For the second time in two days, Fatma walked the cells beneath the Ministry. Zagros was still here, but she hadn’t come to see him. What she intended was more dangerous than questioning the librarian—even if he’d tried to murder her. She understood now he had been under the control of the imposter. The djinn she would encounter today was far less predictable.
“You’re quiet,” she remarked, eyeing Hadia who walked beside her.
The other woman nodded. “Visiting with those … supposed angels. Just has me thinking.”
“It can be a lot—even knowing they’re not really angels.”
Hadia shook her head. “It’s not that. Well, not that alone.” She stopped to look at Fatma, who stopped in turn. “They changed our minds around. Got into our heads. And we had no idea. What else might they have changed or hidden from us? Our writings? Our histories? Our holy books? What else might we no longer know? How can we be certain of anything?” Her eyes closed and she released a lengthy sigh before opening them. “How do you deal with the crushing weight of it? Knowing that we’re just people and there are these vast powers pulling strings we may not even know about? I’m supposed to be helping plan my cousin’s wedding next month. But that just all seems so meaningless in the face of this.” She frowned. “I wonder if this is what it must have been like back when al-Jahiz opened the Kaf? To suddenly learn the world you knew wasn’t quite so real. I’m picking an odd time to be philosophical, I know. Maybe I’m having a mental breakdown.…”
Fatma shook her head slowly. “You’re not having a mental breakdown. Every agent has this moment. More than once. This is what it means to work for the Ministry. To understand more than the average person just how strange the world around us has become. It’s what we signed up for. And why it’s not for everyone. But yeah, I sit down and think about it hard sometimes—then I go out and buy a new suit. Because those little things, like planning your cousin’s wedding, that’s what keeps us grounded.” She winked. “Maybe you could expand your hijab collection.”
Hadia laughed slightly and they started up their walk again.
“Remind me what this Marid said again?” she asked.
This was her fifth time asking, but Fatma answered anyway. “That he slept in the hopes of outliving humanity. Also, he granted the last person who woke him the chance to choose their death.”
“And you gave him your name and word?”
“Both.” She’d felt the pact settle into her skin.
“Doesn’t that make it unbreakable?”
“Anything’s breakable. Just means there’ll be a cost.”
Hadia recited a quick dua for her protection, the worry on her face plain. Her gaze wandered to the object Fatma clutched in one hand—a tarnished, pear-shaped bronze bottle, inlaid with gold floral patterns. “They just let you walk out of the Ministry vault with that thing?”
“I was the one who brought it in. Told them I needed to correct the paperwork. No reason to think I’d do something absolutely foolish—like open it.”
“Of course not,” Hadia muttered. “Not unless you had some sort of death wish.”
They stopped at a cell, the furthest down the hall.
“You don’t have to come in,” Fatma said. “If something goes wrong, the wards of the cell should hold him.”
Hadia reached up and took both black truncheons off the wall this time, hefting one in each hand. That was answer enough.
Fatma opened the door to the cell, and they stepped inside, shutting it again behind them. Moving to the center of the room, she knelt and stood the bronze bottle up on the floor.
“We’re really going through with this?” Hadia asked.
“We have to.”
Hadia looked perplexed. “Why do we have to again?”
Fatma handed over a copy of the bookseller’s note, and the woman winced as her memory returned. “Precisely why we need this magic on us broken. We can’t keep this up forever.” She pulled free her janbiya. “Ready?”
Hadia clutched the black truncheons tight and nodded. Fatma pressed the knife to the dragon-marked seal about the stopper and held her breath—before drawing the blade across the wax covering, breaking the reestablished wards.
There was barely time to jump back as bright green smoke burst from the bottle like a geyser. The swirling gas fast took shape, knitting into a broad form somewhat like a man—only far bigger. The cloud coalesced, becoming firmer until it was made flesh. In moments, a full-grown djinn towered before them.
The Marid was as terrifying now as he had been that night—a giant covered in emerald scales, his bared chest heaving, with smooth ivory horns grazing the ceiling. For a moment he stood, silent, coming out of his slumber. When his three eyes opened—a pyramid of burning stars—they took in the cell with one imperious glance, before settling and narrowing on Fatma.
“Enchantress.” The word rumbled in the small space.
Fatma forced herself to meet that scouring gaze. “Great One, I say again, I’m no enchantress.”
The djinn’s green lips twisted. “Yet twice I have been summoned into your presence. Who but an enchantress would dare such a thing? Not that it matters. You have broken your word. Sworn to me by your name. You are already dead.”
He spoke that last sentence as if relating the weather. Fatma steeled herself. “Great One, I would not have awakened you, if not for dire cause.”
The Marid actually yawned. “You mortals always have reasons for breaking your oaths. Excuses for your filthy ways. For your very existence. Just listening to your inane chatter is vexing to my ears.” He raised a clawed hand twice as large as her head, palm open and fingers spread. “Should I remove your bones so that your frail body collapses into pulp? Perhaps replace your blood with scorching sand? Or make you cut out your own entrails and choke yourself with them?”
“I see you’ve given this some thought,” Fatma said. Her voice came firm, but her insides quivered.
The djinn grinned sharply. “When I sleep, all I dream of is how to slaughter mortals. I could slay every last one of you, like so many sheep.”
“That’s enough!” Hadia said. She activated both truncheons until they crackled hot with blue bolts. “No one’s slaughtering anyone today. If you’d just listen—”
The Marid casually waved in her direction. Stone arms suddenly erupted from the wall behind Hadia, each with hands bearing seven fingers. They grabbed hold of the woman, pulling her into the wall. Her shocked cries cut off as her body became stone—a statue trapped halfway in and halfway out. The black truncheons she dropped had not hit the floor before it was over. Fatma stared, janbiya in her hand. She rounded on the djinn.
“Let her go! This is between you and me!”
The Marid snorted. “It is between whomever I wish it to be. Let apprentice and mistress suffer.”
“She was just trying to get you to listen! So that I could tell you…”
Fatma’s words trailed off. Tell him what? Whatever had seemed so important had vanished. She looked up to see the Marid with his arm still extended. Those fiery eyes flared into hot white flames. In the palm of his hand a jade glow emanated. Inexplicably, a ringing bell went off. The djinn frowned, looking to her jacket. It went off again.
“Are you going to get that?” he asked. “It’s irritating.”
Fatma drew out her pocket watch. Why had she set an alarm? Flipping the timepiece open, she found a bit of folded paper inside and unwrapped it. As she read, her mouth worked in a rush.
“The Seal of Sulayman!”
The Marid cocked a horned head. His fiery eyes dimmed to a simmer, and his arm lowered slowly to his side. “What,” he asked coldly, “do you know of that?”
Fatma released a breath. “I know that it’s a ring created to control djinn. One that robs you of your free will. A mortal holds that ring now. He bound an Ifrit. He’d think nothing of tearing you out of that bottle and making you a slave. I just thought you might want to know.”
The djinn said nothing for a while, only stroking his curling white beard. Finally, he flicked a wrist—and Hadia fell out of the wall, her body made flesh again. Her interrupted cries finished in a wail as she landed on hands and knees. Fatma bent down to help her up.
“An abomination,” the Marid murmured, distracted. “We were fools to think its forging a wise thing.” Fatma’s eyebrows rose at that. He turned back to look at her, dismissing Hadia, who swayed unsteadily. “What do you want of me, not-enchantress?”
“There’s magic woven around the ring. It makes us forget. We need that removed. The angels said you could do that.”
The djinn rumbled in his throat. “Angels. Is that what those creatures are calling themselves now?” Sniffing a sharp nose, he made a bitter face. “The stench of them is thick about you.”
Fatma really preferred he stop smelling her. “Well, the angels—or whatever they are—said you could remove the spell. When you do, we can find this mortal who stole the ring and return it to their keeping.”
The djinn rumbled again, louder this time.
“What?” she snapped.
“A mortal,” the Marid drawled mockingly. “Stole the Great Seal. From one of them? Is that the story they told you?”
Fatma frowned. “What are you saying?”
The djinn rolled all three eyes, as one would to a baffled child—or dog. “You believe that beings able to traverse planes of existence, who wield sorcery potent enough to confound an entire world, who can bend space and reality to their will, were swindled—by a mortal thief?”
“They said the ring was stolen from their vault…” Fatma managed.
The djinn sighed. “Did that pathetic organ you call a brain never stop to think the power that emanates from those creatures might allow them to make you believe what they wish? Or what you want to believe?”
Now Fatma’s head swam. She ran through their meeting with the angels. The awe they naturally induced. The idea of thieves breaking into one of their vaults had seemed far-fetched. Yet they’d provided an answer she’d wanted to believe. So she’d accepted it, without another thought. But what this djinn was saying spoke to her buried doubts. It could only mean one thing.
“They allowed the ring to be taken!” Hadia exclaimed. The shock of the realization appeared to bring her back to her wits, though her voice shook. “They wanted it to be taken!”
The weight of it staggered Fatma. “Why?”
“To have its power wielded, one must assume,” the djinn answered matter-of-factly.
“Why not just use it themselves, then?” Hadia asked.
“The seal cannot be wielded by djinn or any other magic-touched creature. It is meant for mortal hands, provided it finds one worthy.”
Fatma frowned. “Finds worthy?”
The Marid looked ready to throw up his hands. “Do you know nothing of the properties and laws that govern near-sentient magical objects?”
“Pretend we don’t,” Fatma snapped. “We’re just pathetic-minded mortals after all.”
At this he gave an agreeable snort. The son of a dog!
“The seal has its own mind,” he told them. “Only a mortal of exceptionally strong will could call it master. It would not allow itself to be revealed to any other. Though it seems it yet keeps the greater part of its power veiled. That you believe the seal’s true form is that of a ring is proof enough.”
“Is that supposed to make sense?” Fatma asked, not masking her annoyance.
The djinn leaned forward, his words crisp. “The seal is no more truly a ring than you are a creature approaching even middling intelligence. Its most potent power and true form are revealed only to one whose want is pure—a quality its present wielder appears to lack. As is the way with most mortals.”
“The bookseller said that no one really knows what the seal looks like,” Hadia murmured.
Fatma recalled as much, but it hardly seemed relevant. Besides, her mind was busied trying to untangle the various strands the djinn laid before them. “It was all arranged,” she thought and spoke at once. Her eyes met Hadia’s. “The list getting to Siwa. The Brotherhood’s thieves. Taking the seal. Every piece carefully put together, so that the ring could end up in the hands of someone able to wield it.” She turned back to the djinn. “But why would they want a mortal to wield the ring?”
The Marid shrugged hefty shoulders, to say that either he did not know or did not care.
“Whatever the reason,” Hadia said, “they lost control. They hadn’t prepared for the ambitiousness of this imposter. Who can’t be reined in. Now they want us to clean up their mess.”
“The greed of mortals should never be undervalued,” the Marid intoned.
Angels. Fatma shook her head. Whatever machinations were at work, none of it changed that the ring had to be retrieved from this imposter. “They said you could remove the confoundment spell. That there’s a contract you can renegotiate by—”
The Marid waved her off. “I understand how magical contractual bindings work, mortal. Please do not insult me by trying to explain it with your inarticulate speech.”
“Will you do it?”
“What will I gain in return?”
Fatma gaped. He wanted something in return? After putting Hadia in a wall? “How about making sure this imposter doesn’t turn you into their personal puppet. That good enough?”
“Magic exacts a price,” the Marid insisted. “What will you give?”
She clenched her fists. Djinn could be insistent about contracts. There wasn’t going to be a way out of this. Or, it suddenly dawned on her, was there? “Do Nine Ifrit Lords mean anything to you?”
Alarm crossed that ancient face. It was both satisfying and frightening.
“So they’re real, then,” she pressed. “The imposter plans to awaken them. Bring them here. With the Seal of Sulayman, he’ll have control of the most powerful of djinn. You want a trade for your magical contract? We stop that from happening.”
The Marid scowled. “You wish to keep them from this world as much as I.”
“Think of it as a mutual benefit,” Fatma retorted. “Do we have a bargain or not?”
The Marid’s three eyes burned angrily, not caring for the offer. But he seemed to like these Nine Lords less. “We have a bargain,” he decreed. “But know this, not-enchantress. If ever you awaken me again, there will be no bargains to make. I do not care if the heavens are falling.”
“Whatever,” Fatma bit back. “Now fulfill your side and remove the spell.”
The djinn extended a hand, and Fatma felt suddenly like she was on fire—as if she had been thrown into fire. The pain was so intense, she couldn’t even scream. When her vision cleared she found she was sprawled on the floor, writhing as the agonizing sensation faded to a dull sting. She could see Hadia beside her, similarly incapacitated. Neither of them looked to be physically hurt. But Merciful God, the pain! As she lay on her back, the Marid’s horned head loomed above.
“The magic is removed,” he rumbled. “I could have done so without pain.” His mouth broke into a wide toothy grin. “But you didn’t make that clear in your request.”
Fatma lifted a trembling hand to form a rude gesture. She really did hate this djinn.
She was still grumbling about haughty djinn and conniving angels as the automated carriage sped through Cairo, to their next destination. At least the confounding magic had been removed. They’d tested it out, including opening up texts to find whole passages now viewable. The Marid had been as good as his word. She’d taken his bottle back to the vault and put in an expedited request to have a safe place found for it—hopefully a chest weighted down to the deepest part of the sea.
“You sure you’re okay?” she asked Hadia.
The woman sat across from her, busily reading through Portendorf’s ledger. She’d made notations of the words “the list,” affirming much of what they now knew. Siwa had been making good use of his pilfered register, marketing and then retrieving items to the highest bidder—which turned out to be Alistair Worthington. The angels had probably assumed someone in that arrogant circle of Englishmen would be willful enough to come across mention of the ring. Hadia looked up at the question.
“A djinn put me into a wall. I think for a while, I was the wall. Then he tried to singe my skin off. So no. I’m not okay. But, God willing, I’ll be alright.”
Fatma didn’t press the matter.
“One question we haven’t asked,” Hadia said, changing topics. “Why are angels—or whatever they are—collecting and hoarding things associated with al-Jahiz?”
Fatma shook her head. If there was one thing they’d learned today, when it came to angels, who knew their motives. The carriage jostled as the streets turned rough, and she pulled back a curtain to look out. “We’re here.”
“Again,” Hadia added.
The Cemetery didn’t look too different in daylight. Except maybe the night obscured some of the squalor—where crumbling bricks littered the ground, and makeshift wooden shacks barely held together. Not every place was like that. Some mausoleums were well kept by their occupants, and there were graves both freshly cleaned and painted. In other places new construction went on, and vendors sold plaster vases—as if it wasn’t a Friday. Children played about the stone markers, amid lines of clothes drying under the midday sun.
“Do you think any of them recognize us?” Hadia asked as they stepped from the carriage. She’d opted not to wear her Ministry jacket, given recent events.
Fatma noticed a woman glancing at them through her kitchen, where she cooked at a stone oven right beside an elaborately carved tomb. “Maybe. Easy to stand out, when you’re not from here.” Not to mention her light gray suit, matching vest, and red-on-white pin-striped shirt. Not exactly discreet.
“That’s it coming up.” She nodded at a tall mausoleum in the distance.
It looked almost like the one they’d fought the imposter on that night. Four figures lounged about outside—young women. No, girls. In bright red kaftans that ended at their knees, over baggy tshalvar. The Turkish trousers were deep blue and tucked into laced black boots. The girls leaned against the mausoleum entrance, idly chatting. One practiced spinning a dagger along the back of her hand, while the others all wore theirs openly at the hip. At seeing Fatma and Hadia approach they stopped their talk, fixing the newcomers with hard stares.
Fatma bid them greetings, then said, “We’re here to see the Leopardess.”
A tall girl with Soudanese features ran Fatma up and down. “Back for some more? Where’s that fat policeman? I’d enjoy slapping his face again, wallahi!”
The other girls barked laughter. So this was the one who had delivered that five-fingered palm to Aasim’s face. And, as Fatma recalled, taken a swing at her. Probably best to let that go.
“She knows we’re coming. So just take us there.”
Another girl said something rude, setting her friends to renewed laughter. But the first one shot them a look that brought silence. She glanced again at Fatma, before turning and beckoning to follow. They were led into the mausoleum, where more people stood about. All women, all wearing the same red kaftans and Turkish trousers, with the older ones in matching red hijabs. Some kind of rank perhaps. From somewhere nearby came the unexpected sounds of children’s laughter.
The girl stopped to confer with one of the women, who eyed both Fatma and Hadia. When they finished, the girl left, presumably returning to her post. Someone from their cluster came forward—a woman in a white dress and black hijab, wearing of all things a brilliant necklace of sapphires and rubies. Her brown skin bore creases and slight bags about her curving eyes, while her body had the stoutness of a grandmother. There was a discomfiting cast to her gaze, however, almost predatory. That was fitting as well, for the leader of the Forty Leopards.
The moment the angels said Siwa hired thieves bold enough to break into their vault, Fatma had known it could only be them. Who else would be that brazen? The lady thieves had started out as shoplifters, often wearing full bur’a, sebleh, and milaya lef to hide their ill-gained goods. They’d gone on to ransack homes of the wealthy, posing as servants and maids, then to heists that made off with jewels, art, and once an entire armored carriage carrying casks of gold coins. To this day, no one knew what had happened to it. Their members went in and out of prison, usually for the smaller crimes. But none revealed a word, serving time in silence. Their leader remained untouched and un-betrayed. People claimed she was as hard to catch as the feline moniker associated with her gang.
“Peace be upon you, Leopardess. I’m Agent Fatma, this is Agent Hadia. Thank you for meeting with us.”
“And upon you peace, agents,” the head of the Forty Leopards replied. “The Usta said to expect you.”
That would be Khalid. The bookie was Fatma’s best tie to Cairo’s underworld. She’d contacted him straight after meeting with the cursed Marid. To her surprise, he’d said the leader of the gang was willing to meet with them—today.
“Tell me, agents,” she went on, “why shouldn’t I have some of my daughters bind the two of you right now and seal you up in one of these mausoleums—where not even someone in your vaunted Ministry will hear your screams?”
Fatma tensed. The words were offered idly, as if asking how much honey they wanted spooned into their tea. But it held the promise of a drawn blade. Beside her Hadia went rigid, eyes scanning the room. No girls like the ones outside, but grown and fit women—very much like leopards. So it was going to be that kind of meeting.
“We didn’t come here to threaten you,” Fatma said. “Or to be threatened by you.”
The Leopardess’s tone went cold. “The last time agents were in el-Arafa, you caused a riot.”
Fatma felt her indignation rise. “Your people were the ones stirring up the crowd. Working on the side of the man in the gold mask.”
The woman’s dark eyes drew to slits, her voice tight. “We are only on el-Arafa’s side. Do not place us in league with that foul man. You came in as an army onto our land, among the people we protect and who protect us in turn. We would have fought you to the end.”
Alright, then, Fatma conceded. One question answered—even if not how she’d planned going about it. Time to de-escalate.
“That night,” she said with regret in her voice. “It was a mistake.”
The Leopardess seemed to weigh her sincerity. She finally gave the apology the barest nod of acceptance. “People in el-Arafa are bad off enough without all of you making things worse. It seems the only time we see the police is when there’s some crime in the more respectable parts of Cairo. People here distrust authorities, and with good reason. That night didn’t help.”
“I don’t think the man in the gold mask helped either,” Hadia put in. “He’s the problem.”
The leader of the Forty Leopards looked to Hadia—who actually took a step back under that hard gaze. But the older woman dipped her head appreciatively.
“He is a problem,” she agreed. “No one who lives here is stupid or gullible. They’re just tired of the exploitation. Tired of being ignored. Desperate ears will listen to anyone offering up others to blame. What do you want of me?”
“Khalid said you’d be willing to tell us about one of your contracts,” Fatma said. “For a djinn named Siwa.”
The older woman eyed them both now with scrutiny. The uneasy quiet that followed was broken by a lilting adhan.
“Time for prayer,” she remarked. “You’ll join me. And you may call me Layla.”
That wasn’t a request. So after performing their ablutions, they prayed.
When they’d finished, the Leopardess—Layla—led Fatma and Hadia through the mausoleum to an entrance in the back, her entourage trailing like bodyguards. Outside was a surprising sight. A set of sky-blue tents had been set up. Beneath them were rows upon rows of wooden tables seated with children—likely the ones they’d heard before.
“I grew up here,” Layla said. She took a white apron embroidered with colorful flowers from someone, wrapping it about her dress. “There was a woman who took care of one of the tombs. It was not her family but the family her own had worked for. I thought her a fool. Taking care of the dead of someone who had likely treated her family as servants for generations? But every day after Friday prayer, she would come around and give all of us children loaves of bread and cheese. I later learned she was taking what monies the tomb owner’s family gave her and using it on us. It was a lesson not to pass judgment so quickly. She’s gone now, but I carry on her tradition.”
Fatma stayed quiet. If the woman wanted to claim her band of lady thieves were actually philanthropists stealing from the wealthy to feed the poor, she wouldn’t argue. But she doubted anyone else in this slum could afford fancy aprons. And the red ruby that extended from the woman’s necklace—the size of a hen’s egg—could probably feed all these children for a year.
“You’ll need aprons as well,” Layla remarked. “And ladles.”
Someone stepped forward to offer both.
“I don’t think you understand why we came,” Fatma began. “We don’t have the time—”
“You had time to come in here and disrupt these children’s lives,” Layla countered sharply. “Some of their parents are still in jail. Others saw their brothers or family beaten by police. I think you have time, agents. Unless your apologies are just words.”
Fatma looked at the children. None paid her much mind in their chatter. But she felt the guilt all the same and slipped on the apron without further protest. Hadia joined her. In short order, the two were serving rounds of baladi bread along with bowls of chicken and mulukhiya—the latter filling the air with the fragrant scent of fried garlic and coriander. Sometime in the middle of this, Layla spoke.
“I am at times contracted by a djinn named Siwa.”
Well, that was one confirmation. “To break into the vault of the angels,” Fatma said.
“That is where he sends us.” Layla paused to scold two children fighting over some bread. “It pays well. Though not as thrilling as my girls hoped.”
Fatma exchanged a look with Hadia. “Oh? How’s that?”
Layla shrugged. “One would expect breaking into the vault of angels would carry more danger. Or greater difficulty. Not to say it was easy. But…”
“It seemed just dangerous enough to navigate for your girls,” Fatma guessed. “Just difficult enough for them to overcome. And tended to work out in their favor. Without fail.”
The older woman paused, inspecting them with hard eyes. “Odd, that, don’t you think?” She turned back to her work. “When Usta Khalid told me you wanted to ask questions about my contract for Siwa, I agreed. Because something has been troubling me these past few weeks. The last time he hired us, it was to steal two items. Said it was very important that I go myself. I did.” Seeing their surprised looks, she frowned. “Don’t let these old bones fool you. I’m quite agile. I retrieved the items with the information he provided—telling me precisely where to find it in the angels’ vault. But a strange thing. I recall stealing a sword—a blade dark as midnight that sings. The other item, however.” She frowned deeper. “When I try to remember what else I stole—”
“—you can’t,” Fatma finished.
Confusion creased the Leopardess’s sharp eyes. “I can’t remember anything from that night other than retrieving the sword. Like a hole in my memory. I don’t know what else I came out with from that vault. But then this man in the gold mask appears on Cairo’s streets. Wielding that very black blade. Claiming to be al-Jahiz. Riding on the back of an Ifrit!” She shook her head at the implausibility. “We were paid handsomely. But I cannot help but feel I played a hand in the wrongness that has gripped the city. And every night since coming out of that vault, I dream ill omens. Something terrible is coming.” She paused. “I’m telling you this because I believe you are trying to stop that.”
“We are,” Fatma assured. “You’ve been a great help. Now we have to visit—”
“All well and good,” the older woman cut in. “Once you finish here.” She gestured pointedly to an empty bowl. A small girl with a bit of dirt on her nose sat behind it, looking up expectantly. “Now keep spooning out food. These children are hungry.”