Chapter 13
Thirteen
Grayson
Sunlight. Beautiful, warm, sunshine.
Awareness slowly returned. I wasn’t certain when, but my body had dissipated and I was currently in my wisp form.
Physically, this form was far different from my humanoid one.
I didn’t have eyes to see or ears to hear, and yet I was capable of both.
Skin absent, I could still feel the warmth of the sunshine where it touched me.
I was above ground, although not high in the sky. Beautiful green leaves surrounded me, filtering the sun’s rays. A soothing, soft breeze pulled at my edges. The wind wasn’t enough to be worrisome. In some ways, it was the perfect touch.
Had I been in my humanoid form, I would have sighed, long and deep. As it was, my flame expanded and contracted, reaching out and touching all it could. That piece of Martin’s magic sitting in my soul hummed with contentment. The song of his soil lovingly sweet.
I wasn’t certain Martin and I could communicate in these forms. Surprisingly, he’d been able to hear me in my wisp form before, but he’d been humanoid then. Deciding to test the idea, I thought, “Martin?”
“Hmm?” It was little more than a gentle hum tickling my senses.
“Can you hear and understand me?”
“I can. And you?”
“Loud and clear.” It was a wonder really, this connection. “How long have I been asleep?”
“I am uncertain. Time loses meaning when I am in my tree form. I can say the sun has moved across the sky. It will set soon.”
Most of the day then. Considering the energy it had taken to find the wyvern eggs and then what had happened with the djinn, my body was exhausted. I was… “Jima. How’s Jima?” My memories were slowly catching up, but now they arrived in a flood of images.
“Elvira stopped by earlier. She said Jima is resting more comfortably. At that time, his heartrate had returned to normal and he’d woken but wasn’t moving much. Tabitha was able to get him to eat some. My understanding is that Jima is currently staying with Tabitha and Navarre.”
“Navarre?”
“A necromancer Tabitha is working with.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know what else to say. I’d had very few interactions with necromancers in the past and the limited experience I did have wasn’t favorable. Finding a sane necromancer was like searching for a unicorn.
“And the djinn?” I nearly tripped over the word.
“To my knowledge, Helios has not returned. Hopefully, Aurelia will set him straight and we will not have a repeat of what happened today.”
“Aurelia?” I wondered if I was destined to simply repeat new names for the remainder of the evening.
“Another djinn.”
“Goddess. How many are there?”
“Only the two that I know of.”
Only two. One was more than enough, and I internally groaned at the thought.
It was odd, but I could feel Martin’s hesitance when he asked, “You are aware of djinn?”
“Unfortunately.”
There was a pause before Martin said, “Most are not. Many believe djinn are little more than a ghost story. That if they ever did truly exist, they vanished long ago.”
I mentally grunted. “If only. I suppose one could agree that they vanished. I’m not sure anyone can truly kill a djinn.”
Another pause. “There is a way.” Martin sounded even more hesitant. “Though I only know of one with the capability.”
My flame shivered. “I do not want to meet the creature that can harm a djinn.”
This time, I felt amusement. “Interestingly, I do not believe this individual would be harmful to you.”
“Do the djinn know of him?” I couldn’t imagine they would suffer this individual’s existence.
“They do.”
“And he is still alive?” I couldn’t hide my disbelief.
“Very much so. We can discuss Necromancer Boone at another time. As for now, I am curious how you are aware of djinn and recognized Helios as one.” There was no accusation in Martin’s tone. Merely curiosity.
“I’m a will-o’-the-wisp. We find treasure and there is hardly any treasure more coveted than djinn.”
“You’ve met one then? Found one?”
“Not personally, no.” I thought back to one of the many stories my aunt had told me.
“But others have. Even will-o’-the-wisps are smart enough to let sleeping djinn lie.
We do not retrieve that treasure. We leave it be and move on.
” I’d been told that finding a djinn’s object of attachment was…
odd. Or at least the feeling was odd. They sang; that was certain.
Most treasure wanted to be found and djinn weren’t necessarily different in that respect.
What was different was that once found, they didn’t want to be retrieved.
At least that’s what I’d been told. Having never felt one or heard its song, I didn’t have any personal experience to bring to the table.
Martin was quiet as I contemplated before he finally said, “Helios doesn’t sing.”
“No.” I took a moment to consider. “Perhaps I didn’t hear his song because his object of attachment wasn’t near, but I don’t think so.
I’m not sure why, but I really think he no longer sings.
” I couldn’t really wrap my head around that one.
“The only way I’d know for certain is if his object of attachment was closer. ”
“Hmm, I doubt that will be possible. To my knowledge, Helios’s object is on the East Coast, and since djinn can’t touch their own object of attachment without being sucked back inside…”
“His master would need to bring the object closer,” I finished.
“Or you’d need to get closer to it yourself. Either way, I don’t see that happening.”
Neither did I. “To be truthful, I don’t really want to get closer to it.”
“Understandable. For what it is worth, I hope you are right and Helios’s object no longer sings. I would imagine that is a difficult concept for a djinn to wrap their head around. They’ve been coveted since their creation. A few months of relative freedom doesn’t erase a lifetime of enslavement.”
Words escaped me. I couldn’t imagine a life like that.
All that unimaginable power, all at someone else’s fingertips, not your own.
I wasn’t certain what type of moral core djinn had.
Folklore was all over the map when it came to djinn.
Helios seemed to have some sense of right and wrong.
If he hadn’t, then my earlier insanity would have been ineffective and we’d all be dead, especially if his current master really was allowing Helios to do as he wished.
A shiver ran through me, temporarily scattering my blue flame.
It was nice staying like this. I’d rarely felt this relaxed, this at peace when in my wisp form.
Treasure always called, begging to be found.
Martin’s soil was different. It had been found and was full of joy and contentment.
That sentiment wiggled its way into my flame, settling me and allowing me to do little more than lazily drift in the breeze, Martin’s branches and leaves serving as a physical anchor while that little piece of magic dancing in my core filled me with peaceful contemplation.
I had no idea what a day in the spa might feel like for a wisp, but if I had to guess, this would be it.
Martin and I grew silent, neither having anything more to say. That didn’t mean we had nothing more to share. Simply existing—being where we were and present in our peaceful state—was enough. More than enough. Contemplative peace rarely lasted and when it found you, it was its own type of treasure.
“Heard what you did.” Henry was sitting on top of the small nightstand situated near my bed.
He leaned against the lamp base, fiddling with the knob that turned it on and off.
“Wish I’d been there.” He grinned, showing off tiny, pointed teeth.
“I would’ve helped give that djinn the what for.
” Henry jabbed a fisted hand in the air, as if he were punching something.
“Can’t believe he tried to make Jima a pet.
A pet! That’s some messed-up shit right there. ”
I didn’t necessarily disagree. What I did think was that Helios was confused.
Or perhaps simply uneducated. “He backed off in the end.” I wasn’t exactly sure why I was defending the djinn.
Maybe it was knowing that Helios hadn’t needed to concede.
That he’d made the decision willingly. No one could have forced him to make a different choice.
The exception was Helios’s current master…
who was currently miles away, so not very useful.
Henry grunted and crossed his arms, puffing out his small chest. “I don’t like it. I don’t like what it did to Jima.”
I’d been getting dressed and turned, giving Henry my complete attention. “You’ve visited him?”
“Of course. Jima’s my friend.”
Moving to the bed, I perched on the edge. “How is he?”
Henry’s gaze tilted to the side, his eyes pinched and lips thinned. “Physically, he’s recoverin’. Not so sure about up here.” Henry tapped his temple. “He’s puttin’ on a brave face, but he’s gotta be wonderin’ what’ll happen if Helios changes his mind and comes back.”
Foolishly, I hadn’t considered that as a possibility. “You think Helios will do that?”
“Don’t know.” Henry shrugged. “And that’s the problem.”
I could see how that tracked. Uncertainty played more havoc with the brain than knowing and accepting something you didn’t want to.
“Does anyone know how to get ahold of Helios’s master?
” By all the gods, I hated using that word.
Every time I said it, my gut rebelled. How could a word make one feel so ill?
Henry cocked his head to the side, considering. “Keir might, and if he doesn’t, then he knows others who do. I think Hikaru’s warlock knows.”
“Holland?”
“Mm-hmm. That’s the one,” Henry said with a snap of his fingers.
“I’ll talk with Keir. Chances are, he’s already contacted the necessary parties.
” I wasn’t sure how Helios would take that.
Would he be angry with us for ratting him out?
Would he even view our actions that way?
It was hard to say. At the end of the day, I had no idea how a djinn’s mind worked.
A day ago, I would have said I was okay with that. Now I wasn’t so certain.
Standing, Henry placed a hand on the lamp post, leaning against it as he crossed one foot over the other. “You goin’ searchin’ again today?”
I took a moment and did a quick self-scan.
Given yesterday’s events, I felt surprisingly good.
I thought back to my time spent in my wisp form, protected within Martin’s canopy while his birth dirt lovingly sang in the background.
Warmth flooded my cheeks. But it wasn’t just warmth; it was contentment like I’d never experienced before, like I never knew could be experienced.
A shit-eating grin split Henry’s face. “You like him.”
The denial was immediate and tasted like ash on my tongue. I couldn’t say the words, couldn’t completely deny my feelings. I also couldn’t fully admit them and settled on “of course I like him. Martin’s nice, for a dryad.” That wasn’t a complete lie. It was simply understating the situation.
Henry slapped his hip, sending up a little dust mote. “Sure. We’ll stick with that for now.” Scrabbling his way across the nightstand, Henry jumped up on my thigh, perching there. “I like you, wisp boy.”
Wisp boy?
“Even after you find all the nasty shit Huxley left behind, I hope you hang around after. The council could use a fella with your talents.”
Stay at the Magical Usage Council? That thought hadn’t even entered my mind. “I’m not sure Keir would want that.”
“Trust me, he would and does. You mark my words. By the time all is said and done, Keir will ask you to become part of the team.”
The very thought was ludicrous. Will-o’-the-wisps were solitary creatures by nature.
I knew and spoke with family, but we didn’t cohabitate.
As soon as a will-o’-the-wisp was old enough, they left, striking out on their own, hunting down their own treasure, building their own life.
The very thought of belonging to a community, to a group of others…
It was so foreign I hardly knew what to do with the thought.
“Ah, I can see you’re havin’ a mental meltdown.
” Henry patted my thigh. “Don’t think on it too hard.
Just let it sit there and ruminate. Sometimes you gotta do that with a thought.
Give it a bit of space and a titch of light and see if it blossoms and sprouts a flower or two or if it turns into a nasty weed.
When you figure out which way the thought grows, you can either tend it or rip it out.
“I’m gonna head out. I wanna check on Jima again. I’m probably the only one here he doesn’t view as a threat.”
Those words pulled me out of my mental trap. “I’m not a threat.”
“Didn’t say you were. Just said Jima might view you as one.”
“Why?” I was truly baffled.
“On account of your size,” Henry said as if it were obvious.
“My size? But I’m barely taller than him. I’m—”
“Not when he’s in his ferret form.”
My mouth slipped open before snapping shut. “Oh, I…hadn’t thought of that. I’m still not a threat.”
“I know that and you know that, but right now, Jima’s strugglin’. I didn’t say it made sense. I’m just sayin’ that’s how it is. Sometimes shit don’t have to make sense to make it true.”
“No, I suppose not.”
Henry patted my leg again before using my pants to shimmy his way down to the floor. Going on all fours, he took off, scurrying across the floor and disappearing through the crack in the wall, a barely audible “take care, wisp boy” following in his wake.
“Wisp boy.” I scoffed but found a grin stretching my lips. Coming from Henry, the nickname was a form of endearment. The house dweller already considered me a member of the team. The question was, did I? Could I?