Deliverance (25 page)

“I can’t take you further,” the taxi driver said.

“But I’m not even near.”

“This is the start of Jinn territory. I don’t want to have anything to do with them. You can find another taxi. Some are desperate enough… but I’ve heard the stories. Out.”

I paid the driver and resigned myself to walking through the almost deserted streets. I couldn’t even be too upset with the driver for his superstitious nature, he was correct. This was Jinn territory. It’s why I was here.

Only two blocks after I left the taxi, I felt as if I was being followed. I smiled. It seemed my guard dog/griffin Deleer was around. I slowed my pace and searched the shadows for him, but I couldn’t find him. Was he still shy with me?

After several blocks of looking for him, a sudden wave of nausea doubled me over. I knew the feeling too well. It was corruption – tainted essence – and a lot of it. When I got back to my feet, I saw them. Jinn. About twenty of them crowded together. Most of them were weak, and ugly. They looked like deformed humans. Like the animals we’d seen in Montreal before the earthquakes. All but one. One stood tall at the back of the crowd. He looked human but too beautiful. Most of the energy radiated from him. He was the one making me sick.

He was drawn to me just as I was repulsed by him and I understood it then. It was the tainted essence in me. I felt the murky essence within me purifying itself. But I was still a little sick and this called out to them. They hadn’t immediately meant me harm. But they now recognized I wasn’t one of them.

I needed to run, but they surrounded me. I wanted to shift, but the taint in me made me too sick. I didn’t want to just stand there and die either. I remembered the way my body had attracted that dying Jinni’s essence. Could I do that on my own? I felt for the locket I still kept in my pocket. The Jinni who had given it to me had said something about being able to control essence. I pulled it out and held it tightly in front of me. As if it was some sort of talisman.

I focused on the creatures in front of me, but felt nothing. I took a deep breath and really concentrated, but the only difference was the knot in my stomach getting tighter. Whether it was from the nausea or fear, I couldn’t tell. I pulled deep within myself but I just became sicker and sicker. I emptied my stomach right before the first one got to me. It reached me mentally first. The locket slipped out of my hand. That's what saved me. When it tried to pull at my essence, I was trying to grab hold of the locket. My mind connected with the creature’s somehow and I got a hold on it mentally. Through its essence. I had somewhere to tug back. I pulled hard. And he unraveled entirely inside me. His physical form melted and bubbled on the asphalt.

I had an opening to run and I took it. I ran and I ran. And though they kept chasing me, they never got closer either.

Until I reached a dead end.

Then another creature reached for me the way the first had. I knew how to grab its essence now. And I did. Again and again. But the creatures kept coming faster and faster and I couldn’t react fast enough. I tugged and pulled where I could. I tried to shield myself mentally, and physically, but they kept coming and lashed out at me with fingernails and claws and teeth. I could hardly stand up. My vision blurred and doubled. I tugged and pulled their essence into me whenever I could reach them, but the effort and their taint made me violently ill each time. I fell to my knees and curled up into a ball ready to die.

South Tehran is worse than I remember it. The earthquakes have destroyed the area and people have barely begun to rebuild. There is more to it, too. Something otherworldly. A scrawny cat limps between two buildings and stops to stare at me. With his one eye. I shudder. The cat is off. In fact the whole neighborhood is off.

A faint sound of metal scraping on pavement causes me to look at my feet. A piece of jewelry lies there. I’m shocked. It shouldn’t be there. Last I’d seen it, Garnier had it and I didn’t want to touch it. Then I’d recognized it as something I’d owned, and recognized it contained power, but not the rest. With only Nakissa’s awareness, I hadn’t seen it for what it was. Something that belongs to me like the harp does. More than the harp does. This locket isn’t mine, it’s me.

I bend to retrieve it and the moment I tighten my clasp against it, I feel it. Strong. It flows into me. Clear and cool. It tingles. Who could have done this? Who could have preserved my essence like this? Why is it here for me to find?

I take a deep breath and smile. It’s not my old power. I’m still very much human. I’m still unfortunately mortal. But I’m not defenseless anymore. I have the power of your average human witch, but knowledge-wise, I’m far superior. The things I can do with this essence. I’m giddy. Giddy and light headed. Maybe I don’t need to find the Jinn. This pendant is all I need. I instinctively cast my essence ahead of me before turning back to return home. I stop in my steps. I’m floored by what I feel. Corruption. Fear. Pain.

Clear blue essence seeping out into the Earth. More of it turning murky.

Can I ignore the pain and go? It’s not my fight, I should preserve myself. I’m so mortal and what I feel is beyond me. Beyond my new power. But what if I can help? I grit my teeth together and run towards the pain. Even though I know I’m going to regret this.

I run for several blocks and finally round the corner into a dead end. I feel him immediately. He’s so weak but with my essence cast out the way it is, I can’t help but recognize him. I can’t regret coming here. No matter what happens, I’m here for a reason. Garnier can’t die. I cast out wider and further. I need to find safe haven. A mosque, a church, a synagogue, a temple. I feel nothing like that. The earthquakes have destroyed the local mosques. There is no protection here.

I do feel something else. Someone else. Ramtin is on his way and Garnier has no time. I have to find another way. I can only think of one trick. It’s a sort of parlor trick. The one that inspired my escape into humanity. I cast most of my essence outside of myself. Only this time I keep a small wound up ball of it tight inside. I concentrate it all in one area, making a projection of myself. I pull at Garnier’s essence too. But it feels wrong and I momentarily lose focus. My stomach heaves. This isn’t time to get sick. Curse my human stomach.

I pull back some of my essence and use it to heal myself. Then to cleanse Garnier. But he’s still under attack and soon the Jinn will see me and come after me. Each hit he takes loosens my hold. Pushes me back. But I can’t give up. Everything I have been through has led to this moment. I remember seeing Garnier for the first time. His blue eyes had captivated me. So human and otherworldly at the same time.

There had been so much humor in his eyes. I had momentarily thawed. But it hadn’t been enough. Now it is all I can hold on to. The essence-blue of his eyes. The smokeless fire that burns within him. He isn’t stronger than the other Gargoyles. In fact, he’s weaker. More human. How can someone live so long and retain that vulnerability?

I need to know him. Not because he’s different than me. I know all about being vulnerable, now. But because he is precious. In so many ways.

It comes out of me, not from my core where our essence is tied, but from my chest. The place that aches when one suffers love. More white than blue. More human than soul. And it cleanses him. Purifies him so that I can manipulate his essence.

Oh, Garnier, please forgive me. I think this will work. But please forgive me if it doesn’t.

I grab his essence and anchor it to mine. I throw it back out of me, this time casting Garnier with me. When I look up, the creatures have begun advancing on me. But they pause. Distracted. They look between me and the spot two blocks away. The place I had felt a homeless man sleeping on the curve.

I pause, just realizing the fate I sent this man to. Hopelessness seizes me. I could, I should, call it back. But I don’t. I don’t want to live. I’m so tired and it’s not worth fighting, but I need something. I need to save Garnier.

Only one thought. One need drives me. I walk towards him and try to pull him up. He doesn’t help me. I can’t leave him there but I can’t save him either. Finally he stops fighting me. He stops fighting. One thing drives me; Garnier cannot die. I don’t know where I’m going, or how to get there. I just need to get far away from where Ramtin is. But I can’t think of that. I can’t think of anything except how hopeless it is. How heavy Garnier is. I can’t continue dragging him.  

We have to rest. I don’t know if we’re safe. I’d thought I was making us safe, but I can’t see how it could work. I can’t see how anything could work. I’m failing Garnier. I’m failing myself too. Whatever is left of me.

I drag him off the street. Into the inner walls of an old apartment building. I don’t know if anyone still lives there. I don’t want to know. In a way, I just want it to be all over. I have so little left. But I have Garnier. Is he sleeping or is he dead?

I prop him against the wall and stare at him for about thirty seconds. He’s the only thing I have left. He has to be alive. I grab his hand. It doesn’t feel like the hand of a corpse. I feel for his pulse. My whole body is shaking so I drop his hand a couple times. Finally I find it. It’s there. Steady. Something inside me grows. It’s not bright enough to call it hope. But it’s coming from that core where I have this little ball of me left.

I can’t let go of that 
me
. But I can’t let it grow too big either. I can’t get their attention. I just want to close my eyes. I want to stop caring. But Garnier stirs. 

My eyes could open, but I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want to continue. I wasn’t me anymore, just a body. What was left of who I had been was so small it only teased me. I couldn’t keep living like this. I couldn’t continue. It wasn’t fair.

I wrapped the darkness around myself. Even this was too difficult. Took too much out of me. I’d had a long life, why shouldn’t I just let go of it now?

“Wake up Garnier.”

Nakissa’s voice was dull but painful. Like being stabbed by a butter knife. It woke me up. Though barely. Could I hold on for her? I didn’t know if I could. I didn’t know if I wanted to. Why should I continue to give of myself for others? Maybe I’d already given everything I had to give.