"You mean he could kill you."
"No, he probably couldn't. But I wouldn't like what was left of me, in the end, if I won." She said it without much emphasis - just a calm assessment of her chances, nothing to be afraid of. "It's better if you do it, anyway. Humans. You don't have the same vulnerabilities that we do."
It was very odd to hear a Djinn talk about human strengths instead of considering us slightly less useful than a soiled tissue.
Of course, she ruined it by adding, "And you're much more easily replaced." Lovely. "Does he have any vulnerabilities?"
"Of course. He can still die," she said. "He can still feel pain. Part of him is still human. A small part, but it remains, and it feels things the way humans do. The way you do." I felt the ship's speed lurch, accelerating. Some of the ship's staff looked startled.
That wasn't standard procedure, obviously.
"I sped us up," Venna said. "We were moving too slowly. I don't want the storm catching us again. It would be inconvenient."
Maybe, but now I could feel the thudding impacts of waves through the ship, and the very slight rolling had increased to a definite wallow. A ship this large dampened the usual motion of the sea, but in waves this high, at unnatural speed, we were going to be in for a rough ride.
I glanced at Brett, who was already looking distinctly uncomfortable. "Better get the ship's stores to break out the giant economy-size Dramamine." He nodded. "Anything else?"
"Yeah. Bad Bob was a Weather Warden, when he still had just his regular set of powers.
Fire may be our best bet to overcome him - it's his biggest weakness. You get your guys ready. I want original ideas, something he can't anticipate or plan for." I chewed my lip for a second. "And whatever your plans are - don't tell me about them. I'd rather you keep it in your team."
Whatever he thought of that, Brett nodded and left me. I sat, watching the dead Wardens being loaded into body bags, then trundled away on gurneys.
I looked at the faces of the survivors. Almost all the Wardens had gathered now, except those with specific duties related to the voyage or standing lookout up on the aetheric, and they all had a similar expression.
They were measuring themselves against the body bags.
I stood up and walked to the stage. I didn't go up, just stood in front of where the medical team was working. Venna turned in her seat to watch me, and all the Wardens did as well.
"Okay," I said, "I'm not going to lie to you. We knew this trip would be tough, and today we got clear evidence of that. We made a mistake, and it cost lives, but those lives were not wasted. It's the duty of Wardens to give their lives in the protection of others. It's part of the oath we all took when we signed on to this job." I paused and made sure that sank in. "Now we know things we didn't know before, and couldn't know without triggering that trap. It sucks, yes, but our enemies aren't playing around. They want us dead, every single one of us. Every Warden and every Djinn. Once we're gone, there's nothing standing between them and the defenseless human beings of Earth. Once humans are gone, they'll strip this planet clean of every single thing with a connection to the aetheric - every animal, plant, insect, and bacterium. They'll devour all the aetheric energy they can get, and then they'll leave. It's what they do."
The only sound in the theater was that of body bags being quietly zipped behind me.
"The Wardens were formed to save people," I said. "For thousands of years, we've tried our best to do that. Sometimes we've been better at it than others. Sometimes we've outright sucked, like lately. But we can save people. We have to. We're Wardens, and we cannot give up. Ever. Agreed?"
A few of them murmured or nodded. Wintry, unwilling agreement, but at least it was a start. "So what now?" asked one of the Earth Wardens, holding the hand of a still-trembling and shell-shocked Weather Warden survivor.
"Now we get ready to kill us a Demon," I said. "And if you've got any good ideas, start talking."
Sometime later - hours later, in fact - I realized that I was hungry, and so tired I was likely to doze off even if Bad Bob himself showed up and asked me to tango. Food wasn't an issue; the ship's staff brought us buffets, mountains of sandwiches and chips and drinks, entrees steaming in silver trays, sliced cheeses and elaborate desserts. I guessed we were getting first-class treatment. It tasted good, although I didn't linger after I got a turkey sandwich into my system.
I grabbed a ship's map and tried to find my way back to my cabin. The effort was marginally successful. Hallways were clearly labeled, but faded into one another with dizzying regularity. Add in the other decks, and I could see that I'd be getting lost for some time to come. That was something I really couldn't afford. You never know when you might need to get somewhere in a real hurry.
Following my map led me down a maze of corridors, mostly deserted... whole decks were empty and lifeless now. Somehow, my exhausted brain betrayed me during some turning, and I found myself in an area that didn't match up to my less-than-expert map reading.
A housekeeper was just coming out of one of the cabins, and I tapped her on the shoulder.
She turned, smiling. She was a cinnamon-skinned young woman with black hair pulled back in a sleek, lacquered bun, and warm chocolate eyes. Not very tall, but graceful. I could see her as a dancer, somehow, moonlighting as a maid.
"Miss?" she asked. "Can I be of assistance?" She spoke excellent English, though I could tell it wasn't her mother tongue.
I held out my hand. "My name is Joanne Baldwin. I'm one of your - ah - special guests.
You're on staff, right?"
She looked at my outstretched hand, at my face, and slowly took my fingers to shake.
"Hello, Miss Baldwin. But I'm not staff. I'm crew."
"There's a difference? Call me Joanne."
"We're not allowed to use the first names of guests, miss," she said. "Yes, staff would be the people who work in guest relations areas. I'm a cabin stewardess. We're crew, not staff." She read the expression on my face, and smiled. "Ships are very tightly regimented, miss. We all know our duties and where we fit."
"Trust me, the rules are going to be shredded on this trip. So I'm Joanne, and you are... ?"
"Aldonza Araujo," she said, and her handshake grew a little more firm. We were about the same age, I thought. "Aldonza, miss."
I gave up temporarily on forcing informality on her. "I'm looking for my cabin. I know I'm close, but - "
She got my cabin number and showed me the route by tracing a French-manicured fingernail on the map. I'd mirror-imaged my route, and I'd somehow ended up on the opposite side of where I should have been. Port, not starboard, in nautical terms. "I'm afraid you'll have to go around this way," she said.
I frowned down at the map. "What about this way?" It was marked in featureless gray.
"Those are service areas, miss. You can't go that way."
"I'm pretty sure that for us there is no such thing as off-limits. We're not regular guests.
You know what I mean?"
She did, but her smile instantly froze solid. "I - I am sorry, but I can't - we're not allowed - "
"Aldonza." I interrupted her gently enough, but firmly, and took her hand in both of mine.
"You signed the waivers, right? The Wardens explained to you what kind of risk was involved in staying on this ship?"
She nodded mutely. I could sense that she wanted to pull away from me, but also that her curiosity was burning a hole in her head. Instead of asking, she just waited.
"The fact is, we're not going to be regular passengers," I said. "Think of us as policemen, or military personnel. We don't need coddling, but we do need to know everything about this ship we can, from the technical stuff to the most insignificant details. It could mean the difference between life and death for everybody on board if things get worse." I watched that sink in, but Aldonza still shook her head in refusal. "I can't let you in, not without someone telling me I can. It's strictly against regulations."
"Okay, you can tell me how to get there, and if I happen to stumble accidentally into the crew areas, then it's not your fault, right?" She hesitated. "Please, Aldonza. It could be important. I promise, I'll talk to Security and to the Chief Engineer too, but in my experience, the bosses don't know everything.They think they know everything. You are the guys who really understand the ship."
She actually laughed, covering her mouth with her hand, as if too loud a sound was definitely Not Done in the posh areas, at least not when wearing a uniform. "That's true," she agreed, but she sobered from her brief burst of laughter far too quickly. "It's not possible for you to go through the crew area without being seen and stopped. The ship has lots of surveillance. Cameras everywhere. We all know each other. We have to, living in such close quarters. If they don't know you and you're in off-limits areas, they'll call security and escort you out." She was shaking her head again, clearly talking herself out of even trying it. "We have very good security people. It's not worth the risk. Talk to the captain or the Executive Officer."
I tried to imagine any of the security people being prepared to deal with even a middle-grade Warden, much less somebody like me or Lewis or the Djinn. I failed. "Okay," I said, because Aldonza clearly was feeling more and more uncomfortable. "I suppose it's a bad idea anyway. I'll take the long way around. - But, just for future reference, what do the crew-area doors look like?"
Aldonza blinked. "I thought you knew."
Huh? My confusion must have registered, because she looked behind me at a simple door with a swipe card lock labeled PRIVATE.
"Oh," I said. "Right. Thanks."
She clearly thought I was crazy, and she wasn't about to get fired over it. From the glances she threw back at me as she moved down the hallway, she was trying to make sure I wouldn't do anything wrong - at least not before she was safely away from the scene of the crime.
Couldn't really blame her.
I pretended to read my map, waiting until she'd had plenty of escape time. I marked the location of the crew door on it and noted the locations of the surveillance cameras, too.
I could pop the door right open, with a relatively minor pulse of power. I could fritz out the cameras, too.
But the truth was, I could do that anytime I needed to, and right now it wasn't my first choice. I just wanted to reach my soft, expensively appointed bed.
I looked up at the surveillance eyes focused on where I stood, sighed, and took the long way around.
I still got lost. This huge floating palace was like some creepily deserted amusement park -
all the lights were on, but there seemed to be a faintly sinister edge to everything. It was made to be inhabited, to be full of life and fun and conversation, and instead there was just fear. The few people I spotted were staff (crew?) going about their business.
I somehow ended up on the Grand Promenade, or at least that was what I read on the map.
It was the big railed expanse looking out over the ocean. Overhead, the sky was nail gray, and the water looked just as hard and unfriendly, with sharp-edged waves. The Grand Paradise was big and heavy enough to cleave its way through like a knife, even at the labored speed we were moving.
The promenade was deserted, too. I stood in the clammy wind for a while, watching the endless rolling of the waves, and then I yawned and felt my eyelids growing even heavier.
So tired.
At least, I was tired until I felt a hot, seductive tingle on my back, just over the shoulder blade. That jerked me back to full alert like a jab from a cattle prod.
I didn't make any more stops on my way.
Safely in the bedroom - no sign of Cherise downstairs - I sat down, closed my eyes, and focused on David. I can't really describe the connection between the two of us; the ceremony and the vows - even though our wedding had been interrupted by Bad Bob's attack, and technically not really finished - had pulled us together, bound us in ways that even now I couldn't understand, except that it made it easier to call him when I needed him.
When I opened my eyes, David was forming out of the air in a swirl of gray and gold. There was something blank in his eyes this time, as if I'd taken him away from something both terrible and important. He'd been with Lewis. I wondered how bad it was.
Then he took a deep breath and willed it away, whatever it was.
"The mark is burning," I said, without any preamble at all. He took on human form and flesh and sat down next to me. He felt warm as summer, and he smelled faintly of spices and real, human sweat, deliciously male. His fingers unbuttoned my cotton camisole and pushed it down my arms, and then he unhooked my bra and slid it off. There was no seduction in it, or at least not as much as I'd have liked; he was very focused on the job at hand.
When his fingertips pressed on the black torch mark on my back, we both gasped. He spread his whole left hand over it, and the heat spread, increased to an agonizing burn that felt as if it should come with the sound of sizzling. His right arm went around me, holding me up, keeping me from fighting him to get away from the pain.
With shocking suddenness, the fire turned to ice, a chill that ripped all the way through me, and I shuddered. When I exhaled, my breath frosted the air in delicate feathers that vanished in seconds.
I couldn't feel the mark on my back anymore, and that was a huge relief. But, as David trailed his fingers over it, I realized that I could feel less of the area around it, too. The numb spot was growing.
