He shut down the call and tossed the phone on the dashboard of the truck.
“Let me guess,” I said. “The FBI agents would like us to inform them of our every movement.”
“Preferably they’d like us to not move at all. But, yeah, failing that, they want us on a leash. Very sad for them. Maybe we should send them a gift basket.” He drummed his fingernails on the steering wheel, looking out at the road ahead. “Thing is, they wanted us back bad for something in particular.”
“What?”
“Don’t know, and I don’t like it. They’re pretty damn cagey about details on the phone. They want a face-to-face briefing—now, they say, but since that ain’t gonna happen, as soon as we get back.”
What he didn’t say was this was bound to not be a good thing; the FBI turned to us only when problems became far too bad for their agents to handle alone. It meant the situation was already messy, and would probably only get worse the longer we delayed.
“We could split up,” I said. “I could go to the FBI. You could go on to the school.”
He shook his head even before I’d finished. “Not a chance. We stay together.”
I smiled a little, and held my hair back from my face as the icy wind thrashed it around in a pink-tinted storm. “Jealous?” I asked.
“As hell. You bet. I’m not letting any filthy feds get their hands all over your ... assets.” He grinned outright. “And we don’t break up the team.
Clara?
”
“
Clara
,” I said. “We go on, then.”
“All night if we have to, but according to the GPS, we don’t have more than a couple more hours to go,” Luis said. “You good for that?”
“Always.” I turned to walk back to the motorcycle. Luis leaned out the window and gave me a sharp whistle. I looked over my shoulder.
“We should have dinner later,” he called. “Something hot. And in my room, while she’s asleep.”
“Maybe,” I said, although that wasn’t what I felt rushing through my body at that moment. No, that was definitely a
yes
.
I put my helmet back on and kicked the engine to life and got us back on the road.
Warden Bearheart’s patrols picked us up almost a hundred miles outside of the location of the school; I first became aware of them as a disturbance in the aetheric, and when I checked I saw a vivid glow on that plane of existence that could only be a first-class Warden at the height of his powers. Male, most certainly, and by the signature of those powers, he was gifted with Weather. There were two others with him, in the traditional Warden triad of Earth and Fire, though neither could match him for strength.
They challenged us outright, on the road, by slamming a wall of air and snow into our faces and forcing us to slow down, then stop. Luis could drive through the gale-force winds, but not easily; on a motorcycle, I was much more vulnerable. If I’d sensed it as a threat, I would have fought, and fought hard, but we had both expected the Wardens to have perimeter security.
Just not quite so far out from their actual location. I approved of the security initiative.
I parked the bike and dismounted, walking over to Luis as he climbed down from the truck. Ibby was awake, and climbing curiously around the cab of the vehicle to look at the view. She rolled down the window and said, “Tío Luis, be careful!” I noticed she left me out of her warning.
Luis turned his head, shoulder-length hair streaming like a black flag in the freezing wind, and said, “Stay inside the truck, Ib. I mean it.” He’d put on a thick parka, and now jerked the fur-lined hood up over his head.
She nodded and rolled up the window, small face gone very serious. She clutched Spike’s plastic container to her chest in anxiety.
I looked ahead of us to see three Wardens emerging from thin air. One of them, probably the Earth Warden, had a respectable cloaking technique. They stood motionless in a group, seeming very competent indeed; the man in the middle was the young Weather Warden, and he seemed hardly old enough to shave. The other two were women, one only a little older than he was, the other a grandmotherly gray-haired elder who wielded Earth.
“Yo!” Luis shouted into the wind. “Can we turn down the fan a little? I’m getting frozen stiff here!”
The wind slacked and then faded to a cold, thin breeze. The fact the Warden didn’t kill the breeze completely told me something about him—despite his power, he had relatively little training. Although he wasn’t in her class, someone like the strongest of the Wardens—say, Joanne Baldwin—would have been able to pull gale-force winds from stillness and stop them on a breath; he still required some starting point, and made it easier by continuing the flow of air molecules, albeit in a minor way. It was a weakness, though not one many would recognize.
I didn’t need to tell Luis about this. I knew he would see it as well, should we require it.
“Thanks,” Luis said, smiling. He held up his hand, palm out, and the other Wardens did the same. On each, the stylized sun symbol of their organization glowed, visible only in Oversight. I didn’t bother to identify myself. They wouldn’t mistake me for anyone else. “Friends?”
“We hoped you’d be coming,” the grandmotherly woman said, stepping forward. She had a sweet, crinkled face and a cloud of soft white hair, and she radiated a soothing presence that made it difficult to keep my customary wariness in place. I knew it was a manifestation of her power, but even so, it was a powerful, subtle force. “Nice to meet you. I’m Janice Worthing. This here’s my friend Ben, and that’s Shasa.” Shasa was the younger woman, who was darker-skinned and sharper-featured. She radiated mistrust in equal proportion to Janice Worthing’s peace. “Stop glaring, Shasa—they’ve been invited.”
“Not by me,” Shasa muttered. She seemed to save her special dislike for me. I returned the favor by fixing her with a steady stare, of the sort that made the most powerful of Djinn flinch.
She didn’t. In fact, she intensified her glare.
Warden Worthing evidently decided not to push for better relations between us; she stepped forward, still smiling and communicating that soothing, warm reassurance, and shook hands with Luis. Coincidentally, that brought her closer to the truck, and Isabel, who was still staring through the window. “Well, hello, sweetheart,” Janice said, and gave Ibby a smile that warmed even me. “You’re a pretty one! You must be Isabel. I’m Janice.”
Ibby put Spike’s container down, opened the truck door, and jumped down, staring up at Janice with blank concentration for a moment. She finally said, “You can’t make me like you, you know. I’m stronger than that.”
Janice blinked. “I never had any intention of making you do anything, Isabel.”
“Oh. You don’t know you’re doing it?”
“Doing what?”
“You make people feel safe, even when it’s not true.” Isabel studied her curiously. “I guess that’s a good thing, though. There were lots of times I wanted to feel safe when I really wasn’t. It would have been nicer.”
Janice bent down and gravely offered her hand. “I hope you always feel safe with me.”
Ibby looked to her uncle for permission, then reached out and took the woman’s hand with great formality. I saw a visible relaxation in her—something that surprised me because I had not really understood until that moment that deep down, Ibby had never let go of her fear, her worry, her wariness. I had not been able to give her that sense of safety, and it hurt me in an unexpected way.
It hurt even more when Janice opened her arms, and Isabel hugged her. The old Ibby, the one I had first met, was a hugging sort of child, willing to give her love unreservedly; this one, the one we had taken out of Pearl’s hands, was much more guarded. The burning sensation inside me was, I realized, jealousy. I had wanted to bring that trust out in her, but I had wanted her to feel safe with
me
.
Janice’s bright blue eyes met mine over the top of Ibby’s dark head, and I saw understanding in them, and pity.
Irritated even more, I turned away to slap dirt from my leathers. I wanted no pity, no understanding. I didn’t even understand what I did want. It made me irritable.
“Guess we’re not going to have a problem after all, Shasa,” Luis said, and gave her his famously seductive grin. “Sorry. I know you were looking forward to a bare-knuckle throw-down. Must get pretty dull out here.”
She smiled back, but there was nothing seductive about it. It was pure malice. “Next time,” she said, and kissed her fingers at him. Ben turned and looked at her, eyebrows raised; she gave him a dark, burning look and stalked away. There was a black SUV parked just at the bend of the road that became visible as she walked toward it. Shasa, I realized, was the one with the talent for disguise, not Janice. Unusual in a Fire Warden.
Ben finally came forward, to me, and offered his hand. “Hey,” he said. “Ben Samms. Pleased to meet you, ah—” He fumbled for my name.
“Cassiel,” I supplied, and we shook. “Yes, I was a Djinn once, before you ask.”
His face took on a faintly pink tinge, as if he was surprised I’d anticipated the question, and he glanced over at Luis, who was watching us with an expression of mild interest. “Warden Rocha.” Ben nodded, and got a nod in turn. “Hey. Nice to meet you. I’ve heard a lot of good things.”
“Thanks,” Luis said. “Nice gale you blew up on us. Took some skill, man.”
“Thanks. I’ve been working at it.”
Janice and Isabel were no longer hugging, but Ibby held on to the older woman’s hand, looking happier than I had seen her in some time. Another stab of jealousy, followed by guilt, found its mark inside me, and twisted. “We should get going,” Janice said. “Isabel, you want to ride with us, or with your uncle?”
“With you,” Ibby said. “Can I bring Spike with me? He needs to stay warm.”
“Spike?” Janice said, raising her eyebrows at Luis.
“Lizard,” he said, and held out his palms to indicate the short span equating to Spike’s size. “He’s okay.”
“Oh, certainly. All right, you get Spike,” Janice said. Ibby climbed up into the truck, got Spike’s container and supplies, and ran to the black SUV. I saw the flash of pain go across Luis’s face, but it was only a flash, and then he smiled.
“Right, let’s get moving, then,” he said. “Cass? Time to mount up.”
I was grateful to get back on my motorcycle. Things seemed simple there, stripped to bare essentials. While I was moving, slipping like a shadow through the world, I didn’t feel so vulnerable to a child’s smile, or an old woman’s pity.
Or Luis’s pain, which, like mine, had an edge of jealousy and guilt to it.
We passed through increasing layers of Warden security, some of it Djinn-provided, to reach the school itself, which lay in a snowy, shadowed valley surrounded by dramatic forested hills. A small frozen stream wandered its way through, gleaming silver in the light, and came within fifty feet of the fence that surrounded the school.
It was the fence that made me think of a prison. Twenty feet high, built of strong metal links fringed with icicles and topped with razor wire, it hardly seemed reassuring, but I also understood the need; it was as much to protect the children from those who might wish to harm them as it was to keep them contained, though the children might not see it that way. I wondered how Ibby would interpret it, and was suddenly glad that she was riding under the calming influence of Janice Worthing. That might prevent any unpleasantness, at least for now.
The fence opened for our little convoy of vehicles—not a gate, but an accordion-like folding of the metal that I was certain was done by Janice, or another Earth Warden. As the last car (Luis’s) passed through, the fence repaired itself seamlessly.
Luis opened a communication channel in my ear.
Mira
, he whispered,
I hope they don’t go and lose all their Earth Wardens at one time
.
That would be awkward
.
Especially if one of them was you
, I replied soberly. I hoped that Marion Bearheart had thought all this through; I did not know her well enough to feel confidence in her decisions. Not that I really had confidence in anyone when it came to my safety or the safety of those I loved. A human saying had always struck me as apt:
Trust, but verify
. It might seem paranoid to some, but it made excellent sense to me.
At least they kept the interior of the compound refreshingly free of snow. I supposed that would be light work for a Weather Warden, creating a microclimate just large enough to protect those within from the winter weather. It felt warmer, though not by any stretch warm.
I had only just dismounted my bike, feeling every cold mile of the road in my bones and aching flesh, when the front door of the school opened and a woman rolled down the ramp in a wheelchair, picking up speed and braking with a flair that landed her perfectly in front of us. Bearheart. I knew she had been injured during the Djinn rebellion, but I hadn’t known how badly; it was plain, when I looked at her in Oversight, that she would never walk again. No matter the skill of the healer, there were some things that could not be fixed in the human body once shattered. In a way, she had that in common with Esmeralda, the Snake Girl.
Bearheart met my eyes with her dark, glittering ones, and said, “No need to pity me, Djinn,” she said. “I’m satisfied I came out a winner. Plenty of my friends didn’t—on both sides.”
“I wasn’t pitying you,” I said. “I was wondering how much of a disadvantage you’d pose for us in a fight.”
She laughed. “Don’t make me roll over your foot. I’m heavier than I look, and I can build up a lot of momentum.”
She was also one of the most powerful Earth Wardens I had ever seen in person, and I had certainly seen many thousands. Physically, she was in her late-middle age, with thick black hair worn long, threaded through with liberal silver. Her skin was a warm copper, her features sharp, and I noticed a sudden resemblance to the Fire Warden girl on the road, Shasa. There was something of the same commanding nose on both.