The Marid shrugged hefty shoulders, to say that either he did not know or did not care.
“Whatever the reason,” Hadia said, “they lost control. They hadn’t prepared for the ambitiousness of this imposter. Who can’t be reined in. Now they want us to clean up their mess.”
“The greed of mortals should never be undervalued,” the Marid intoned.
Angels. Fatma shook her head. Whatever machinations were at work, none of it changed that the ring had to be retrieved from this imposter. “They said you could remove the confoundment spell. That there’s a contract you can renegotiate by—”
The Marid waved her off. “I understand how magical contractual bindings work, mortal. Please do not insult me by trying to explain it with your inarticulate speech.”
“Will you do it?”
“What will I gain in return?”
Fatma gaped. He wanted something in return? After putting Hadia in a wall? “How about making sure this imposter doesn’t turn you into their personal puppet. That good enough?”
“Magic exacts a price,” the Marid insisted. “What will you give?”
She clenched her fists. Djinn could be insistent about contracts. There wasn’t going to be a way out of this. Or, it suddenly dawned on her, was there? “Do Nine Ifrit Lords mean anything to you?”
Alarm crossed that ancient face. It was both satisfying and frightening.
“So they’re real, then,” she pressed. “The imposter plans to awaken them. Bring them here. With the Seal of Sulayman, he’ll have control of the most powerful of djinn. You want a trade for your magical contract? We stop that from happening.”
The Marid scowled. “You wish to keep them from this world as much as I.”
“Think of it as a mutual benefit,” Fatma retorted. “Do we have a bargain or not?”
The Marid’s three eyes burned angrily, not caring for the offer. But he seemed to like these Nine Lords less. “We have a bargain,” he decreed. “But know this, not-enchantress. If ever you awaken me again, there will be no bargains to make. I do not care if the heavens are falling.”
“Whatever,” Fatma bit back. “Now fulfill your side and remove the spell.”
The djinn extended a hand, and Fatma felt suddenly like she was on fire—as if she had been thrown into fire. The pain was so intense, she couldn’t even scream. When her vision cleared she found she was sprawled on the floor, writhing as the agonizing sensation faded to a dull sting. She could see Hadia beside her, similarly incapacitated. Neither of them looked to be physically hurt. But Merciful God, the pain! As she lay on her back, the Marid’s horned head loomed above.
“The magic is removed,” he rumbled. “I could have done so without pain.” His mouth broke into a wide toothy grin. “But you didn’t make that clear in your request.”
Fatma lifted a trembling hand to form a rude gesture. She really did hate this djinn.
She was still grumbling about haughty djinn and conniving angels as the automated carriage sped through Cairo, to their next destination. At least the confounding magic had been removed. They’d tested it out, including opening up texts to find whole passages now viewable. The Marid had been as good as his word. She’d taken his bottle back to the vault and put in an expedited request to have a safe place found for it—hopefully a chest weighted down to the deepest part of the sea.
“You sure you’re okay?” she asked Hadia.
The woman sat across from her, busily reading through Portendorf’s ledger. She’d made notations of the words “the list,” affirming much of what they now knew. Siwa had been making good use of his pilfered register, marketing and then retrieving items to the highest bidder—which turned out to be Alistair Worthington. The angels had probably assumed someone in that arrogant circle of Englishmen would be willful enough to come across mention of the ring. Hadia looked up at the question.
“A djinn put me into a wall. I think for a while, I was the wall. Then he tried to singe my skin off. So no. I’m not okay. But, God willing, I’ll be alright.”
Fatma didn’t press the matter.
“One question we haven’t asked,” Hadia said, changing topics. “Why are angels—or whatever they are—collecting and hoarding things associated with al-Jahiz?”
Fatma shook her head. If there was one thing they’d learned today, when it came to angels, who knew their motives. The carriage jostled as the streets turned rough, and she pulled back a curtain to look out. “We’re here.”
“Again,” Hadia added.
The Cemetery didn’t look too different in daylight. Except maybe the night obscured some of the squalor—where crumbling bricks littered the ground, and makeshift wooden shacks barely held together. Not every place was like that. Some mausoleums were well kept by their occupants, and there were graves both freshly cleaned and painted. In other places new construction went on, and vendors sold plaster vases—as if it wasn’t a Friday. Children played about the stone markers, amid lines of clothes drying under the midday sun.
“Do you think any of them recognize us?” Hadia asked as they stepped from the carriage. She’d opted not to wear her Ministry jacket, given recent events.
Fatma noticed a woman glancing at them through her kitchen, where she cooked at a stone oven right beside an elaborately carved tomb. “Maybe. Easy to stand out, when you’re not from here.” Not to mention her light gray suit, matching vest, and red-on-white pin-striped shirt. Not exactly discreet.
“That’s it coming up.” She nodded at a tall mausoleum in the distance.
It looked almost like the one they’d
