Windfall Page 0,127

numb. At least my guts weren't falling out. I was counting my blessings.

I couldn't kill the cougar-evil people, yeah, okay, but not cats who were just doing their survival job-so I only had a few minutes at most to get rid of the one controlling it.

And he already had something else lined up. I caught the blur of motion out of the corner of my eye. There was no way I could move in time, and my brain snapshotted a snake-a big, unhappy-looking snake-striking for me with enormous fangs in a flat, triangular-shaped head as big as my hand.

Rahel caught it in midstrike, thumped its head with one neon-polished fingernail, and the snake went limp in her hands. She looked perfectly well groomed. There was no sign she'd been in any kind of a fight, and I didn't see the other Djinn anywhere.

"You should be more careful," she said-to the snake-and set him down in the underbrush. He crawled away with fast convulsions of his body and disappeared in seconds.

Rahel turned her eerie, hawk gold eyes on the Earth Warden, and smiled. Not the kind of smile you'd want to get on your worst day, believe me.

The Earth Warden took a giant step back.

"Djinn are killing Wardens," she said. Again, it might have been a comment to me ... or not. "I don't altogether find this distressing."

"Good thing for me that I'm not a Warden anymore, then," I said. "Busy?"

"Not especially."

"Don't need to, ah, help Lewis... ?"

Her eyes flicked briefly to the enormous fireball that surrounded the other two.

Inside of it, it looked as though Lewis had Shirl in a choke hold. "I don't believe that will be necessary."

"Then would you mind-?"

"Not at all."

The Earth Warden's nerve failed and he bolted. Rahel took him down with one neat jump, carrying him down to the shining, wet pavement, and shoved him flat with a knee in the small of his back. He flailed. It didn't much matter.

"You can let the cougar go now," she called back to me. "It won't harm you."

Oh, right, easy for her to say... I removed the vacuum from around the cat, and it choked in a fast breath, then another, and bounded up and away. Following the path of the snake. I wished them both luck.

Speaking of which... I skinned up my shirt and traced the wounds in my stomach with my fingertips. Blood sheeted wetly down, pink in the rain, but it looked pretty superficial. No guts poking out. Some prime scar material, though.

I gulped damp air and tried not to think how close I'd come to being cat chow, and then moved to where Rahel had the Warden in a position of utter helplessness.

I got down on one knee, which was painful, and he turned his head to stare at me. Yep, there was a definite component of demon-shimmer in his eyes. I didn't know if anyone else could have seen it; I was a pretty unique case, having had the Demon Mark and Djinn experiences. It looked like he was in the early stages.

Probably wasn't even aware yet how the creature growing inside of him under that mark would be influencing his actions, compromising his judgment.

Eating his power even as it stoked the fire and made him feel more in control.

I couldn't help him with that. He had to help himself, and I was about to take away his only way to do that.

"Hold him," I said to Rahel. She shifted her weight off the man, but kept him flat with one hand between his shoulder blades.

"Let go!" he yelled. I ignored him and stuck my hand in his right coat pocket.

Nothing. The left held a ring of keys. I dropped them on the ground.

"Roll him over," I said. The Djinn took one arm and flipped him like a pancake, and this time held him down with her palm on his forehead. Paralyzed. She flicked me a look, and I read unease in it. She reached over and sliced open his shirt with one taloned finger, and folded the cloth back to show me the black, slow-moving tattoo of the Demon Mark.

He started screaming. Whatever she was doing to hold him down, the demon didn't like it. His whole body arched in pain, and Rahel's face went blank with concentration.

I ransacked his pants pockets