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THE GLORIOUS CITY
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Sultan Iksander knew it was time to go.
Empress Luna’s curse rolled inward on his city in a slow but inexorable wave, petrifying every djinni the towering circle touched. Warm flesh turned to marble statues, unwakeable and unknowing. Though they’d had warning of the danger, undoing the spell proved impossible. Three days the empress took to weave her magic, marching about their walls with her black-garbed army. On the second night, she offered Iksander one last chance to avert the catastrophe.
Her terms were two-fold. First, he must marry her. Second, he must relinquish his throne to her. The first demand he might have learned to suffer. The second he couldn’t subject his people to. Luna was dark ifrit—a djinniya who’d given her soul over to evil. She’d done so by brutally murdering Iksander’s beloved wife, Najat, though the sorceress had known the act would damn her to djinn hell.
When Iksander said Luna knew, he meant it literally. Unlike humans he’d heard of, djinn very much believed in Iblis and his infernal realm. How could they not? Djinn were beings of magic, the actual embodiment of dimensions humans struggled to find faith in. Luna was willing to face eternal torment to revenge herself on him. He’d rejected her romantic interest, so she’d killed her rival. To her, the choice had seemed reasonable.
What such a woman would do to Iksander’s people didn’t bear thinking on.
His innermost circle—three trusted friends and his vizier—had convinced him it was better to turn to stone than live beneath a thumb so depraved. Though Iksander wasn’t sure this was true, he’d heeded their counsel.
Now he stood at the window in his splendid palace office, putting off the moment when he must enact their “Hail Mary” plan. Before the curse could petrify them, Iksander, Arcadius, Joseph, and Philip would slip away through magic portals—different ones for each, to maximize their chances of escaping. Once on the human plane they’d lay low, gather strength, and find some way to return and break the spell.
Or so they hoped. Iksander was far from certain they’d succeed. Regarding himself, he wasn’t convinced he deserved to. His misjudgments, his failures, had led them to this precipice. He ought to suffer with his people.
Unless that was the coward’s choice . . . The days when djinn had been the Creator’s favorites were ages gone, their period of grace cut short by a refusal to bow to new creations. Humans had supplanted djinn as the deity’s pets: forgiven everything and asked nothing. Maybe the Almighty wanted the Glorious City’s ruler to work for his redemption. Iksander couldn’t say, but his chest ached at the thought of leaving everything he loved. The only life he’d known was here.
His memories, even his guilt seemed to demand he stay.
To his right beside the window, a gilded ormolu clock ticked on a shining rock crystal pedestal. No one but Iksander heard it chime softly for the tenth hour. Normally, this wing of the palace bustled. This morning, the rooms were eerily abandoned. Iksander had sent the servants to their friends and families, to make what goodbyes they wished. As a result, he lingered here alone.
You have to go, he urged himself. You have no more time to waste.
The palace complex crowned a hill overlooking the great city. Outside the window, a shimmer in the distance behind the palms of Victory Park drew his eye. Spying it stalled his breath. The rippling, barely visible wall of force had to be Luna’s curse. It had reached the royal quarter’s edge, barely a mile from Iksander’s watching post. The crest of the forward wave pierced the clouds, higher than the finest flying carpet could surmount.
The faint sound it made recalled a whale’s low rumble.
Iksander shuddered with visceral dread. Was this what humans felt on seeing tidal waves roar toward them?
Though this wave progressed more slowly, it could no more be stopped than a tsunami. Last night Joseph the Magician, his friend Arcadius’s servant, had tricked the enchantress into accepting a devious gift: a beautiful arm cuff Joseph had pretended was a token of repentance from Iksander. Within the finely detailed gold, the sorcerer had hidden a miniature spell. As soon as she slid it on, Luna had sealed her fate. What she did to Iksander’s people, she now did to herself and her army. Evidently, she hadn’t cared. She’d triggered her curse anyway.
Because she’d been outside the walls at the time—magical ground zero, so to speak—she’d be locked in stone already. Her soldiers too. No one remained to utter the anti-charm, assuming there was one.
A new movement caught his attention. In the distance, tiny toy-like figures stumbled into the grassy park, unable to resist their instinct to flee what logic knew couldn’t be outrun. One figure fell and Iksander gasped. Even as the man tried to rise, the curse swallowed him. He turned ice-white from his feet up.
Luna’s curse had frozen him in place.
“Move,” Iksander ordered himself, aloud this time.
He moved, breaking into a run in his office’s outer chamber. Here, on long rows of velvet-cushioned chairs, countless ambassadors had sat elbow to elbow with laborers—anyone welcome to request an audience. Iksander had done his best to be fair to everyone.
Fairness demanded he do his best today.
His bejeweled slippers were too smooth-soled for traction. He skidded on the polished floor as he hit the corridor. Cursing, he caught himself on a carved marble rail. The reception hall below was a long way to fall. He’d accomplish nothing if he broke his neck before reaching the treasure vault. That room was four floors lower, where the interdimensional portal he meant to go through was located.
Telling himself he had time to watch his steps, he restrained his pell-mell gallop down the grand stairway as much as his nerves allowed. He was hot underneath his tunic, an uncustomary sweat having broken across his skin. Maybe he should change form. His smoke shape could move faster. Unfortunately, he didn’t know how his somewhat ordinary personal magic would react with the empress’s. The atmosphere had begun to buzz with her approaching power. Iksander faltered as a new alarming sound became audible: the frightened cries of djinn being overtaken by the curse.
He shook himself and moved faster, darting into an enclosed stairway to access the treasury floor. As he hurried down the steps, his broad shoulders bumped the walls, his mane of wavy golden hair sticking to his face. Perhaps he had an extra second to tie it back, but perhaps he didn’t.
Ignoring the inconvenience, he struggled with the diamond knob on the final door . . . then remembered its hinges swung outward.
The narrow passageway the door opened on was dim. He was underground now, and there were no windows. Though the air was cooler, it also was strangely thick. His pulse skipped as he spotted a tall veiled woman facing him six or so yards away. She was dressed like an upper servant but not one he recognized. Her stillness created the impression she’d been waiting for him to arrive.
The clammy pool of perspiration in the small of his back increased.
“Are you lost?” he asked, politeness overruling paranoia. “Do you need help getting to safety?”
The woman laughed throatily. “What safety might that be, Iksander?”
Her voice was cultured . . . and horribly familiar. Suddenly he knew why the air felt strange. Her dark magic had weighted it.
“Y-you,” he said, helpless to avoid the stutter. “You’re supposed to be dead.”
“Not dead,” Luna corrected, still amused. “Merely turned to stone.”
As she walked to him, hips swaying, her brazen femininity mesmerized. Long past adhering to rules of modesty, she threw back her veil gracefully. Despite the repugnance her fallen nature stirred, her moonlike beauty shone bright to him. Her straight silken hair was silver, her eyes the milky blue of glaciers. Iksander didn’t want to, but he remembered how kissing her red mouth felt.
His shame at having betrayed his wife with this monster crashed over him.
“What do you want?” he asked, his voice scraping his throat harshly.
She smiled. “Merely to gaze upon your beloved face one last time. I have, after all, done all of this for you.”
For a heartbeat, he accepted what she said. He wracked his brain for the right response. Should he plead with her to reverse the curse? Reason? Promise? Would anything change her twisted mind?
Then he remembered where they were. She shouldn’t have known where to find him. He and the others had kept their plan secret. Either Luna meant to stop him fleeing through the portal, or she intended to make use of it herself.
The first option would be bad. The second he’d rather die than let happen.
The simplicity of the choice steadied him.
“It’s not too late,” he said, lying unabashedly through his teeth. “You and I can still make peace.”
She answered, unruffled. “I am ifrit now. What do I care for peace?” Her lips curved, two deep dimples appearing in her smooth cheeks. “There is, however, one small favor you could do me.”
“What would that be?”
She extended her arm and pointed, indicating a golden hatch set into the left-hand wall. Though studded with jewels and decorated, the vault entrance was a serious security device. “Please unlock the door to your treasure room.”
Joseph had set spells against the code being hacked. Iksander concluded she’d already tried and failed to crack them. He appreciated knowing the head magician’s skills were up to thwarting Luna in this at least.
“I don’t believe I shall,” he said.
To his surprise, the enchantress laughed. As she tossed her head, her sterling silver hair floated on her amped energy. “Oh Iksander, if only you’d shown this strength of mind when I convinced you your precious Najat had been unfaithful. Then again, everything you do is too little and too late.”
He wished he could deny it, but Najat had died thinking he hated her. For that, he’d never forgive himself.
“Nonetheless,” he said simply.
She cocked her head. “Truly? You’d rather your statue form spend eternity here with me?”
“If it must.”
She blinked. Perhaps his grim tone took her aback. She was the empress of the City of Endless Night. From the moment she’d married its late emperor, she’d had power and beauty and position. She was accustomed to men falling for her—on their knees, preferably. Iksander wondered if she knew his friends were escaping too, or if she thought he was his city’s one last hope.
Before he could resolve the question, the atmosphere in the passage thickened, causing him to jerk slightly. His skin crawled with distaste at the seething sensation. The curse must be rolling closer, possibly at the palace now. Did Luna realize this? She hadn’t reacted. Perhaps she’d gone nose-blind to her own magic. If Iksander could keep her distracted long enough, this standoff would solve itself.
Luna pushed up her sleeves, baring the golden cuff Joseph had used to bind her fate to that of her victims’. The redness of the skin around it suggested she’d tried removing it many times.
“Very well,” she said. “We’ll do this the hard way.”
Iksander braced as she closed her eyes and began whispering. Her magic was unlike any he’d encountered. Light djinn didn’t do death magic: couldn’t, actually, and remain what they were. Luna had sacrificed animals and djinn to enact her curse. Even with such resources, so large a work should have exhausted her supply of power. Evidently, she’d stored plenty for herself. Iksander fought to remain where he was while his muscles struggled to obey her.
She’s attacking you, he reminded his helplessly fascinated will. You’re entitled to defend yourself.
He drew his scimitar and swung. He was a warrior-sultan, not one who sat on a couch. His stroke should have cleaved her skull in two. Instead, his blade hit an invisible shield. The forged steel shattered, glancing off his clothes and clattering to the floor.
The empress hadn’t flinched at his attack. When she opened her eyes, her pale blue irises glowed like flames.
“Unlock the door,” she said in a voice layered many times on itself.
Iksander’s body jerked toward the golden hatch.
I have cried unto Thee, O Lord, he thought frantically, the familiar psalm springing to his mind. Incantations others had used successfully often worked better. Let my prayer come unto Thee. If it be Thy will, help me now.
He guessed it wasn’t. Utterly against his wishes, his fingers spun the gears for the combination. The mechanism worked on sigils and not numbers. He set the first wheel to the symbol for the lion’s constellation, the second to the glyph for the planet Mars. The third was the Hebrew letter Yod, the fourth a white lotus. The Open Sesame was tetramorph, which his vocal cords fought to utter.
He groaned, his conflicted throat seeming to boil with fire.
“Say it!” she ordered.
“Tet—” he said, sweat running into his eyes. He clamped his jaw against finishing the word. The temperature had gone dank like a prison cell. He saw something that both terrified him and inspired a desperate hope. A gel-like essence bulged through the wall of the passage a stone's throw behind his enemy. The rainbows wavering on its rippling surface reminded him of oil slicks.
Simply looking at them turned his stomach.
Repeating the syllable he'd already spoken was easier than staying silent. “Tet,” he said. “Tet, tet, tet—”
Luna slapped him across the face.
She shouldn’t have lost control. She’d let her concentration waver enough for him to seize a fraction more agency.
“I hate you,” he hissed, the primal emotion stronger than any spell. “I hate you, you fucking bitch.”
Unlike his sword, this barb drew blood.
“You hate yourself,” she spat back, her pale cheeks flushed with reaction. “Najat died because of you.”
His heart thundered crazily. The curse was mere feet behind her. Don’t give away that it’s here. Hold your ground and let it take you too if you must.
But maybe he didn’t have to.
“I’m glad Najat is free,” he cried wildly, the first thing that came to mind. “You’ll never hurt her again!”
His violent shove caught the enchantress unprepared. Face twisting with anger, she stepped back to catch her balance.
Her rear foot landed inside the curse.
She gasped but didn’t get breath to scream. The magic ran up her as if hungry for the one who’d created it. Luna fell to her knees, then her hands, and then—the same as the hordes before her—she was a perfect sugar-white statue.
“Almighty,” Iksander breathed.
He couldn’t waste time on shock. “Tetramorph,” he turned to bark at the golden hatch.
Though his limbs shook, he yanked the heavy barrier open and ran inside. He ignored the shelves piled high with gleaming treasures, gifts to himself and sultans before him. The portal was at the back, the only item of value to him now.
Luckily, the transdimensional orb was already charged. Fist-sized and ringing softly, light rayed out and sparkled from it as it spun slowly at waist level. Iksander flung himself to the floor to sit near it cross-legged. Joseph, who was their best magician, and Philip, who was an artist and also skilled, had devised the spell that worked it. Because the four friends had different magical aptitudes, they’d kept the ritual simple. He only needed to calm himself, focus on where he planned to go, and activate the charm Philip had encoded in a twin sun tattoo on his ankle.
From there, the spell would take care of everything. Iksander’s soul would divide into two pieces. The larger part would project through the portal into the human realm, where it would create a physical double for him to inhabit. The smaller portion would remain within his statue, ensuring his original form didn’t die. With Luna gone, one of her allies was likely to claim the city. They’d never guess a future rescue could be mounted. The former sultan would seem as powerless as his citizens. Additionally, if the foursome couldn’t accomplish a return trip, there’d still be a chance—however minuscule—that someone from their side would find a means to revive their statues. Plan B was a long shot, but it was better than none at all.
Plan A was simple enough that Iksander hadn’t worried about enacting it. He hadn’t realized how discomposed his journey to the treasury would leave him.
“Fuck,” he said, only then noticing he’d left the vault door ajar.
It was too late to correct the oversight. The curse was at the threshold, billowing greasily.
He growled with his effort to throw off the distraction. The door didn’t matter. Focusing did. Iksander had a clear sense of his own body. All djinn could spin simple spells, but he’d always been a primarily physical being. He knew he could project the details of his form with reasonable accuracy.
Visualizing his desired location would be the challenge. Istanbul was the Glorious City’s twin on the human plane. Though it took less magic to reach than other places, the downside to traveling there was its citizens’ continued belief in djinn. If the escapees were identified, humans would know formulas for controlling them. Worse, they’d possess the needed faith for spells to work. Too many in that part of the world knew King Solomon’s power to command their race was more than a bible tale. Precisely because the human country of the USA didn’t have similar traditions, Joseph had selected it.
To most of that populace, djinn were less real than Santa Claus.
This was essential. Though the Almighty’s favorites had shaky faith and in most cases sketchy knowledge, their Creator endowed them with more magical potential than the beings He'd cast off. Other factors being equal, humans would always out-spell djinn. Best they not be able to exploit the advantage. The less vulnerable Iksander and his friends were to enslavement, the better.
He'd settled on the state of Florida as his goal. He thought the climate would make him feel at home. In contrast to some djinn, Iksander wasn’t obsessed with magically spying on humans. Nonetheless, he’d viewed many pirated episodes of CSI: Miami to cement the place in his mind.
You’re ready, he thought. Just relax and picture it.
He exhaled and shut his eyes, too aware of the empress’s magic closing in. Ignoring the fear prickling at his nape, he thought of coconut palms and warm breezes, of pleasantly baking heat and waves foaming on the shore.
His eyes burned without warning, his heart suddenly aching. Najat had loved swimming in the Glorious City’s freshwater inlets. During the happy years of their marriage, they’d sneaked off to them many times. We’re otters, she’d tease. No more sultan and kadin. Our only worry is where to catch dinner.
God, she’d been good for him.
The back of his neck itched fiercely, a sensation like tiny claws sinking into him. He resisted the urge to check where the curse was now.
“Miami,” he murmured. “I’m going to Miami.”
He couldn’t put it off any longer. His hair was bristling like crazy. He touched the tattoo of interlocking suns inside his right ankle then sent a surge of energy through his fingertips. He called up his trigger word.
“Undine,” he said. Najat, he thought.
The portal flared, its glare blinding even through closed eyelids. He felt a tug, and a wrench, and then his soul split in two like a star unzipping. Ready or not, he was sucked into the door’s riptide.
Traveling between dimensions was no small matter. A single trip burned too much magic for him to have experienced a journey this long before. Iksander prayed the process was working the way it should. Lightning flashed, plasma filaments whirling out from it dizzyingly. His essence was formless. He couldn't tell if he was right-side up or even right-side out. Did he have a side? Was he just spinning in one place?
He materialized in a body that felt peculiar though still recognizable as his. He was somewhere again.
Off balance, he lurched forward. His palms saved him from falling by slapping the wall that had appeared in front of him. Its bricks were rough, the scent that assailed his senses not what he expected. Instead of salty air and suntan lotion, he scented too-sweet apples and cooking grease.
He wrinkled his nose. A large green bin labeled STUCKEY’S DINER hulked next to him.
Never mind that, though. Iksander wasn’t so delicate he couldn’t survive an encounter with a dumpster. The police on CSI: Miami searched through them all the time. Better yet, no one had seen him materialize—which they might have done, since the hour appeared similar to the one he’d left. That was a positive sign. Time between the dimensions didn’t always run in sync. Because he’d arrived unnoticed, he’d simply stroll casually from this alley and find the beach.
His shaky knees agreed to hold him, so he proceeded with his plan.
Hurdle one down, he told himself. He simply had to stay out of trouble until he and his friends could meet. A day or two. A week at the most. Then they’d pool their resources and strategize.
His teeth started chattering before he'd taken a handful of cautious steps.
He realized he was shivering.
That wasn’t right. Miami was supposed to be warm year round. As he puzzled over this, the wind blew a swirl of leaves around the corner and down the dirty lane. The leaves were bright red and not palm-shaped. He picked one up and stared at it.
“This is a maple leaf.” He plucked the knowledge from the ethers the way most of his kind could. The knack was handy for learning languages. At the moment, it filled him with dismay.
According to his understanding, Miami didn’t have autumn foliage.