A Dead Djinn in Cairo Read Online Free PDF Page B

woman with the dagger, who only winked.
    The older woman put on an apologetic look. “Forgive us. Siti was only sent as a messenger. But she has more of Sekhmet in her than most, and can be … overzealous.” The priestess gave the younger woman a remonstrative glare, which finally erased her smile.
    Siti, was it? Fatma thought. “What’s this all about, Merira? Thought your kind kept a low profile. Not running around accosting Ministry agents!”
    “We near the end of worlds,” the jann put in with an echoing voice. “And the hour is late.” Fatma frowned at her, then turned back to Merira questioningly.
    “You’ve seen many things this night,” the priestess said. She flipped over the cards on the table, revealing the image each bore: a pair of curving horns, a sickle, an axe with a hooked end, and a half moon shrouded in twisting vines.
    Fatma stared, unable to hold back at the sight of the familiar glyphs. She leaned forward, gripping the table.
    “Enough of the games, Merira! How do you know about any of this?”
    The woman’s cheeks dimpled with a slight smile. “We may be forced into the shadows, but the Eye of Ra pierces all.” She motioned and someone stepped unexpectedly from around a corner. Like the other women, she wore a diaphanous gown that hugged her plump curves well. She sat beside the priestess, staring apprehensively at Fatma with large green eyes set in a round, olive-skinned face.
    “Rika came to us seeking sanctuary,” Merira said. “She had business with a certain djinn.”
    Fatma’s eyebrows rose. The dead djinn’s Greek lover? It had to be. The woman fit Aasim’s description perfectly. “What do you have to do with any of this?”
    The woman glanced to the priestess, who nodded with approval.
    “I met Sennar at a brothel house,” she said in a thick accent, definitely Greek. “He picked me out. Said he liked my eyes.” She shrugged. “I play a role, he pays. But he became obsessed with me, starting to asking that he be my only customer. I didn’t mind, so long as he paid for my time. Then he started talking to me about other things.” She paused, looking again to Merira, who nodded. “He would tell me about other worlds,” she continued. “He claimed there were places beyond where he came from, where gods lived. Gods that could curse you with madness, if you dared speak their name.”
    Fatma shook her head. “I don’t understand. What are you saying?”
    The jann glided forward, pointing an ephemeral finger at the card with the half moon shrouded in twisted vines. “Djinn once worshipped their own gods, Investigator, old beings that dwelled beyond the Kaf in cold and dark worlds. Do you not see them here? Rising from that darkness?”
    Fatma looked down at the half moon, for the first time realizing it looked like something emerging, the way the sun rose on the horizon.
    “The Rising,” she breathed aloud.
    “Sennar bragged that these old gods would soon make this world their own,” Rika went on. “He said he would be able to die and live again. He promised me I could remain with him when everyone else perished. I could be his … pet.” Her eyes flashed with anger at the word. “He bragged about powerful friends. I asked him for proof and he showed me a feather. Did you find it, Investigator? Where I left it?”
    Fatma nodded in astonishment, looking at the woman with new eyes. Aasim had underestimated this one. “Why didn’t you go to the police with this? To the Ministry?”
    The woman’s plump face went pale. “Me? Speak against a Marid djinn? And his powerful friends? What would have happened then? No dark gods were going to make me live again. When I found Sennar tonight, like that, I knew it had begun. I ran. Siti is a friend. She brought me here to hide. I told the holy mother … the priestess … everything I knew.”
    “And now we’re telling you,” Merira finished.
    “Telling me what, exactly?”
    “Of an old djinn prophecy,” the