The hotel clerk was an auburn haired girl with a few freckles on the bridge of her nose. She wore a name tag that read Heather in Sharpie black. Samosa was feeling so many different emotions that she wished she could just tell someone. Anyone about her problems.
Sadly, she had no one.
“Single bed?”
“Yes.” Samosa pulled out the cash and handed it to the girl. Their fingers touched and a tingle shot up Samosa’s arm. The girl’s brown eyes widened too. “What was that?”
“You have been Touched?”
“Excuse me?” Samosa adjusted the satchel on her shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” the chic waved her hand. “I’m Heather and I too have been blessed to receive my wish.”
Samosa’s mouth dropped. The girl showed her a tattoo of a simple dark sphere with a squiggly S dangling down the center.
“ I’m not truly marked but got the tattoo after a genie granted me three wishes.” She whispered looking around her. The place was a ghost town and located a few miles from Historic Williamsburg. The place was decadent and she paid up for a week.
“Oh. I’m not marked,” Samosa lied. “But I’ve had some granted.”
“I see!” The girl clapped gleefully. “Finally, someone like me.”
“Sure.”
“Oh, oops, forgot to give you your room key.” The girl hummed a little tune and handed the swipe key card to Samosa. “The WIFI access code is located on the front.”
“Thank you.” Samosa turned to leave but the girl stepped from behind the counter. Her red shirt was fitting to her ample bosom and her pants were way too tight- she was curvaceous.
“If you ever want to chat about genies and stuff. I’m here.” The girl touched Samosa’s hand again. The electricity experienced before was magnified.
“Does this happen to all of us? Do more people know?”
Heather slowly shook her head. “Not really. I met one once a few months back but it was very sporadic.”
If I were you, I would have wished for a better job, Samosa thought.
“I took this job specifically for this moment,” the girl’s eyes brightened. “And to fill my days up.”
“To meet people like me?” Hope she isn’t psychic.
“Sure! What happened to me was so beautiful and unexpected and he was very, very handsome.” They both heard the door open and cold air moved in. Samosa looked back and saw that the night had grown darker already and it was not even five o’clock.
“We’ll chat later.” Heather waved goodbye and Samosa tipped her head once. Her stomach roiled in hunger.
Imagine that.
Another woman who met a genie.
Which one did she meet though?
_________
While in bed Samosa clicked from channel to channel. The crisp, fresh sheets were warm and fresh against her skin; the pillows were bright white and fluffy against her head. Nothing in particular was on, but her heart was the main channel she did focus on. What was really wrong with Stone? He seemed so different from other men and did not remind her of a demon. Until tonight of course.
She kept peeking at the phone Korin gave her. Forgetting again and again that Stone will not call her because her phone was left at home. Korin also made it clear that she was not to contact outside family members or friends or anyone from that cell. Only him.
This was getting too serious.
Suddenly the phone glowed and made a Womph womph sound. The entire phone lit up, how crazy. It was already a sleek black and platinum colored with a large display screen.
Korin’s face appeared. It scared her because she didn’t expect a picture, or rather a…
“Yes, my dear, it’s a video phone.” Korin said and smiled wanely. He looked tired but still picture perfect.
“Oh goodness! How’s Stone? Is he okay?”
“He’s subdued for the moment. I said a few prayers and covered him with a prayer cloth blessed with anointing oil. He’s been sleeping soundly for an hour now.”
“Oh thank God.” Samosa said. “When can I come back?” Already she missed home. Their home.
Korin’s face dipped down. That’s when she noticed her legs were bared to him via the screen and she smoothly placed them back under the covers.
“In a few days, or a week. That will cover the time for the other jinn to be prepped with the elixir and give some time for Stone to calm down.” He paused. “He was very…off. We fought but I still love him.”
Love. Korin used the L word.
How far along in his spiritual walk was he to use a word like that?
“The hotel clerk here says she has met a genie.”
Korin blinked once. Twice. Three times. “She has? She’s there now?”
“She works here. When we touched hands, I felt something and she did too.”
Korin’s eyes turned to slits. “Does she know you are marked?”
“No. She just knows I have met a genie and offered to tell me more.”
“Hold on.” Korin closed his eyes as if her were in an instant deep meditation. Samosa watched the clock next to the bed. She wanted to get his attention but it was as if he went on Sleep Mode like her laptop back at home.
“Sam. Get out of there. Get out now!”
“What?” Samosa leaped from her bed and jacked on her pants in less than three seconds. The phone was still lying on the bed; Korin’s eyes burned ruby red. “Tell me. What is it?”
“That girl is spy for the Grand Marid.”
“Shoot!” Samosa pulled on her top. Just as the door exploded.
She held her breath as a tall beast looking thing. Actually it had the head of a lizard. Half Godzilla half man. His skin was a leathery green color and he wore a brown monk robe with a thick rope tied at the waist for a belt. Samosa covered her mouth.
Heather. If that was her name, showed up next to him. “Sorry. I really do wish we could have been good friends.”
Samosa ignored her.
“Sam! Listen to my words!” Korin said. The lizard man advanced towards her and she shrank further back in the small room. Suddenly she heard chanting in a foreign language. Korin was reciting something.
“Nooooo!” Lizard man and Heather both screamed.
It was too late.
Samosa felt a surge of strength pour into her body, her nails curved into claws and the lizard man’s mouth was open exposing rows and rows of sharp teeth. Heather looked at him. “I didn’t know she was marked!” She pleaded. But the lizard man wrapped his massive hands around Heather’s slender neck and twisted it until Samosa could hear the loud pop of her bones.
Leaping over the bed Samosa stood before the beast. He was very smelly and very strong. His tongue- forked like a snake’s hissed at her, dripping white foam.
“One bite or scratch from me and you’ll die a slow painful death.” The thing’s voice sounded like nails dragging across a chalkboard.
Korin was still murmuring a magic incantation. Samosa felt strong as a lioness. She eyed the monster.
He swiped at her , nearly missing her neck and she dodged the second swipe to her belly by moving with the speed of a cheetah. The television crashed behind her sending shards of glass and electrical plugs sailing through the air.
She hopped again, took the coffee carafe and threw it hard at the beast’s head. He dodged it effortlessly.
But not the table it sat on.
Samosa lifted it swiftly; watched it sail through the air and land on top of his heavy body. He fell hard. She landed on top of him, straddled his torso and held her new ten inch claws high into the air.
“Who sent you?” She growled.
“I can’t…I can’t!” Foam dribbled from the sides of his mouth. Samosa put both her hands around his throat now. She knew without being told that she could snap his neck just like he did Heather’s.
“The Grand Marid sent you. Didn’t he?”
The beast looked confused, his yellow lizard e
yes looked through her. “No. He did not send us.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t serve you.”
“You said us. Who is us?” Samosa squeezed his neck for encouragement.
“I cannot tell. I won’t tell.”
Samosa choked him harder feeling his slimy but leathery skin slip and slide in her hands.
“I can’t tell! I will be killed!”
“I don’t really care.” Samosa stood up.
“You’re not going to kill me?” The thing sat up heaving, rubbing his neck.
Samosa’s stomach rumbled.
“Nah.” She said, adrenaline coursing through her blood.
“Good. Good girl.”
“I’m going to eat you.”
The beast had no time move before Samosa leapt at him with claws extracted. She imagined she would be a sight to see: A short woman leaping at something like that and then digging her nails into his meat to eat him alive. No matter where he came from- his meat was so good.
________
When she came to, her face was caked with blood and her nails had chunks of meat in them. Korin carried her all the way from hotel’s back parking lot to an area she would be familiar. He left Stone at the house, shielding him from going outside- he warned that Samosa would be fine if he stay put. He had much work to do already preparing the jinn and now handling Samosa.
She was going to die if he hadn’t chanted that spell over her. She already has darkness inside her but she had so much light too. Which is why she was attracting so much attention.
Near Huntington Park, a few miles from her mother’s home, he lay her down in the grass. The moon had cast an unearthly shine on her face, paling her and making her seem ethereal.
So much like Cyn.
He took a mug of water and a soft cloth like material emerged from his hands and he ran the liquid over it, wiped her face clean and her neck.
He had an opportunity to suck her soul completely away. She was not his but he could very well take it if he had the gall to. Her aura held a blue light with feathery white static fringes and a very dark hole in the center .Colors of a good soul but with struggle.
All it would take is a few words and she will completely turn and he could be in the Grand Marid’s good graces and not worry about being good.
“K- Korin.”
He leaned down so he could hear her
Then, a gurgling sound followed by a foul splash of liquid spewed from her lips landing on his chin and mouth.
He spat the stuff from his lips and quickly cleaned himself off with a spell. “What in hell?”
Samosa sat up groggily, leaves and twigs poking up from her hair. “Sorry. I ate something bad.” She hugged her belly and puked again in a nearby bush. Korin sighed and sat next to her, wiped her mouth.
“You’re a mess. You know that?”
“Yeah. Always have been.” She wiped her mouth with the cloth and plopped it on the ground. It was quiet save for a few owls hooting. They were near the CSX train rails on Huntington Avenue, about a mile from her mother’s home. Where she used to have picnics with them.
Except back then she wasn’t possessed and eating creatures and now she lay in the arms of a handsome blond guy whose eyes kept changing colors. Now they were a blood red.
“What does it mean when your eyes are red?” She asked.
Korin inclined his head, thought a moment, then looked back down and away from her. “Typically when I feel sexually excited or soul thirsty.”
“Soul thirsty?”
“No different than when Stone looks at you I’m sure, but he’s a closed book. I’m the one who can’t hide my feelings.”
“You’ve taken many souls then. Served them up to the Grand Marid.” Samosa’s tone cut.
“Yep. Lots of them.” Korin picked himself up and held out a hand to Samosa. Her hands were soft, but chilled. “You must go to your mother’s. Stay there until its time.”
“So I won’t see Stone until then?”
“Think of it as the nights before your wedding. No peeking,” he wagged his finger at her. That’s when she looked down at his feet; they stood on an Oriental carpet with some Turkish influences and swirling thin shapes in the center.
________
“Is that a-?”
“Some tales are true. We ride skies and fly carpets.” She took Korin’s hand, astonished that Stone never took her on a magic carpet ride like in her favorite old Disney movie.
As if reading he mind(maybe he did) Korin said, “Stone tries too much to be human.”
You too. Samosa thought.
Samosa graciously took his hand, aware that he studied her very closely.
“I could have taken your soul back there but I didn’t. You are too fascinating.”
“Okay so a threat and a compliment in one sentence.” She opting to sit on the plush carpet while he stood.
A good, strong wind picked up suddenly and the carpet floated up, carrying them beyond the trees and up. Up. Up over the treetops and between the clouds. She would have felt the cold any other time but did not. The air felt clean. Good. Korin faced the front, “steering” them to her mother’s home.
She will have to nag Stone about this later.
If she ever saw him again.
Should she even bother? He was not himself. A depressed Nightwalker .
When they finally touched down in front of her mom’s door she started to dash from the carpet, but Korin’s warm hand led her to the ground. “Patience.”
“I know,” she replied honestly loving the blue of his eyes.
“Remember, stay here and contact no one from your mom’s phone. Don’t even answer it if it’s for you or not.”
She gave a short nod but didn’t move to ring the doorbell. The air around Korin was too potent-electrifying and he knew it, leaning down to her face he let his lips graze her ear as he whispered: “If only you were mine.”