The Blind Wish Page 19

  “It’s made from the same gold as the Shaitan spear. It can track down anyone, if you know what they look like.”

  “What wish do I use?”

  She closed my fingers over the bangle, sealing them between her warmth and the gold’s cool metal. “Think only of the face you mean to find, and it will show you the way.”

  —

  I waited to use the bangle until I was out of the Room of Iblis and alone beside the Lamp. Then I slipped it onto my wrist and closed my eyes. I pictured the jinni and his penetrating gaze, his sharp features, and his dark, oily braid.

  My wrist started to burn, and then it pulled me out of my skin. I started to twist, to dissolve, to turn to smoke, and then the bangle yanked me right out of the Cavern and through basalt and shale, pockets of air and layers of sand.

  I was a cyclone pulled by the circlet of gold. It was my compass, my light, and it delivered me from the depths onto a ridge. I was a speck in the landscape, a lone figure standing on high ground between the sky and the earth flowing out before me, and I was exposed.

  I crouched to the ground and looked around me. There were no jinn, no humans, no animals at all but for a falcon. It circled over a valley of strange, dark boulders separated by thin plumes of smoke that rose to my elevation and dispersed in the air.

  The jinni was somewhere nearby, but where?

  I spun, holding out my wrist with the gold dangling from it, and felt a tug in the direction of the boulders. But they weren’t boulders—they were tents. Hundreds of dark tents bunched up together in the hollow of the ground.

  People milled between the tents, small and quick as beetles. And everywhere, as numerous as the people, stood horses in leather-and-copper armor. These horses, however, wore no bells or tassels. They were outfitted for silence and darkness.

  “Shahtabi.” As soon as I was hidden from sight, I ran down the side of the ridge onto the packed dirt and horse droppings. They had come from this direction, then.

  I reached the edge of the army, for that was clearly what this was, and lurked from tent to tent. These were all humans, not jinn, but they were not of the caliphate. Their armor was different, their horses were slung with footholds I’d never seen before, and their swords curved backward. Many wore two swords strapped to their backs, deadly mirrored moons of iron.

  Somewhere in this foreign army, the Forgotten jinni walked free.

  I crept to the center of the encampment. A few times, I had to leap aside in an effort to avoid being run into by a horse or man. At last, I saw the banner signifying the general’s tent. The long banner was black and gold, and too heavy for the faint wind to lift it off its post.

  The bangle jerked, pointing me toward the general’s tent, so I went to the back entrance and pulled away the flap. My hand shook and my heart was in my throat, but I could not make it this far without setting eyes on the jinni.

  The interior was dark and smelled of smoking oil, but I found him, sitting in a circle of men. They sat cross-legged, each with his hands on his knees, and listened while a man in black armor and with thick, felted plaits of hair barked out his commands. They were in a language I didn’t recognize. There was a wish for this, and I whispered it to myself.

  “Alefjaala.” This wish was supposed to enable me to speak and understand their words, but I’d never used it before.

  “We will strike while they are busy,” the commander said. The wish worked! “I want to see these bridges they’ve constructed first,” he went on.

  “Master,” Toqto’a said. He grabbed one of the golden cuffs on his wrists and bowed. “Where would you have my men be positioned?”

  The general pursed his dry lips. “When we arrive in Samarra, I would like your kind to be in the same formation we used in Ashgabat. And, as always, I appreciate your assistance, Toqto’a.”

  “As you wish.”

  Was he enslaved to this man? I didn’t see anything binding him, and the general didn’t seem like the sort of man to acknowledge a slave, much less thank him.

  An army with a handful of jinn would be unstoppable. Toqto’a had heard what Ibrahim planned. It did not take much thought to piece it all together: this army was going to attack the caliph’s army from behind.

  A third army. A third army with far more power and numbers than Ibrahim’s soldiers would be able to withstand.

  Toqto’a lifted his head and his eyes traveled toward me. I almost dropped the flap, which he would not have missed. The moment the wind picked up, I let the flap go and backed away.

  This army was from the northeast. They had come from beyond the mountains, light and quick on their multitude of horses. This was far worse than Delia could have imagined. She needed to know as soon as possible. And so did Kamal and his brother.

  THERE WAS NO time for celebration. The moment the boats reached the dock, Gal and Delia were waiting for Melchior, Aga, and Rashid. I had barely straightened my legs when Rashid shouted out at the congregation of Dyads, “We must get to Samarra. Ibrahim and his army are planning to attack us there!”

  The boats rocked in the lake, empty, while we ran to the tunnel that led to Samarra. I stole a glance at Atish and caught him watching me.

  “Will you be all right?” he asked. “You haven’t had to fight anyone yet. Not really.”

  I grimaced. “Don’t have a choice, do we?”

  He laughed cynically and shook his head. I looked back at Melchior and Delia. They were out of earshot, but I could see they were arguing with each other about something.

  Atish took my hand in his and pulled me with him. “Come. I won’t let you fall behind.”

  We ran in groups of two, and when we reached the entrance to the Samarra Tunnel, we had to slow down, because the entire Shaitan was already filing in, clogging the mouth like too many ants.

  “Delia must have alerted them already,” Saam said, coming up on my right. We slowed to a walk, and caught our breath. “Get to the river. Taja and I will show you what to do on the way there.”

  “Where are the other magi and their partners?” I asked, remembering the dozens who had been there when I was marked.

  Atish looked at Saam, who frowned before he answered. “Most of them only came for that one event. They are positioned at many different tunnels, throughout the earth. There is always the possibility we will be attacked from another source when busy with battle.”

  “So we’re on our own,” I said.

  “Precisely. But we don’t need them,” Saam teased. “We’ve got Taja, who can kick any army off their feet with her eyes closed.” Taja snorted, and then ran ahead.

  While we ran, the sound of a hundred feet echoing down the tunnel pounded against my eardrums, and no amount of covering my ears made a difference. At one point, Taja pulled my hand away and shook her head.

  “You cannot unhear it. You can only ignore it. Like all the sounds in battle.”

  I had never fought in a war. I had never fought against anyone. I did not know how to use a dagger, or send out balls of fire. And although the women in the Cavern fought alongside the men, I had been raised amongst humans, where women never wielded any weapons. The only time I had seen real fighting had been in the Baghdad palace, when the Shaitan fought against the palace guards. And then, I had not been expected to be a part of it.

  “Atish, what are we going to do?” I asked.

  “I was wondering the same. I know as much about being in a Dyad as you do, you know.”

  “Yes, but you can fight. I can barely keep a flame going.”

  He grinned. “That’s not true and you know it. You’ve blazed through magus training. I’ve never heard of anyone completing it so quickly. Besides, you just need to cover me.”

  This made everything twice as bad. I pretended to look at the heels of the jinni in front of me. “I barely passed. The only test I did well on was the last one.”

  He snapped his jaw shut and sucked in a deep breath. We went on like this, silent and dark, for another minute before he
shook his head. “No, I don’t think you failed.”

  “What?”

  “Melchior would never have initiated the Bonding if you weren’t good enough. Those tests weren’t there to see if you could overcome them. If they’re like the Shaitan tests, they test you, all of you, and the instructors are looking deeper than you think.”

  “So I was supposed to fail?”

  “They were impossible tasks. And when we did the run, you did better than most Shaitan, Zayele. Melchior and Taja wore down your defenses. They saw what was beneath. Of course, they could have just asked me,” he said slyly.

  I jabbed him in the shoulder, and then Taja pushed into mine. We were slowing down, and I had almost tripped over her. “Done?” she asked. “Good. Because it’s time to transport to the other end. Atish, have you been there before?” Atish shook his head. “Then I’ll take Zayele and Saam will take you. We need to get there before everyone else. It’s our job to put up the barricades.”

  She gripped my upper arm and took me away from the middle of the earth to a place struck through with the amber light of sunrise. We landed at the edge of the tunnel and nearly fell into the swiftly rushing Tigris. She pulled me back, and we bent over, gripping our knees and breathing heavily. Atish and Saam had arrived farther back in the tunnel.

  “I told you not to transport so close,” Saam said, rushing up to us and frowning. “That river is faster than it looks.” We all looked down at the jade-colored water, and I was taken back, remembering how I had floated past these very caves only a few weeks ago, whining about how I had to marry a prince in Baghdad. The water was the same, deep and translucent, but everything else—me, my sister, and the war—had changed.

  “Come,” Taja said in my ear. Her voice was urgent. “We have work to do.”

  NO ONE WAS inside the Eyes of Iblis Command, so I went outside and found Delia and Melchior arguing by the fountain. Yashar stood behind Melchior, looking like he wanted to say something but was too afraid.

  “But what about after the battle?” Delia asked. She was an arm’s length from Melchior, eyes blazing and mouth curled in disgust. “Have you any consideration for what happens next?”

  Melchior, in contrast with Delia, was calm. “There will not be an ‘after’ if we do not take advantage of this now,” Melchior said. He was about to leave when he saw me. “Najwa. What do you report?”

  Delia spun around and pressed her palm to her heart. “Thank Iblis you’ve returned. Did you find the jinni?”

  “Yes. He is with another army.”

  “Another army?” Melchior asked, frowning. “Whose?”

  “I did not recognize them, but they came from the northeast. They are working with him and a few other jinn. The jinn will help them fight the caliph’s army.”

  “And so the caliph’s army will be caught between two armies,” Delia said, her voice barely above a whisper. “They will be decimated.”

  Melchior nodded. “As fortunate as that would be, we cannot let this army have these jinn. They must be freed.”

  “But, Melchior, they’re the Forgotten. They aren’t…” Delia’s lip began to tremble, and she bit it hard. A moment later, her face was hard as stone.

  “You’ve not forgotten them, it seems,” he said to Delia. “Najwa, you need to go back and release them from their bonds. What sort are they? Are they chained together? Did you see any signs of selenite or hematite?”

  “No. Toqto’a wore golden cuffs, but they didn’t look like shackles. I don’t think they’re slaves, Melchior.”

  “Of course they’re slaves,” Melchior snapped. “You must break them free, Najwa, because once they push through the caliph’s army, their masters may never stop.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but the only words I could come up with would just prove my youth, my inexperience, and my inabilities, so I clamped it shut. They weren’t slaves, and there wasn’t anything I could do about them helping the foreign army if that was what they wanted to do.

  “When you finish, join us at the mouth of the Samarra Tunnel. It is where your sister will be, fighting beside her dyad.”

  “You mean she’s—”

  “Yes. She has been bonded with Atish. With any luck, they will prove themselves at tomorrow’s battle.”

  My mind was reeling, but I did not have time to straighten it out. I bowed at Melchior and Delia. “I will go collect some things and be on my way.”

  There was nothing I truly needed, but I could not return to the third army’s encampment now. Too much had happened all at once, and both my body and my mind were growing weak.

  When I reached the house, I found Rahela sitting on the floor in the very center of the room. She startled, backing up a little on her knees, and then regained her composure.

  “I finished it,” she said, and she brushed her hand across the rug beneath her. It was the brightly colored rug she’d been working on earlier. How had she finished it so quickly? She was only a human. Had Abdas helped her?

  She crawled off the rug and showed it to me, pointing out the mountain peaks, the gorge and agate-blue river, the crust of the earth, and the Cavern. She had found milky-white thread for the shards in the ceiling, and strangely illuminated thread for the flames on the lake. I brushed the pile, which was thick and stiff, amazed. This was not an ordinary woven rug. The snow on the mountains was cold to touch. I ran my finger down the river, and it came away moist. The wall of the gorge was rough and filed down my nail when I scratched at it. Most amazing of all was the Lake of Fire. The flames flickered, just as they did in real life.

  And that’s what this was: a living, true-to-life rug.

  “How did you do this?” I asked. “It’s beautiful. It’s magical. But you’re not a jinni.”

  She smiled knowingly. “I think it was all of these things,” she said, pointing at the loom and piles of glistening thread. “There is power in that loom, and in the dyes.”

  “But no one has ever made anything like this before. Not Laira.”

  “I think…I think it’s because they’ve never thought to. I wanted something that would let me travel the world without having to depend on anyone else.” Then she crawled back onto the center of the rug, not seeming to care that the river left a wet mark on her knee. “Watch.” She motioned for me to get off the rug. Then she held her hands out, palms up, and lifted them up to the ceiling.

  The rug rose off the floor and hovered waist-high in the air.

  “Shards, Rahela! How did you do that?”

  She shrugged. “I had a little help from a friend. But it was my idea.”

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  “Abdas went to help the physicians. They called for more bandages, in preparation for this battle.” She brushed off the tassels at the edge of the rug, pushing them over the edge so they hung down. The rest of the rug was surprisingly straight. It didn’t bow under her weight at all. “Don’t worry. I plan to help them. But in my own way.”

  I did not have time to find out what she meant. I wished her luck and ran to where we kept the flatbread and water. It tasted like chalk, but it settled my stomach. Then I left Rahela behind with her flying rug.

  —

  I transported straight to the center of the encampment, but the tents were gone. Two warhorses flanked me, and in the slight shadow, I wished, “Shahtabi.”

  I did it just in time, because the soldier atop the horse on my left turned and looked down at where I stood.

  “Did you see that?” he asked the other soldier. I cringed, and kept myself still. The horses were probably trained to ignore strange scents and surprises, but I did not want to test them. “Something flew straight through here. Something big.”

  “It was probably a vulture,” said the other soldier. “It knows what we’re about.”

  The other one shrugged, and they clicked their tongues at the horses, who began to move. That was when I noticed I was in the midst of a herd of warhorses carrying soldiers gleaming in steel. They moved en m
asse, and if I did not move out of the way, I was going to find myself beneath their hooves.

  I weaved, running around the horses and careful not to startle them. Finally, I reached the shallow slope of the valley, where the horsemen did not bother to climb. From there, I looked for Toqto’a and any other jinn.

  It did not take long. In the center of the horde waved five black flags from the saddles of five heavily armored horses. Each horse was ridden by a man with gold cuffs like Toqto’a’s, and they were marching away from me.

  I would have to go back into the army of hooves and swords, of choking dust and whipping tails. I could feel my shahtabi wish was not as strong as it had been earlier. I was losing my strength, and I did not have time left. I took a breath, focused on the cloud of dust in front of the jinni horses, and transported. A moment later, a horse reared in front of me. In the shock, my shahtabi fell away. A man shouted, echoed by another, and I backed into the swirling dirt.

  When the horse calmed down, I forced myself to go up to the first jinni. It was Toqto’a. He saw me immediately and glared at me down his nose.

  “At long last, they’ve sent a jinni to claim us, friends,” he said to the other jinn.

  I swallowed. “I have come to release you from your imprisonment.”

  Toqto’a slowed his horse, but it was still moving quickly. I trotted beside them, trying to keep my eye on Toqto’a while not tripping over anything on the ground. “What makes you think we’re imprisoned?”

  “But you’re being used by this army. To fight.”

  One of the other jinn chuckled behind me. “They’ve sent a little one to do a man’s job. Do you think you can take us by force? All five of us, and only one of you?”

  Then Toqto’a laughed. It was loud and full of pain and anger. “We are not captives here. We fight with this army willingly.” My mouth was dry. I tried to swallow away the dust, but my tongue was paper. It could do nothing without any words. “Go back and tell your jinni family we are coming for them. This army intends to wipe out the caliph’s army, and we intend to wipe out yours.”