Tales of the Djinn: The Double (7 page)

Joseph checked the portal first. Its power was drained from sending him and Cade to the human world, resembling a guttering candle instead of a robust sun. He’d already examined the portals in the treasure room at the palace and underneath the Church of Sighs. Their condition was identical.

Considering half the administration’s mages had turned to stone, three portals were too much to recharge. Joseph had to prioritize. The treasure room’s nexus was the portal Iksander had left from. Reasoning that tracking their missing sultan through the same door he’d used would be easiest, Joseph had tasked the remaining royal magic corps with restoring it.

The other doors would have to wait.

His decision reaffirmed, Joseph turned to the object he’d put off surveying.

A grout-spattered sheet draped the statue of his original. The highest hump, where the cloth fell across his head, wasn’t far off the ground. His body knelt just as it had in the moment he projected the lion’s share of his spirit through the portal and into his copy. Arcadius must have covered his stone remains when he woke up here alone. Joseph supposed this was a compassionate act on his master’s part, like closing the eyes of deceased people—no matter that the dead saw nothing.

Taking a breath to steady himself, he pulled off the concealing cloth.

And there he was, eyes closed with concentration, butt on his heels, palms flat and serene on his folded thighs. Joseph sensed the tiniest spark anchored deep within the stone. Part of him was still in there, still revivable, though not by him.

Then again, maybe he didn’t want to revive himself.

If that were true, all the more reason to make a sincere attempt.

Unnerved by the sight of his familiar yet strange face, he circled the marble form until he was behind it. He laid his palms on the waves of his original’s frozen hair. Quieting his emotions, he willed the magic that remained to him to radiate down his arms.

The small spark within the statue didn’t react at all.

Should he turn up the power and risk doing unknown damage? Joseph tried an incrementally stronger surge. Nothing happened. Like everyone else who hadn’t recovered from the curse, Joseph’s original stayed locked in its suspension.

He dropped his hands. He’d tried and failed and for now he could give up.

His mood lightened shamefully.

~

As soon as the carpet lifted off the commemorative arch, Joseph started questioning his actions. Had he tried hard enough? Should he turn back and try again?

“Stop,” he said aloud to himself.

Confused by the order, the smoothly gliding rug juddered to a halt.

Clearly, he hadn’t been paying attention to the route. He’d overshot the palace by at least eight blocks. Now he hung over the winding cobbled byways of Old Town, where—despite the hour—a few businesses displayed signs of life. Two taverns were lit up, plus an outpost of the always popular Temple of Aphrodite. Righteous djinn of the Glorious City were free to honor any aspect of the Creator that called to them. As in olden times, having sex with the priestesses of the goddess qualified as worship.

If some priestesses made their living from this worship, that was their concern.

Business was good, apparently. Handsome carvings decorated the narrow building’s front. Dolphins leaped from foaming pale jade waves with ruby apples caught in their smiling mouths. Mother of pearl cased the lintels, and flourishing rose and lime trees spilled from pots by the door. Perfume trailed out the windows in heady whiffs, inviting both the reverent and the lonely to draw closer.

It was precisely the sort of place Joseph made a habit of avoiding.

When he was twenty-two, an evil sorcerer had ripped his scrotum from his body. Some djinn who’d been castrated at that age would have retained their ability to function sexually. Joseph didn’t know if his former master had added magic to his violence, but he hadn’t been one of them. His parents had apprenticed him to the sorcerer when he was just fifteen, after which he’d lived more as the sorcerer’s prisoner than his student.

Joseph had kissed girls in his youth, but he’d never made love to one.

He drifted closer to the temple, his carpet still out of reach of the sanctuary's soft lighting. The nearest window was open, the decor inside vibrant blue and gold. One of the young priestesses sat at a vanity mirror, combing her long auburn hair. She was naked from the waist up—perhaps from the waist down as well; the upholstered chair and the angle hid that from him. As she ran her comb down her gleaming tresses, the curves of her breasts came into and out of view. They were very pretty, full and temptingly shaped. Joseph’s heart beat faster, his breath catching in his throat. His fingers curled toward his palms, almost feeling the weight of those creamy globes. The priestess’s eyes were drowsy, her head tilted to the side. She didn’t know she had an audience. If she had, she wouldn’t have slid one hand down her belly and tucked it between her legs.

Joseph’s cock went so hard so fast that the pain of his lust jerked him out of his reverie.

He couldn’t do this. Bad enough he was spying on this female without her leave. It was crucial he not walk any farther down the path of being an able man. His original was a eunuch. Joseph must act—and think—as if he were one too.

He moved his lips on a silent spell, hastily backing his carpet out of viewing range.

Then he flew to the palace like a djinni chased by demons.

~

Nine times out of ten, sultan’s concubines were daughters of noble blood. Rulers exchanged them as diplomatic gifts. For the women, a lifetime spent in a harem, scheming side by side with their rivals to catch the sultan’s eye, was a great privilege. When she was accepted into their ranks, Yasmin had been elated.

Sultan Iksander was so handsome he was called “the Golden,” on top of which he was considered a wise ruler. Aware that she was attractive, Yasmin had looked forward to rising in prestige by bearing a son to him. This would have been a coup. She was only a merchant’s daughter, though her father was important. He’d pioneered a secret process for transporting goods across the perilous nonmaterial “in-betweens” that separated djinn territories with seas of mist. No other firm had her father’s record of successful deliveries, or his reputation for honesty. When Iksander (or possibly his proxy) had consented to take Yasmin, the honor had been her family’s too.

Yasmin hadn’t expected to sleep with the great man exactly once.

Iksander had fallen for his wife Najat before reaching Yasmin in the rotation set by the chief eunuch. From that day until the one his beloved met her untimely death, Iksander was faithful. Following Najat’s murder, the sultan went slightly mad. Night after night, he chose a different member of the harem to sleep with in his smoke form. This was an eccentric practice. Djinn generally made love to each other as solid beings. Yasmin found the experience pleasurable but ultimately disappointing. There’d been no connection between her and Iksander, no true intimacy or bonding. Like the other consorts, she’d been a vessel into which he exorcised his grief. When he’d slept with each female once, he turned that grief elsewhere.

To Yasmin’s mind, she might as well have stayed a virgin.

On the bright side, the sultan’s unconventional behavior had given her an idea. She could escape the harem the same way that he’d come in. Concubines weren’t supposed to want to. Leaving their protected precinct was forbidden. Yasmin didn’t care anymore. Her older brother had turned ifrit. Her younger had thrown off propriety to hang out at view cafés watching humans do silly things. What did it matter if she, her parents’ middle child, rebelled?

A woman could die of boredom waiting for her neglectful master to visit her.

In the beginning, Yasmin was content to explore the palace in the invisible version of her smoke form. The sultan’s complex was huge and there was a lot to see. Eventually, though, the wider world called to her. As a dutiful sheltered daughter, she’d seen little of the Glorious City before she was shut away. Reaching the metropolis was a challenge. Sophisticated spells kept intruders from smoking in or out of the palace. Fortunately, Yasmin’s family had a knack for enchantments. With practice and determination, she perfected her ability to change into a solid form no one would look twice at.

Yasmin the concubine became a shy stray cat.

Delighting in the fiction, she gave herself a crooked black tail, three white socks, and a battle-scarred right ear. She looked a fright, perfectly safe from anyone falling in love with her feline form and wanting to adopt her.

Perhaps her lucky escape from being stuck in stone should have cured her of risk-taking. Instead, the very night her consciousness woke she slipped out again. She couldn’t regret that now. If she hadn’t been pit-patting around the city on her cat paws, she’d never have discovered other citizens besides her brother had disappeared. In truth, there might be more she hadn’t heard about.

She hesitated at the irrigation pipe that was her usual exit from the harem into the palace grounds. Though she was eager to squeeze out, she was a God-loving djinni and didn’t wish to be reckless. Sparing the moment she knew she should, she sat on her haunches, curled her crooked tail around her, and bowed her furry head.

Blessed Mother,
she prayed silently.
Please protect me on my journeys as You protect the world. Guide my feet as You guide all Your children.

She immediately felt more confident. Out the pipe she wriggled, into the soft night air. As always, her sense of freedom invigorated her. Accustomed by now to running on four legs, she bounded like a shadow through the shaggy grass of a dark courtyard.

Maybe she’d head to the market down near the port. Young people who had no homes often went there when it was closed, to scrounge for leftover food or sheltered places to curl up. Like anyone, rich or poor, they’d gossip with each other when they met up. Her cat form had learned a lot by eavesdropping.

A current of displaced air teased her sensitive whiskers. Yasmin turned to see where the draft came from.

A flying carpet was settling on the marble pavers that surrounded a small fountain. No lights announced the rug’s arrival, nor was this an official landing site. If Yasmin’s cat senses hadn’t been so sharp, the vehicle might have slipped in unnoticed.

A tall man stepped off and began to roll up the rug like he meant to carry it. Was the pilot an assassin? Had Empress Luna’s surviving allies come to finish what she’d begun? Yasmin’s little heart thumped hard in her narrow chest. Should she run for help or should she attack?
Could
she attack, for that matter? Penetrating the palace’s barriers required strong magic. She had some spell craft but probably not enough to combat a skilled practitioner.

Try,
she thought. At the least, she could claw the intruder until he screamed.

She could also yowl herself, she thought a moment later. That would bring someone running, if only to shut her up.

Though she’d never made a noise in her animal form before, she drew in breath and forced out a terrible caterwaul. Despite the situation, she nearly laughed. No cat she’d ever heard sounded so ridiculous.

“In the name of God,” swore the man with the rug tucked beneath his arm. “Quiet yourself right now.”

His words had power. She shut her mouth and sat back on her rump, startled. The man who’d ordered her was Joseph the Magician, the very man she’d asked the commander’s consort to turn to for help. Why was he flying in here so stealthily?
He
wouldn’t act against the city. He was an honorable man.

Had he perhaps been using his magic to find Balu?

If he had, the commander’s consort was unlikely to report to Yasmin until morning. Yasmin didn’t think she could stand to wait that long. With no offense to her honorable parents, her younger brother was the closest person to her in the world. Losing their older brother Ramis in such a scandalous way had thrown the two of them together. Balu understood what it was to walk on eggshells in a fractured family.

With that to goad her, and possibly more besides, she trotted after the handsome magician into the main palace.

~

Joseph’s guilt followed him to his rooms like a stubborn ghost. He did his best to shove it away. So he’d looked at a naked woman. His eunuch self might have done the same. The female form was lovely—no matter what a male did or didn’t have the power to do with it. He’d admired the Almighty’s creation. That shouldn’t qualify as a sin.

He pushed his door shut behind him with extra emphasis.

He was alone, only the shadows keeping him company. His body seemed to vibrate with extra life, the pulse and thrum heaviest between his legs. He put his hand there and found his cock rigid.

He knew enough to recognize an erection when he felt one. Though those days seemed distant, he’d experienced the same swelling in his youth, before his parents sold him to the cruel sorcerer. He rubbed the ridge beneath his trousers testingly, sharp sensations washing out from the place he touched. Curious, he slid his fingers down the thick ridge to his testicles. Because massaging the hanging sac was enjoyable, he pulled his hand away. This caused his turgid penis to throb more intensely.

Why did denying oneself a pleasure make it twice as alluring?

The question was better suited to a philosopher. Ignoring his body’s urges, he stepped to the sitting area of his rooms. Here, a line of windows opened into a small courtyard, one of many in the complex. Joseph’s favorite armchair was positioned next to the view. He lowered his weight to the firm cushion, poured a glass of brandy from the decanter that sat nearby, and opened the heavy book he’d borrowed from the absent sultan’s personal library.

The volume’s title was
Creating Doubles with Magic
.

Everything he’d read thus far was useless.

The book contained spells to copy every item under the sun, including items invented by humans. It related stories of doubles throughout history. Humans who were the spitting image of djinn. Djinn who impersonated humans by imitating their appearance. Cloned works of art and mirror spaces. Incantations for playing back events on the basis of the vibrations they’d left behind.