feet.
“It’s my camel they want,” I said to Eddy and held up its remains. It was scorched and smoking. “Its eyes are pearls.”
Her Ladyship’s face lost its steely expression and her eyes widened with awe. My camel’s fabric fell away in ashes and revealed the pearls.
“You bear Iblis’s bane?” she exclaimed.
One of the evil genies took a swipe at me but Eddy blocked it and deftly swung back. The genie jumped clear. She dragged me to the doorway. “Stay here!”
Two genies fell on her and she parried both blades and drove them back.
Ben helped Oliver pull Werling next to me. Werling was burned and smoking. He looked terrible. Nigel and Bruce joined Cathal and Eddy and fought back. The fight was in the middle of the street now.
It was all wrong. I felt it was all wrong. Anger no longer filled me. Fighting for the pearls, cutting and stabbing—it made me sick. It was stupid. I was stupid for sitting down and doing nothing.
Oliver held Werling’s singed head in his lap and put his crumpled jacket under his head. Ben took Werling’s hand and checked for a pulse. Werling looked dead. I kneeled next to him.
Drivers from the two damaged cars wobbled away from the fight in a daze. The genies ignored them. Cars and a bus had stopped at the border of a misty bubble that formed around us. Others tried to speed around but crashed and added to the pile-up. Stupid. The people outside the bubble looked totally confused.
Ben took out his cell and called 911.
I shouted to Eddy, “Werling’s hurt. You have to stop this.” I didn’t know if she heard me. My pearls glowed and the fiery pain of my arm eased. Cool waves flowed over my skin. Eddy and Cathal were being pushed back and stood between the genies and us at the sidewalk’s edge. Nigel and Bruce took up positions on either side of them.
“If I could stop it, I would,” Eddy shouted over her shoulder to me. “It is you who brought this. Your treasure.”
“Me!” I wiped my eyes clear. “I didn’t do anything. My dad gave me the camel. I didn’t know about the pearls!”
Eddy shouted, “You know now.”
The biggest genie cupped his hands over his head and they filled with orange fire. Cathal charged and reared, slapping with his mane. The ball of flame exploded into steam, and sent the genie howling and staggering back.
Eddy fended off another attack and pushed two genies back into the street. “The pearls were meant for you,” she bellowed. “They have power only the bearer controls. Don’t you feel it?” She ducked a massive fist and sliced into the owner’s shoulder. A howl like an air-raid siren filled the street.
“I don’t know about power,” I replied. Since Dad gave me the camel I had always held it when I was afraid or angry. I felt something when I did, a lightness. I thought it came from him, the thought of him. I unclasped my scorched hand as cautiously as possible and looked at the pearls. Pain shot up my right arm. There was a bloody tear below my elbow and my skin was raw. It made me queasy, and I thought I’d throw up. The pearls glinted in my fingers. Just looking at them eased my pain. “Could they kill the jinn?” The second I said it I knew that wasn’t their purpose.
“Oh, no!” Oliver pointed down the street to where the remaining jackals had regrouped. They charged Cathal’s left side. Nigel raced forward to protect him.
The Doublemint genies from the alley appeared down the street in the opposite direction and crept up the sidewalk toward us. Each held an axe.
Ben looked their way. “This is it!” He tried to lift an enormous broadsword from the wall, but it was too heavy.
I stood and reached out. The sword jumped to my good left hand, light as a feather.
Eddy fought her way back to us and took a spear from the wall. “Wendy, you are the bearer. You must act,” Eddy said. She sighted down the spear, ready to throw.
“I don’t know what to do!” I fought back tears. I was sick to my soul. Werling was dying! I hefted my sword and tried to make up my mind.
“Use your head and your heart, not a sword,” she said.
Eddy threw her spear and caught one twin in the thigh. He twisted and screamed and the other reached for him. I wished my dad were here to help. Werling looked unspeakably burned. Dad was a medic. He’d know what to do. I hated myself for not knowing what to do.
Her Ladyship placed her mouth next to my ear, her long, blood-spattered hair draped over me. Her breath smelled of the morning woods. “You can be bigger and stronger than all of this. Think. The power to stop this is not in swords.”
I knew my dad was braver for fighting without a gun. Some of my friends laughed at that, but I thought he was the bravest soldier of all. “Don’t talk to your friends to stop a war,” he’d said. “Talk to your enemies.” He hated war.
“Wendy, it is said the pearls’ strength lies in doing good,” Eddy said. “It is why Iblis hates them—why he would destroy them.”
“Give us the pearls!” roared the largest genie.
Cathal neighed in panic and Nigel and Bruce cried in pain. I wanted to hide, but the pearls were cool in my burned hand. They took away my fear.
Werling moaned and coughed. He was alive! I filled with hope. I clutched the pearls to my chest.
“Hey, genie,” I shouted at the big one. “Do you want these?” I held the pearls up.
“What are you doing?” Ben cried.
“I’m going to talk to them.”
“Wendy, you might want to think about that.”
“I have to.” I stepped under Eddy’s arm. Ben grabbed my T-shirt but I pulled away.
“You’re hurt,” he said. He hesitated and added, “What do you think you can do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Give them to me. I’ll do it. I’ll talk to them.”
I took back every snarky thought I’d ever had about him. “No. I have to do this.”
“Look at you!” he said. “You’re hurt, in no shape to do this.”
“I know.”
The clang of steel, the fire, and now the police sirens were a mash of sound. The huge genie pushed past Nigel and Bruce like they were nothing and strode toward me. No one could stop him.
Eddy raised her sword, but I dropped my sword and raised the pearls high. I stepped into the street. “Hey! No more fighting!”
That stopped him in his tracks. He looked down on me. There was no way I could threaten him. He could squash me with his thumb.
“You wish to parley?” He threw his head back and thundered with triumphant laughter. His cohorts stopped fighting. It was a good thing, since I didn’t think Cathal could survive another minute. Nigel and Bruce weren’t much better off. The genie towered over me.
I smiled weakly and glanced back at Eddy. She looked grim but bowed for me to continue.
“Well, daughter of Eve,” the monster genie roared, “Will you give us what is ours, or stand there all day?”
My hair fluttered back at his breath. He could use a gallon of Listerine. I saw that Cathal had landed some good kicks. The genie looked like Mr. Clean after a freight train hit him.
I didn’t know what to say, and looked around. Everyone’s injuries were horrible, on both sides. The big genie stretched out his catcher’s mitt of a hand for the pearls.
“What’s your name?” I asked. The pearls vibrated and I got a rush that tingled from head to toe. My arm still pulsed with pain, but I could think clearly and I withheld the pearls, waiting for his answer.
A quick, puzzled look flashed over the genie’s messed-up face. Then he growled, “The pearls.” He shook his open hand.
“I’m Wendy. That’s Cathal, Nigel, and Bruce.” I pointed to them in turn. “That’s Ben, Oliver, Werling, and Eddy . . . Her Ladyship of Minnehaha Creek.”
“I do not care to waste time talking to you, little human girl. Give me the pearls or I will take them.”
I tilted my hand to show him the pearls better. They flashed and seemed to grow. He leaned back slightly, like the sight of them somehow amazed him. They were more beautiful than I recalled, transparent and filled with shapes that flowed and swirled with images. Pictures filled my head: the last time my dad held me, my grandma’s smile, Mom singing as she tucked me in—and my Aunt Mary hugging me. I saw Werling in his dumb suit of leaves. The visions shot through my brain in an instant. My eyes teared up, but the thoughts made me smile.
I squeezed the pearls tight, then reopened my hand. They were now creamy blue! Dazzlingly blue, so bright and beautiful they were hard to look at. But it was impossible not to. The genie shielded his eyes. I wondered if he saw anything, any visions?
“What is your name?” I asked him again.
The genie rocked back and adjusted his feet like he was braced against a wind. “My name is Kalil,” he said with surprise. He didn’t shout this time.
I was not sure if the change in the pearls amazed him or if suddenly telling me his name did. His eyes fixed on the pearls. He had seen something! He lost his frown.
“My Lord Iblis commanded me to find these pearls.” This he said in a lowered voice. “They are to be broken and crushed.” He now sounded like he was trying to reason with me. He relaxed a bit. His voice was deep and made my chest vibrate.
What I was going to do next was a big, big mistake. Still, it felt right. I held up the pearls and offered them to him. “Kalil. That’s a very good name. I like it. It fits you. I figure if I’m going to give you the pearls, I should at least know who I’m giving them to.”
“You would give me the pearls, freely?” His bloodied forehead wrinkled up and he reached for them.
“You are free to take them or leave them,” I said.
His hand hesitated and he looked from me to the brilliant pearls. They were like stars, shining, casting light everywhere.
“I am ordered to destroy them.” It now sounded more like a warning than a desire. His fingers touched the pearls and then his hand slipped, wavered, and dropped to his side.
“They are more beautiful than the legend,” he stated and stared at them, transfixed. He leaned closer and tried taking them again, but his hand failed to close on them. “You would let that happen? Let me crush them?”
I was a midget next to him. “‘Let’ might not be the word.” I looked around at the wreckage. Words came to mind and I didn’t know from where. “Killing me wouldn’t take much strength, Kalil. I know that. You’re strong. But you have other strength, greater strength.”
He puffed up, self-important, and hammered his chest with his good fist. “We are warriors and were created before humans. We have free will. We are made of fire,” he said proudly. “And you humans are made of nothing but clay.”
My fear of this hulk had disappeared. He was a bit like my brother, Tyrone—boastful, full of bluster, big and slow, but not really bad. The light of the pearls shined on him and made him glow.
“Fire and clay,” I said. “We sound like brick makers.”
“Brick makers?” He cleared his good eye with the back of his hand and gave me a strange look. Then it occurred to him I’d made a joke, and he laughed.
“I see! Fire and clay. Yes, bricks.” He tossed it around for a moment more, then pointed at me. “You would make a strong brick, little human.”
I think it was a compliment—sort of. “Thank you. And now this brick wants to end the fight.”
He considered this, too. “Your friends have fought bravely. It would be a pity to kill them.”
Cathal scowled. “Póg mo tóin.”
Eddy shouted, “Cathal! You don’t help.”
“Na help? Ach! That must be why I’m beat to a bloody pulp. Thanks be to heaven that I didn’t try to help.”
Kalil looked at Cathal and grunted, like he suddenly understood Cathal’s black sense of humor. He laughed again, so hard he nearly knocked me over with the force of it. “The horse boy makes a good joke, too.”
A fire truck slid to a stop just outside our shimmering bubble. The firemen jumped out and started strapping tanks on their backs, but they looked troubled and confused. It was like they saw the smoking cars but didn’t want to go near them. Or maybe it was us. I was sure they couldn’t see the genies or Cathal and Eddy. Maybe they could, but their brains weren’t ready to handle it. The beaming pearls might have blinded them, too.
I held the pearls up to Kalil. He could easily have taken them. “You may have them. But do you have to break them?”
He scratched his chin but didn’t move to take the pearls. He rumbled softly, “I was told you would use the pearls to try destroying us.”
“I don’t think they can do that.”
“My hound bit you.” He looked at my blackened arm.
“And was killed.”
“Yes.” He shook his head sadly. “This is not a good day.”
“No, it is not.”
The huge genie took a lungful of air and slowly exhaled. His breath had not improved. He seemed to see the battlefield for the first time, and it didn’t please him. He nodded to himself as if he’d come to a conclusion, then stood erect and shouted for all to hear, “I, Kalil, say this battle is over. We will leave and fight no more.”
Eddy lowered her sword. I heard metal clinking to the pavement.
“Thank you,” I said, and eased my hand—and the pearls—down. His gaze followed them. Kalil did see something in the pearls. The thoughtful way he looked at them told me that.
“Daughter of Eve, you may keep your pearls,” he whispered.
“Kalil!” Eddy called out. “Iblis will not be pleased.”
He gave her a defiant look. “He lied. These pearls will not destroy jinn. They are no threat to him or me.”
Eddy said, “It is of no difference to me, but you will have disobeyed, and he will seek vengeance.”
Nigel told Kalil, “You are welcome here. There are others of our kind here.”
Kalil shook his head at Nigel and Bruce. “No. You chose your path, I choose mine.” He bowed slightly to Eddy. “He lied and is without honor. I will face Iblis. I will not hide.” He raised his sword, but only to signal his troops. “We leave.”
And that was it. Both sides separated without more talk and the firemen hurried in, spraying foam and making a thicker fog of the steam and smoke around the damaged cars. If they saw the genies, or Cathal and Eddy, it was not apparent.
I rushed back to Werling. My arm was a length of fiery pain, but I brushed back his scorched hair and felt his forehead. Oliver still held Werling’s head in his lap, and cried. Ben held one hand and loosened Werling’s charred shirt with the other. Worry sickened me, and I gently shifted the pearls onto Werling’s chest. They would help him. They had to. I wanted to shout at him for being so stupid. “You persistent idiot,” I whispered.
If the firemen could not see the spirits, they saw us. Paramedics clustered around Werling and tried to press us back. I fought them and held the pearls to his chest. The haze swirled and smoke thickened. It was hard to breathe. My vision grayed, and Ben reached out and kept me upright. A medic took a look at my arm and waved for a stretcher. I was so tired, but I knelt next to Werling and took his hand with my good one and squeezed, willing life into him. I thought he squeezed back.