Crystal Doors #3: Sky Realm (No. 3) (10 page)

“Jordan’s taller,” Vic said. “Don’t you think he’s gotten taller?”

“May I see my parents?” Lyssandra asked, so Gwen opened up a window on Groxas and Kaisa. The two stood in the kitchen of Lyssandra’s home, their arms wrapped tightly around each other, whispering into one another’s ears. Lys sandra’s mouth fell open and she blushed furiously. “Close it,” she said, putting her hands over her ears.

“Perhaps your gifts are best used only in emergencies,” Tiaret suggested to Gwen and Lyssandra.

“You are right,” Lyssandra said. “These powerful skills are not to be used lightly.”

“At least we know what our gifts are now,” Gwen said, feeling relieved.

Sharif threw a handful of candy into the crowd again. “Except for mine.”

12

THE STORM CLOUDS GATHERED in the night sky as Irrakesh drifted along. The thick, dark masses blocked out the stars, filling the open air and even masking the moon so that the light left only a silvery edge outlining the scalloped edges of the puffy thunderclouds. A silver lining . . . Sharif tried to take heart from that. But his heart was heavy from the bad news Piri had broken during the banquet.

Before the feast, the Sultan had consumed another dose of the antidote to the poison so he could function well enough through the busy activity. Although the court functionaries, other noble families, and minor Viziers saw nothing wrong in his performance, Sharif recognized the tremor in the old man’s hands and the grayish cast to his skin. In spite of his worry, Sharif had forced himself to eat normally. Then Piri had blindsided him, explaining in her short bursts of words what would happen. He had already lost so much . . . and tonight he would lose another very important part of his life.

Now his spacious bedchambers seemed to echo with loneliness. Inside her transparent shell, Piri hovered in front of him. He could see her small doll-like form placing her hands against the curved boundary as if trying to get out. Her long hair floated about her small, perfectly shaped head as if static electricity filled the egg. The colors shifted, but kept returning to the deep purple of love.

Too sad.
She waved her hands, looking at him.
Don’t be.

“I can accept it, Piri,” he said, “but that does not mean I can be happy about it. I am even a little frightened. As my people say, ‘The sadness after a loss is a measure of what one had.’ And I had so very much, Piri.”

Gwen and Vic, Tiaret, and Lyssandra stood at the entrance to his bedchambers, calling out to him.

“Is now a good time?” Gwen asked.

“You said something about teaching us court games,” Vic said, “but I’m guessing you just wanted to talk.”

Sharif drew a deep breath to gather strength and turned to face his friends. “No, neither talk nor games, Viccus. I simply needed you here with me.”

Gwen came in, her expression sad and concerned. Piri floated over Sharif’s shoulder, and he took great comfort just from seeing the nymph djinni. With his four friends there with him, and Piri, his new bedchamber no longer felt so echoingly empty. The gigantic suite not far from his father’s palatial chambers had seemed far too extravagant — too much room, too many colorful fabric hangings, too many pieces of ornate art. The walls were intricate mosaics. Each covering on his bed competed with the others for intricacy of weaving and embroidery. The vaulted ceiling overhead, with its patterned tiles and gold edgings, seemed to swallow up every sound. He felt as if he could be lost here.

When he was younger, these quarters had seemed perfectly ordinary, his due as the second son of the Sultan. But he had spent the last year in students’ quarters in Elantya, and in a fairly small chamber working with Sage Rubicas. He had forgotten how to be ostentatious. The sheer size of his rooms no longer represented wealth or grandeur for him, but the weight of his responsibility.

At first Piri had flitted around the room, raising her lighted sphere all the way to the high ceiling and shining down like a miniature sun. Now, though, she appeared much more somber. He knew he should be happy for the nymph djinni, but he was secretly relieved that she seemed as affected and uneasy as he was.

Gwen and Vic went to stand out on the balcony, looking up into the backlit clouds.

Tiaret, however, picked up on the prince’s apprehension. “You seem unsettled, Sharif. Is something unpleasant about to occur?”

Lyssandra’s large cobalt eyes were filled with worry. “I do not understand it, but I had an uneasy dream last night. In an older dream I saw Azric, huge and towering in the clouds. This seemed something like that . . . only different.”

Before Sharif could summon the courage to answer, Gwen pointed upward. “It looks like a thunderstorm. I think I saw lightning.”

“That is not lightning,” Sharif said, then swallowed hard. “It is the Air Spirits. It is the djinni.”

They all gathered on the balcony, where the wind had begun to whip coolly around their faces. Sharif took a deep breath and smelled the dampness. Flashes of lights appeared in the clouds like the sky fireworks Lyssandra’s father created in Elantya. Piri bobbed in the air, glowing brighter, flashing. Sharif thought perhaps she was signaling into the sky.

Sharif concentrated on his story. Talking about dry facts and history eased the lump in his throat. “The djinni are powerful beings, who have helped Irrakesh in the past. The adults become Air Spirits and live in the clouds. They can project images of themselves vast enough to frighten anyone. Although I know they are our friends, even I find them intimidating.”

“I thought genies were supposed to live in bottles or lamps,” Vic said. “That’s how it is in all the stories I’ve read.”

“This isn’t a story, Taz,” Gwen said, giving him one of her get-a-grip looks. “It’s real.”

“Right,” he said with a hint of sarcasm. “Come on, Doc. We’re on the balcony of a Sultan’s palace in a giant flying city looking into the clouds for Air Spirits, and we took a flying carpet ride to get here. Sheesh, all we need now is some computer graphics or Ray Harryhausen to add the special effects.”

Sharif pressed on, though his eyes kept drifting to Piri. “Djinnis have their own powerful magic, a life energy that they can expend to create things that most people would consider miracles. Someone ambitious and power hungry can find ways to trap a djinni, to enslave it and force it to do that person’s bidding. But the djinni are clever as well as powerful, and very often when a person utters such a wish, the captive djinni will twist the command, making the wish turn out unlike what the master expected.

“A person with selfish wishes can usually only hold a djinni for no more than three wishes. After that, the djinni is able to break free.”

“See? Genies and bottles and three wishes,” Vic said. “Just like in the stories.”

“Long, long ago, when Azric came to this world for the first time as a powerful dark sage, he captured and imprisoned several Air Spirits. Each wish drains part of the life force of the djinni who grants it. Azric used his wishes to wreak great destruction, and added his dark magic to dry up and shrivel much of the landscape. Millions of people and djinnis were destroyed. Irrakesh would have died as a city, but many of our citizens sacrificed their lives to free the djinni and foil Azric’s plans. As a reward, the Air Spirits became our allies. They expended some of their powers to help our Viziers uproot Irrakesh, so that it could rise above the devastation and fly forever. Since that time, the people of Irrakesh have sworn never to make demands or wishes of the djinni. That is why they continue to help us. That is why they trust us.” He reached out his hand, spreading his fingers, and Piri drifted close to it so that he could lovingly caress her sphere.

“An excellent story,” Tiaret murmured.

“Why do you have a nymph djinni, then?” Gwen asked. “You never told us how you actually received Piri.”

“After the shape-shifter Azric murdered my brother Hashim, I was angry with the Air Spirits. Their magic is sufficient to detect a dark sage, yet they did not. They could have warned us —
should
have protected Hashim from him. Their sorrow for our loss was great, and the Air Spirits tried to comfort my family, but I would hear none of it. I turned my back on the Air Spirits and vowed neither to help or rely upon them again.

“Nymph djinnis are slow to mature and are very rare. When my father brought me Piri, I did not stop to think of the honor the Air Spirits did us by trusting me with their only nymph in a century. I accepted her as a valuable trinket which, in my arrogance, I believed I deserved. But I cared for her, and she soon became my closest friend. I understand now that the Air Spirits let me have her for a time to comfort me and to reestablish trust with my family. I did not, however, deserve her.”

In the clouds, the lights grew brighter, flashes of lightning flaring like molten gold, spilling through the swollen cumulus. The clouds themselves seemed to be reshaped. Piri throbbed yellow-white, lifting herself high in the air above Sharif’s head. In a hoarse voice, the future leader of Irrakesh said, “A nymph djinni should not reach maturity for many decades, even a century. I believed Piri would be with me for all of my life. But when Orpheon threw her into the lavaja cracks, the power there changed her, accelerated her. Piri matured much sooner than anyone expected. Tonight she will shed her shell and become a free djinni.”

His voice cracked. “Tonight she must leave me.”

Piri leaned down inside her sphere.
Must go.

Sharif turned to Gwen, struggling to retain his composure, trying to keep his voice steady while tears burned his eyes. “Tonight she joins the other Air Spirits. Piri is still very young, and once she sheds her shell she will be extremely vulnerable to capture. I could not risk her. Only other djinnis can hope to protect her.”

Waves of emotion swelled within him, and he couldn’t speak for a moment. How unfair it seemed. He was not ready for this. Not only had his father called him away from student life in Elantya, changed his future, and increased his responsibilities, but even more had changed. His father was dying and Sharif was powerless to help him. Sadly, Sharif would become Sultan far sooner than he had expected, and on top of that, he would have to do it without Piri. It felt like too much, this abrupt and painful lesson in growing up.

The swollen clouds had grown much closer. With flashes of lightning, faces began to form, huge towering shapes, a handsome but stern-looking bald man with a pointed beard and long curled eyebrows. There was a beautiful woman, too, her projected hair tied into a topknot. Her smile was sincere, her eyes as bright as dazzling fires. Her refined features reminded Sharif of Piri’s tiny face. He could see what his own nymph djinni would look like when she grew up.

Sharif heard shouts and calls from other balconies and towers throughout Irrakesh. Many people had noticed the strange visages. A nymph djinni was rare even on Irrakesh, and when one returned to the Air Spirits, it should have been cause for great celebration. But the Sultan was too ill, and Sharif felt too sad to stand among the crowds. He did not know how he could tolerate the cheering of so many people while waving farewell to his beloved Piri. He wished he could do this in private, with no one but his closest friends.

Piri seemed to grow larger and her sphere became misty as it spread out, expanding. As the faces came closer, lightning bolts arced across the clouds. “Piri, our daughter. We have come for you. Return with us to your destiny,” the giant male face boomed in a voice louder than thunder.

“We will take you home with us to the skies, child,” said the mother.

Behind those faces in the clouds appeared numerous additional projected heads, a shimmering chorus of other djinni. Sharif raised both hands. Gwen and Vic gasped. Tiaret stared, clearly impressed by the sheer power the djinni projected.

Lyssandra had tears in her wide eyes. “This is what I saw in my dream.”

“Go, Piri. Be safe and be strong.” Sharif’s voice nearly broke.

Now the shell dissolved entirely, and the small doll-like djinni grew larger and at the same time less substantial. Free now, she flew away, streaking across the sky. Piri circled the great towers of Irrakesh, dipping low over the sapphire dome of the main palace, rising up to the tops of the tallest pointed minarets. She seemed exhilarated by her freedom, and though Sharif felt tears trickle from the corners of his eyes, he was happy for her. He knew this was where she belonged.

Many of the djinni drew closer, welcoming her. Even Sharif’s breath was taken away by the nearness of the enormous Air Spirits. He had been angry with the awesome presences since the death of his brother Hashim. He had said terrible things and turned his back on them. Now, though, he knew he had been wrong. It was not for him to dictate what the Air Spirits should do.

Impulsively, Vic began to wave his hands. “Wait! Hey, djinnis. We have a request. We need your help. My mother is frozen in ice coral. Azric captured her.”

Gwen shouted out, adding her voice to his, “Yes, you hate Azric, don’t you?”

In unison, the glowing, towering faces in the clouds scowled. “The people of Irrakesh do not make demands of the djinni,” said the male voice who seemed to be Piri’s father.

“We’re from Elantya, not Irrakesh,” Vic said desperately. “We can —”

Sharif put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “We are not trying to enslave you,” Sharif said to the Air Spirits. “Piri can tell you who we are and what we have done. She knows the threat Azric poses. Listen to her. It is our hope that you will help in this great battle.”