The Conjurer (The Vine Witch #3)(60)
Sidra materialized. There was no more reason to run. If the All Seeing wished to play them all for a fool, so may it pass. “I am here,” she said and walked toward the factory, following the trail of mysterious fate that had brought her to its door.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The funicular had been blown off its rails and was now wheels up in a patch of weeds, which meant that witch, sorcerer, and mortal had to walk. The steep climb to the village would have proved hard enough without being pelted by jinni magic, but the wind only made the effort that much more difficult. Elena rested a moment beside a door tucked within an archway. Jean-Paul, still fever-weary, gave no complaint at stopping to shelter out of the storm for a moment. Nor did Yanis, dragging his false leg behind him, his breath coming in great gulps of effort. The dog had followed them up the hill, only reluctantly resting when they did.
Out of curiosity, Elena peeked in through the window to the side of the door. Two young men, their hair and skin dusted white with grit, slept sitting up in front of a stove that had yet to be lit. One of them still held a box of matches in his hand. “It’s like they’re frozen in time,” she said.
The dog stood on his hind legs and pressed his nose against the glass beside her to see the mortals for himself.
“You could reveal yourself,” she said. “If there’s something you’re not telling us, now would be a good time.”
“Isn’t that the same dog I saw running in the vineyard?” Jean-Paul asked, wiping his forehead with the lacy tail of the fichu.
“Yes. He’s also the one who saved me from my abductor.”
The animal dropped from the window and stared at them with a nervous energy that suggested he didn’t think they should linger much longer where they were.
Jean-Paul reached out to pet the dog’s head. “What did you mean by asking him to show himself?”
“She means he’s jinn,” Yanis said while the dog keenly avoided eye contact with him.
Jean-Paul retracted his hand, as if he thought the dog might bite. “Oh, of course,” he said. “I should have realized. What was I thinking?”
The dog trotted a few feet down the lane before turning back, encouraging them to follow a different street from the one they’d been taking.
“He wants us to go that way,” Elena said, gazing ahead.
“Can we trust him?”
Yanis stood. “In this, I think we can,” he said. “Quickly, the wind is dying down. We should take advantage of the break in the storm.”
The animal barked and trotted up the narrow street, his ears alert, tail high. The pace was still slow going, like a recurring dream of Elena’s where she put one foot in front of the other but never seemed to make any forward progress, eventually crawling on her stomach, clawing for an inch of ground until she awoke.
Finally, after what felt like an hour of slogging, they’d nearly reached the market square. Exhausted, they’d meant to sit and catch their breath when a crash like the breaking of clay tiles sounded overhead. Elena glanced up and saw a flash of red and gold leap over the gap between buildings. “It’s Sidra!” The dog growled as the others tilted their heads back in time to spot Jamra jumping from one rooftop to another in pursuit. Hot flames erupted from the jinni’s feet when he landed on the opposite side.
“Follow them,” Yanis said and darted through a narrow passageway that wound between apartment buildings.
It was impossible to keep up. Even though the storm had died down, sand covered the streets and back lanes, making them trudge twice as hard as normal to cover the same ground. They were going to lose the jinn.
“That way.” Jean-Paul pointed ahead where Sidra hurdled over another gap.
Restricted by the corridors of an inner-village maze, the group couldn’t maneuver fast enough even to follow the rare glimpses they caught of the jinn leaping overhead. Sidra was in trouble, likely running for her life, and yet there was little they could do even if they could catch up.
Elena stopped in her tracks. She tugged the makeshift scarf away from her mouth. “You have to help us,” she yelled. She waited for the dog to lift his ears and turn around. “I don’t know what you’re waiting for. I don’t know whose side you’re on or what you have to gain by leading us, but if there’s something you can do to save Sidra, you must do it now.”
The dog checked the roofline, bent his ear to the right, and sniffed the air. He stuck his nose in the other direction and drew in a deep whiff, testing the scents on the wind. Concern rested in the dog’s eyes as he lowered his head. He understood her, she knew he did, but for some reason he continued to hesitate. Instead he kept his nose pointed toward a side alley, growing more agitated the longer he sat. Elena rounded the corner to see what he was reacting to, and there, hobbling forward, was Camille.
Elena ran to meet her, followed by the others. “Are you all right? What happened?”
“They ambushed us. At the shop.” Camille’s hair hung in her face. Tears had left tracks through the dust on her cheeks. “Those things, they dragged Yvette and me to the top of the bell tower.” Her body shivered, remembering. “There was a jinni. He tried to kill us, but Sidra . . . she saved my life. I sprayed that thing in the face with my scent spell, and she helped me to the ground.” The perfume witch leaned against the wall and took a deep breath.