Blood Passage (Dark Caravan Cycle #2) (25 page)

“I'm here,” he murmured. “I'm not going anywhere.”

“I wish you could promise that.”

But he couldn't.

Later, they walked back, her hand in his. As they reached the entrance to the room their party had commandeered for the night, she stopped. He knew what she was going to say: that this couldn't happen again, that it was wrong for them to love each other. Selfish. Dangerous.

Raif brought her hand to his lips. “You'll change your mind.”

He let go and walked away. He didn't turn around—he knew she was watching.

THE WALLS OF THE SUBTERRANEAN CAVERN GLISTENED as the jinn's
chiaan
swept over it
.
The rock was a swirl of color, a river of stone frozen in motion. The rainbow of light emanating from their hands dispelled some of the cave's gloom, but the darkness beyond their reach hovered, waiting to consume them. It was cold and damp, the air heavy with a musty, mineral scent—a grave. The constant
drip drip drip
of beads of water falling from the honeycomb ceiling onto the rocks below threatened to drive Malek insane. He didn't like to think about how far below the Earth's surface they were. Malek wasn't prone to fear, but the idea of being buried alive did not appeal to him. He turned as Raif stepped through the grate.

“You the last of us?” he asked.

Raif nodded. As soon as he jumped down onto the rocky
path, there was a rumble, as though a thousand tanks were suddenly driving through the City of Brass. Dust rained down from the cavern's roof. Malek and Raif looked at one another, their enmity suspended for one brief moment.

“Run!” Raif shouted.

They sprinted down the path toward the others, but just as soon as the cascade of rock started, it stopped.

“What was that?” Samar asked.

Malek returned to the grate, struggling to catch his breath. For a minute there, he'd had a horrible vision of being forever buried under a pile of rubble, the amulet denying him the mercy of death. The other side of the metal was covered by rocks, the entrance into the city obscured.

“My guess is that Antharoe created some kind of safety valve,” he said when he'd rejoined the others. “We can't go back the way we came. It sounded like the whole city fell apart out there. The only way out is through.”

Nalia nodded. “That makes sense. She wouldn't want us to be able to retrace our steps, to return here with others if we can't find the sigil the first time.”

It cheered Malek to no end that the journey held innumerable ways for Raif to meet his demise. He felt the old ruthlessness returning, as if that stint in the desert with Nalia had simply been a head cold that had taken Malek out of the game for a while. Seeing Saranya had shaken him up, it was true. No one likes to be reminded that he's killed his own brother. But here, far away from his sister-in-law's eyes and closer to the sigil than ever, he forced
the cold inside him to grow.

They walked for hours down the natural path. The rock flowed beside them, sinuous as a naked sleeping body. Deep blue stone swirled into rosy peach, turning the cave's wall into a canvas. Crystals of every color grew from the ground like wildflowers, shimmering beneath the
chiaan
and the harsh glare of the flashlight Nalia had manifested for Malek
.
They passed under a natural arch and entered an enormous cavern, its ceiling reaching far above them. Stalactites hung from its domelike roof, and its floor was covered in a maze of thick, sinister stalagmites that reached up, their tips nearly touching the daggers that hung from above. From where Malek stood, the structures resembled a monster's gaping jaws.

“Well, this looks delightful,” he said.

Nalia raised her hands, her palms glowing violet, beaming her light across the rocky expanse. Malek couldn't help but rest his eyes on her lovely profile, sharper now with her short hair. This all would have been so much easier if he'd gotten a male jinni, or one that looked like a hag.

“See any stars?” Zanari asked.

Nalia shook her head. “I think we have to sort our way through this mess. I just hope Antharoe doesn't have any surprises for us.”

Umbek directed his sapphire
chiaan
over the rocks, staring doubtfully at the narrow paths weaving between them, likely wondering if his big frame would be able to get past some of the trickier sections. “I thought the whole point of the stars was to
help
future Aisouri find this thing,” he said to Nalia. “Seems to me like your ancestor was hoping to kill whoever came looking for the ring.”

“Seems that way to me, too,” she said. “Gods, I wish we could see the other side.”

The light from their
chiaan
cast as many shadows as it banished, which made the rocks all the more menacing. No matter what, Malek would have to go through this thing the old-fashioned way, but the jinn would've been able to evanesce across if they could picture where they were going.

“I have a feeling this is going to be unpleasant,” Anso muttered.

Nobody moved.

Malek clapped his hands. “No time like the present.”

He stepped past the group of reluctant jinn and strode into the forest of rock. His heart beat just a little too fast—he couldn't die, of course, but Malek didn't relish the thought of one of those stalactites goring him.

He turned. “Coming?” he said to no one in particular. He caught Zanari's eye and she looked away.

I shouldn't have saved her,
he thought. After he'd hypersuaded away her scorpion illusion, Zanari hadn't so much as thanked him.
Since you used your power to try to kill me, I'd say we're even
, she'd said. All Malek had done was make sure there was one more person to fight him when it came time to get the ring. Weak—that was what he was. All Nalia had to do was threaten to never forgive him and he'd come crawling after her.

Malek turned and strode past the trunks of rock that rose
from the cave's floor, ignoring the fear that clawed his insides. Samar and Noqril assumed their
fawzel
forms and floated in the air above Malek, skirting the stalactites high above his head. The others followed,
chiaan
bouncing in the air, lighting their way. The rocks looked eerie in the jinn's light, as though they were traipsing through the skeleton of a primordial beast.

A
whoosh.

Cold air slicing just past his head.

Then rock, biting into the ground from above.

He looked up just in time to dodge the needle point of a falling stalactite. The jinn screamed as the thin columns of rock became the jaws of a monster gnashing its teeth. Up, down, up, down. The cave floor tilted, forcing Malek to brace himself against the stalagmites on the ground. To his horror, he saw new rock pushing through the cave floor, breaking up what few pathways the deadly labyrinth contained. He hurled himself out of the way as a stalagmite's point burst from beneath his feet and pushed toward the cave's roof.

The jinn stumbled blindly though the gauntlet, narrowly avoiding the stone knives that moved in tandem all around them. He looked at the faces he could make out in the half light, searching for Nalia. He saw a flash of violet
chiaan
, just to his left. She was helping Phara, who'd fallen to the ground, turning the rock around her into dust. Nalia leaped aside as a falling stalactite carved a hole in the place where she'd been standing. She turned, as if sensing his gaze.

“Duck,” she called.

“What?”

Nalia pointed to a spear of rock sailing through the air, not bothering to do more than that. He jumped to the side and it stabbed the ground. He looked toward Nalia, but she had already moved forward, darting around the gnashing teeth with graceful leaps.

It took the longest twenty minutes of Malek's life to get through the rest of the gauntlet unscathed. By the time he reached the other side, sweat was pouring off him and his arms were covered in scrapes from flying shards of rock. Phara attended to the jinn. Several had deep gashes in their skin or dust in their eyes. Once the last jinni stepped safely to the other side, the rocks closed like a clenched jaw, barring any attempt to go back the way they'd come.

Nalia ran her glowing hands over the walls, the ceiling, the floor. She shook her head. “I don't see it.”

“I'd use my
voiqhif
,” Zanari said, “but it doesn't seem to work in the cave.”

This was news. Malek didn't know if that was a good or bad thing. He certainly would have liked to know what waited for them on Earth. He wondered if Calar knew what they were doing. She had to—no doubt she would have tortured it out of every jinni in that Dhoma camp by now.

They seemed to be at a dead end, nothing but a few feet of rock on all sides and a small pool of water lying in an alcove beneath a collection of tiny stalactites. It reminded Malek of the architectural models he'd once inspected for a hotel he owned in Dubai. The pool spanned several feet, but the space between the
water and the shelf of rock above it was hardly large enough for someone to sit beneath.

“Magnificent,” Malek whispered as he drew nearer to the pool. It was a large, shallow puddle, accumulated over thousands of years through the constant drip of water from the sweating rocks above it. The water was so pure that the surface of the pool perfectly reflected the stalactites so that it seemed as though the daggerlike rocks were in the pool, rather than above it. A mirror image so real it was hard to believe it was simply a trick of the light, an optical illusion.

“Oh,”
Nalia breathed as she drew near the water. She stared at it, transfixed. He moved the flashlight's beam slowly over the pool, then stopped at the cluster in its center.

“Nalia,” he said. “Look.”

The stalactites formed a perfect, eight-pointed star.

“We found it,” Nalia called over her shoulder as she pulled her dagger from its sheath and crawled into the shallow water.

“Watch your head,
hayati
,” Malek said as he angled the flashlight so that she could see the stars better.

Nalia sliced her palm and smeared thick, red drops of blood over the symbol. Without warning, the bottom of the pond gave way and Nalia shrieked as she fell through the stone. Seconds later, there was a splash far below them. Malek moved forward, hesitant, unsure what the wisest course of action would be. Raif charged past him and dove headfirst through the hole.

There was a shout and then a peal of laughter. Nalia's laughter. Malek suddenly realized he'd never heard her laugh. Not once in all the years they'd been together.

“Raif? Are you okay?” Zanari called, leaning over the hole.

Malek couldn't help but notice Raif's sister didn't seem concerned about Nalia. He'd noticed the slights since their time in the Dhoma camp and wondered if Nalia had, too. Didn't Zanari know that she was only alive because Nalia had fought for her? If it hadn't been for Nalia, Malek would have happily let the jinni suffer Haraja's madness.

“Well?” Malek yelled into the hole, impatient. “What do you see?”

Zanari ignored him as she beamed her hand into the darkness. In the jade light of her
chiaan
,
Malek could make out Raif and Nalia treading water in what looked like an underground lake.

“We're fine,” Raif called. His voice echoed. “I hope you all know how to swim.”

ZANARI TWISTED HER BRAIDS INTO A CROWN AROUND her head, then lay back against the water, floating. The water was cold, but it numbed her skin and, best of all, there weren't any scorpions. She stared at the slabs of rock that covered the ceiling and walls of the cavern. This rock was different from the other caverns, a luminescent silver that shimmered whenever she swept her
chiaan
across it. The sounds of the jinn's voices echoed in the cave as they searched for bottles on the lake's bed. The desert water was salty, wonderful for floating, but terrible for diving. In order to reach the lake's floor, they'd had to tie weights to their ankles. It was slow, exhausting work, and Zanari was giving herself a much needed break.

Not one bottle had been found, and the joy of possibility was quickly turning to surly frustration.

A beam of golden
chiaan
moved toward her and Zanari pushed herself into a standing position, treading water.

Phara.

“Come with me,” she whispered, grabbing Zanari's hand.

Phara led her around a tiny bend in the lake, out of sight of the others. The clear turquoise water was shallow here and Zanari's bare feet touched down on the soft mud. She sighed as her body connected to the earth. She could never get enough of her element's energy.

“How are you?” Phara asked.

“After nearly being cut in half by a thousand rocks, I'd say I'm doing pretty well.”

“You know what I'm talking about,” Phara said quietly. “No more . . . scorpions?”

Zanari shook her head. “No, thank the gods.” She hesitated, not even sure she wanted the answer to the question sitting on her tongue. “It won't come back, will it—the hallucination or whatever was happening to me?”

“I hope not. Anso seems to think you'll be fine. She said she couldn't detect any disease inside you.”

It'd been horrible, what Haraja had done to her. Zanari could still feel the sting of the scorpions, still hear their claws cutting at the air as they tried to gain purchase on her skin. Phara reached out a tentative hand, then traced Zanari's jaw. Zanari opened like a flower under the healer's light, delicate touch. Her eyes filled with tears and Phara leaned in and brushed them away, her touch like butterfly's wings.

“It's over,” she murmured. “You're okay.”

Zanari shook her head. “It's . . . not that,” she said.

“What?”

“I've been fighting for most of my life.” She looked up at the glittering ceiling. Waited for the tears to stop before continuing. Zanari wasn't used to confessional conversations or having someone other than her brother give a damn about what she had to say. “I grew up in a war zone. I'm surrounded by soldiers every minute of every day. But being with you . . . you're like the first deep breath I've gotten to take in a long time.” She looked down, guilty. “The scorpions . . . they were kind of it for me, you know? I just can't take any more. Part of me doesn't want to go back to Arjinna.” She took in a shuddering breath. “Like, a big part. Does that make me a horrible person?”

Phara shook her head. “No, of course not. You could never be a horrible person.” She ran her fingers down Zanari's arms, then gripped her hands. Zanari shivered as Phara's
chiaan
melded with her own. Again, there was that inexplicable sense of tranquility. “We're not meant to live like this—fighting, running, hiding.” Phara brought her lips close to Zanari's. “
This
is what we're meant for.”

Kissing Phara was like running through the fields in spring, barefoot, with the sun playing on her face. Zanari's
chiaan
was melting, singing, dancing, and it felt so good to finally be
wanted
. It was temporary, she knew. When they got out of that cave, Zanari would go back to Arjinna and Phara would stay on Earth. The thought threatened to crush her.

All the more reason to make it count.
She pressed closer to Phara, her thoughts falling away as the healer's
chiaan
took over.

Later, when they returned to the beach, Noqril looked up from where he was roasting fish. A sly grin spread across his face.

“Ladies,” he said, with a pointed look at Zanari's messy hair.

Zanari threw him a contemptuous glance before joining her brother by the fire. He sat by himself, a short distance from the glum Dhoma who spoke in quiet voices.

“What's next?” she asked, falling down to the sand beside him.

“After we eat and take a bit of a rest, we'll follow that tributary,” Raif said, pointing to where the lake became a fast moving river.

Zanari could hear the distant roar of rapids.

“We're swimming it?” she asked, beaming her
chiaan
in the direction Raif had pointed. The shore stopped a few feet before where the lake disappeared inside a tunnel.

“Got to. See what's over the arch?”

A large star had been carved into the silver rock just above the tunnel.

“Not to mention that it's more water—there could be bottles down there,” he added.

The water in this cavern was one thing—it was calm and Zanari could see the bottom when she lit the surface with her
chiaan
. But trying to navigate violent water with unknown depths in a pitch-black cave?

“Perhaps there's an alternate route?” she said.

Raif laughed. “Not even if you could wish for it, sister.”

Phara frowned at the water as she settled down beside Zanari. “Is it possible the
pardjinn
is wrong? Maybe the bottles aren't in
the water, after all. They could be hidden anywhere.”

Zanari glanced at where the slaver stood removed from the others, gazing at Nalia as she helped Noqril prepare the fish.

“His guess is as good as any,” Zanari said. “Besides, I haven't seen any other particularly good hiding spots.”

The Dhoma had said there would be upward of two thousand jinn trapped in the cave. So where were they?

“No matter where the bottles are hidden, we're all in this together if the only way to open the bottles is with the ring,” Raif said. “I can't believe how long this is taking. By the time we get the sigil, the godsdamned war will be over.”

Zanari rubbed his back. “You're doing the best you can, little brother.”

He was right, though; she didn't think the
tavrai
would be able to hold out against an Ifrit offensive indefinitely. Their mother, Zanari knew, was worried sick—about them and about the prospects for the revolution. But there was nothing to be done for it.

“Samar has agreed to help me take Malek down,” Raif said quietly. “When the time is right.”

“How?” she said.

“We have an invisible jinni, a disease maker, two
fawzel
,
and one of the strongest jinn on Earth,” Phara said, nodding over at Umbek. “The Dhoma can handle one
pardjinn.
”

“But you're forgetting something,” Zanari said. She jutted her chin toward Nalia. “Her.”

“I don't understand,” Phara said. “We're on
her
side.”

“Anyone who tries to interfere with Nalia's ability to grant
Malek's wish will feel the full might of Ghan Aisouri power,” Zanari said. “She'll have no choice but to do whatever it takes to keep him protected.”

“Zan's right,” Raif said. “We wouldn't stand a chance. Which is why we're waiting to make our move. Nalia only agreed to take Malek to the
location
of the sigil. After that, she's on our
side.” Raif leaned back on his hands, his eyes flicking to Nalia. “You saw what happened on the dune. She's more than capable of handling Malek.”

“She's pretty good at killing people, too,” Zanari said, her voice sharp. She glanced at Raif. “Or have you forgotten?”

“Zanari,” he said quietly, “not now.”

“When's a good time to talk about this, then? Because it's like you've
forgotten
—”

“Zanari.”
Raif glared at her, his eyes flashing. “Drop. It.”

“Better come get your grub,” Noqril called. “Couple more minutes on the fire and these fish will be black as Calar's heart.”

Raif swept past Zanari and she stared at the lake, fuming.

Phara placed her hand on Zanari's shoulder. “It does no good, you know.”

“What?”

Zanari threw a rock at the lake's surface. She watched as the ripples moved further and further toward the water's edge. It was like the Ghan Aisouri. All the pain in her life seemed to stem from that one point.

“Holding on to the hurt.” Phara glanced at Nalia. “Her heart is pure, Zan. What she did for you—”

“Did for me? What are you talking about?”

Phara's eyes widened. “I thought Raif told you.”

Zanari shook her head.

“Malek required . . . payment from Nalia. He wouldn't hypersuade you otherwise.”

Zanari's stomach turned. “What kind of payment?”

“He made her kiss him—
really
kiss him—in front of Raif. In front of everyone.”

“Gods, he's despicable.” It could have been worse, she knew, but Zanari had to admit that she hadn't done much to make Nalia want to help her. “That was . . . kind of her.” She frowned. “Still doesn't mean I want her anywhere near my brother.”

“Would you deny Raif the one happiness he has?”

“
Happiness
?
All Nalia's done since she's met him is put his life in danger and break his heart!”

“I suspect you're oversimplifying,” Phara said.

It didn't matter that Nalia had told Raif to leave LA and go to the cave without her. How she'd practically begged Zanari to get Raif out of Marrakech. Yes, she'd wanted him to survive and had been willing to face Haran and the entire Ifrit army on her own. But her brother never listened to Nalia. That was the problem. Even when Nalia was good to Raif, she was bad for him.

“She's not one of us,” Zanari said, stubborn.

Phara pressed her lips to Zanari's hair, then stood. “Neither am I.”

“I didn't mean—”

But Phara was already walking toward the fire.

If Papa could see us now,
she thought. Raif, in love with a Ghan Aisouri, and Zanari kissing a Dhoma in secluded lagoons.
If they made it back to Arjinna alive, the Djan'Urbi kids would have a lot of explaining to do.

Nalia stood by the arch bearing the third star. They couldn't put it off any longer. It was time to see what new horrors awaited them. Noqril whistled as he peered into the tunnel's gaping mouth. “Can't say I'm looking forward to that.”

“Maybe the Marid and I should go ahead and check it out?” Nalia suggested. Samar and Umbek were the only other jinn in the group who wouldn't be harmed by rapids or unexpected whirlpools.

“I go where Samar goes,” Noqril said.

Anso stepped forward. “As do I. We should not separate. It may be far too easy to never find our way out again.”

“As you wish,” Nalia said.

She beamed her
chiaan
into the darkened entrance. All she could see was more tunnel, more water. Black rock, black water. Gods knew what was beneath its surface. She hoped Haraja couldn't swim.

Nalia threw a silent prayer to Lathor, then pushed into the tunnel. The water moved swiftly, pulling her body down a serpentine path. Below her, she could see Samar and Umbek's bright blue
chiaan
searching the water for more brass bottles. There was the faint crimson glow of Noqril's
chiaan
,
the Djan emerald of Raif and Zanari, the gold of Phara and Anso. Malek floated in the middle, surrounded by the light he couldn't produce.

Their
chiaan
did little to dispel the darkness, but Nalia savored the water's cool energy as it seeped into her. The gauntlet had been exhausting, terrifying. This was almost fun, the water pulling them along faster than they ever could have walked. Yes, she could do this for a few hours. This was her very own Lethe.

Until the water turned on them.

There was a rumble, slow at first and then a deafening roar. It took Nalia a moment, but then she suddenly realized what it was: the cavern behind them was closing, pushing them faster toward the rapids she could hear further down the river. The tunnel echoed with the panicked screams of the jinn, the darkness overtaking them as they lost their connection to their
chiaan.

“Marid!” Nalia yelled, “grab hold of someone!”

Umbek and Samar cut through the water, their sapphire light blazing as they sped toward the flailing limbs of their companions. Nalia swept her
chiaan
over the water's surface, searching for Raif. She caught him several feet away from her, struggling against the water's power. Nalia screamed his name, but he couldn't hear her, not over the deafening roar of the rapids.

She started toward him but the water smacked her against the tunnel wall, and bright pinpricks of light flashed across her vision as her head hit the rock. Nalia pushed under the water, letting the rapids rumble over her until her
chiaan
swept away the pain in her head. It was tempting to lose herself in the folds of cool liquid, but she couldn't dissolve into the river, not now, not if she was going to help anyone. Nalia flooded the water with violet light. No Raif. She caught Malek, struggling underwater, the current pulling him down. She shot toward him and wrapped her
hands around his waist, hauling him to the surface. He gasped and spluttered.

“Thank—” he started, but she was already swimming away.

He wasn't the one she wanted to save.

Nalia tried to calm the water, to tame it, but she was too disoriented, everything moving too fast from behind, the water angry and charging and hungry. The roar she'd thought were rapids grew louder and Nalia steeled herself, waiting for the chaos, but when her
chiaan
lit up the tunnel, her stomach lurched.