Firestorm Page 0,21

a Warden anymore!" I remembered her. Emily, a double threat--an Earth and Fire Warden out of Canada. She was blunt, but she was good at her job; she also had a reputation for being pushy.

"Back off," Paul said wearily from his chair in the conference room. His voice echoed through the silence. "She's one of us. Hell, she may be the only one who knows enough to get us through the day." He sounded defeated. I didn't care for that. I hadn't meant to take away his authority--at least, not permanently--but Paul wasn't acting like a guy who could shoulder the burden anymore. "Jo, do your stuff."

"Okay," I said. I turned back to the woman, who was still giving me the fish eye. "Emily, you think you can make this work because you think you're smarter than the Djinn, or faster, or more powerful. You can't. You all need to unlearn what you know about the Djinn. They're not subservient. They're not stupid. And they're not ours, not anymore."

The assembled Wardens were whispering to each other. Emily was staring at me. So was Will. I heard my name being passed around, in varying degrees of incredulity. I thought she was dead, someone said, just a little too loudly for comfort.

"This is stupid," Emily finally said. "Paul, I thought she was out of the Wardens. How does she know anything?"

"She knows because she was with the Djinn when it happened," Marion said, and rolled closer with a brisk snap of her wrists. "Right?"

I nodded. "I saw it happen. We've lost control, and as far as I know, we've lost it for good. We need to face that and figure out how to go forward."

"Forward?" somebody in the crowd yelped. "You've got to be kidding. We need the Djinn!"

"No, we don't," another person countered sharply. "I barely escaped, and only because mine got distracted. Whatever's happening, we can't risk involvement with the Djinn."

"Exactly," I said. "We have to rely on ourselves, and each other. Will? You up for the job?"

He swallowed hard and nodded. "I'll get started."

"Get some people to help you. Draft them if you have to, and don't be afraid to use Paul's name as a big stick." I waited for some confirmation from Paul; he waved a hand vaguely. I turned to Emily. "You're not going to give this guy any shit, right?"

She was silent for a few seconds, looking at me, then shrugged. "Not right now. You're right. We need to stop the bleeding, and save the surgery for later."

I was glad Emily let me push it through, because she'd be a tough opponent. Nothing weak about her, and we needed her on our side.

There was only one side, right now. The side of survival. I faced a crowd of people, and everybody looked tired and harassed and worried. Not the faces of winners. They looked... lost.

"All right," I said. "Everybody, listen up. We've taken some serious hits, and there's no question, things are desperate. But we are Wardens. Wardens don't run, and they don't abandon their responsibilities. There are six billion people on this planet, and we stand up for them. We need to be strong, focused, and we need to be united. No more backbiting, politics, or ambition. Understood?"

"Oh, come on! Look around you. It's impossible," someone in the crowd complained. I fixed that area with a stare that, from the way those in its way quailed, might have been Djinn-strength.

"I was just hanging in midair glowing like a UFO," I said. "Don't tell me about impossible. We're Wardens."

A ripple of laughter. Some of the tension fled from their faces, and there were a few nods.

"I need a volunteer to handle cleanup crew," I continued. "Earth Wardens, probably, maybe a couple of Fire Wardens. Get this place back in operation. Everybody else, pick a conference room and get to work triaging the crisis information. Go."

And amazingly, after a scant second, Emily raised her hand and bellowed, "Right! I need two Earth and one Fire for cleanup!" and the rest of them began milling around and filtering into conference rooms.

They were actually listening to me.

I looked at Marion, who was sitting, hands folded in her lap. She inclined her head, very slightly. Under the bruises, she was smiling.

I said, "Somebody had to."

"You have a gift for it," she countered. We both looked at Paul.

He was gone. Sometime during my little speech, he'd walked away. I felt a little stab of regret and worry. I'd taken away Paul's