Genuine artwork on the walls. I was taking a disbelieving inventory when Cher came out of her own bedroom, dressed in a matching robe, toweling her blond hair dry.
"Dude," she said. This particular inflection of that many-shaded word meant I'm completely impressed . "This is straight out of Titanic. I'm surprised they didn't pipe Celine Dion into the shower or something."
"Great. Now I'll never get that song out of my head," I said with a sigh. "How's your room?"
"Fantastic. Wait, check that. Why'd I get the downstairs room? Because I'm the sidekick?"
"Because you're shorter. I didn't think your little legs could manage the stairs." She stuck her tongue out at me. Sometime in the past few weeks, while I hadn't been paying attention, she'd had it pierced. A tiny diamond stud winked impudently at me in the butter-soft room lighting. "Are you and David going to be love bunnies and keep me up all night?"
"Maybe."
"Oooh, promise? Because the porn's all pay-per-view." She fluttered her eyelashes. Cher was silly and goofy and endearing, and her silliness had a point; she knew how serious all this was. How dangerous. She'd signed up to go with me, knowing there might not be any coming back from it, and she didn't even have any superpowers.
Just courage.
Impulsively, I hugged her. "Thank you," I said. She wiggled free and flipped her damp hair back.
"First grope is free, but after that, you pay to play," she said. "I'm going to jump on your bed, for payback." Halfway up the stairs, she stopped and turned back to look at me. Her face was very serious. "We're not going to die, you know. You can smile every once in a while."
I wasn't so sure about that, but I tried.
The Grand Paradise was a floating city. I studied the complimentary colored map as I paced the semi-spacious confines of the suite, occasionally stopping to stare out the large, very thick windows. Cher was fixing her hair, which I knew would be an hour-long epic struggle. I was content to air-dry. All the product in the world wasn't going to make my upcoming day any prettier.
The rain had stopped. The room had a sliding door and a balcony, and when I stepped out on it, salty sea air closed in around me like a hand. I felt a little stupid standing in the open in my bathrobe, but at the same time, it was a damn nice robe, and who was there to gawk?
Dolphins? Let them look.
I put my hands on the cool railing and let myself float up and out of my body, which remained motionless at the rail. I moved up into the aetheric, where the forces that work on the world can be more clearly seen.
The storm, from this view, was even more terrifying. Most storms glow in the darker spectrums of power, and the worst of them take on an almost photonegative sheen. This one was all that, and a hazmat bag of toxic purple. It was also hungry, and angry. The menace and fury of it stained the entire aetheric like lethal radiation.
Bad Bob wasn't running the storm. He didn't have to. These things were sort of like the weather equivalent of a cruise missile - point, shoot, walk away. Sooner or later, they'll catch up to the target. He'd given it a taste of Warden power, and it wanted more. We were the best chance for it to indulge its cravings, and it would keep on coming.
It had a particular taste for me.
I studied the inner mechanics of the storm as I hung silently in the drifting pastel clouds far above it. I could see the bright flashes of other Wardens coming and going from the aetheric, and subtle smears of movement that I knew were Djinn, who were much more difficult to see. Humans barely registered, except as muddy outlines. The ocean itself lit up on this plane like a spiral galaxy, thick with auras and lights. All that rich diversity of life in it, trailing beautiful colors, pasts, emotions. Down at the bottom, the seafloor glowed with ancient history, steeped in bands of color and power.
Mesmerizing.
I floated weightless on the aetheric.
I felt a violent shove from behind, and turned just in time to be battered again - a flat force, like a moving wall hitting me. I bounced off and floated back. I saw nothing, but I could feel... something. A ripple. A breath of warning...
I twisted aside, and the shearing force just