“No.” Her voice was soft, uninflected, but I could tell there was no moving her. “I will not let him be lost like this. I can’t.”
“There’s no choice,” David whispered. “Please, Sara. Come with me now. Jonathan’s waiting.”
“Will Jonathan give me peace?” she asked. “Will he give me love?”
“Yes.”
“Not like this.” She reached out to ease a strand of pale hair back from the dying man’s face. “Never like this, and David, I cannot bear to lose it.”
“You can’t keep it. Humans die. It’s the law.”
She looked away from him, and I had the strange, creepy impression she was looking somewhere else.
At me. But that wasn’t possible, because I knew I wasn’t here, really. Not in this time. Not in this place.
Sara’s eyes were the color of amethysts, a beautiful, peaceful color. She stared at the corner where I floated, and then she smiled.
“The law of my heart is different,” she said, and let go of the man’s hand. She stood up, and the white gown fell away, sliding to the floor in a puddle of cloth; under it her skin glowed a soft, perfect ivory. No sculptor had ever captured a form like that, so perfect, so graceful.
“Don’t,” David said, and took a step toward her. I know he could have stopped her, but something— maybe just the heartbreaking longing in her eyes— made him hesitate.
She folded back the sheets and climbed into the narrow bed. The dying man seemed to see her, and those pale eyes widened; the word he shaped might have been No… and then she wrapped her arms around him. Her pale, white hair flowed over the two of them like a cloak, wrapping them together.
“No, Sara,” David whispered. It sounded like a good-bye.
There was a flare of light on the bed, something so bright it was like the heart of a bonfire, and in it I heard screams. Terrible, wrenching screams. They were dying, both of them, dying horribly.
David didn’t move. Maybe he couldn’t. I wanted to, but it was still a dream, only a dream for me, and I just floated, waiting, as the fire burned and the screams faded, until the light faded, too.
Two bodies, lying senseless on the bed.
One of them opened its mouth to scream, but nothing came out. Dry, voiceless, horror-stricken. He had turquoise blue eyes now, and the hair that had been thin and fragile was reborn in a white-gold flame around his head.
Restored to life, health, as she must have known him.
Sara lay unmoving beside him, amethyst eyes still open. He reached out to touch her face…
… and that ivory skin cracked, turned to powder, and began to flake away.
A sloughing of skin, for what was underneath.
The soft black shadow of an Ifrit rose out of the pale ruin of the Djinn known as Sara, and the man reached out to it, but it flinched away. Hissing.
He filled his hands with dust and looked at David with tears streaming down his face. No words for it. No help for it.
David said, in a voice gone rough and strange with grief, “I pray you are worth this gift, Patrick.”
This time, Patrick found his voice.
He screamed.
I woke up the next day to the smell of bacon and orange juice, and fresh-ground coffee. There was still a bowl of sugar sitting on the coffee table next to me. I felt hungover from the dream… memory?… nightmare?… and looking around me, I kept seeing that spare stone room, that skull-thin face breathing its last, the unearthly beauty and grace turned to something ugly and twisted.
He’d kept her with him all this time—or she’d haunted him. Impossible to tell how the feelings ran without asking, and I doubted Patrick would have anything revealing to say. He’d left that devastated, screaming moment behind centuries ago. The Patrick of today was cold, savvy, and controlled.
And yet, the sliding, everpresent shadow of the Ifrit who’d been Sara had another story to tell, didn’t it? A story of love, longing, honor, sacrifice, tragedy? Did she still love him so much? Rahel said that Ifrit survived by eating other Djinn. And yet Sara remained here, and hadn’t done Patrick too much damage.
I refused to think too long about that relationship, especially before food.
Patrick had been kind enough to take off my shoes and put a tacky leopard-spotted cotton throw rug over me. I kept it draped over my shoulders and shuffled barefoot toward the kitchen; I was seriously thinking about changing my clothes to something that would be easier to fight in, since Patrick’s coaching style evidently owed a lot to the world of professional wrestling. Maybe Spandex and a cute little domino mask. They could call me The Nutcracker.
Breakfast was sitting on the table, perfectly displayed like a cereal commercial. Serving suggestion. There were even fresh daisies in a vase in the center of the table. Of course, the kitschy Elvis plates and Hello Kitty mugs weren’t quite what Better Homes and Gardens had in mind, but still, he’d made an effort.