Magda hesitates, and the figures flicker. Gunza stomps over and smacks her across the face.
“Do your job!” he says. “Obey me!” He strikes her again.
Magda closes her eyes. Her nimble fingers finish their dance in the air, and the hulking forms solidify.
“Run, rabbit!” Gunza howls with laughter. “Don’t let ’em catch you!”
With one last look at Magda, I turn and sprint off into the depths of the mansion.
The hunters are silent. No shrieking laughter, no ululating howls, no clattering weapons and footsteps. I can barely hear them back there at all-just whispers and the rustling of wings and rags.
The quiet makes it all the worse as I run.
Heart hammering in my chest, I race to the end of the corridor and burst through the oak double doors there. Beyond the doors, I find myself in a vast arboretum, teeming with tropical trees and flowers.
Without stopping, I draw my cell phone and send a text message to my partner. At least I had the sense to post him elsewhere in case I needed backup.
Now, if only Gunza didn’t think to wish for Magda to block outgoing phone signals.
As I pocket the phone, I hear brush shuddering behind me. Ducking off the gold-bricked path, I bolt through the thick foliage, crossing the room away from my original trajectory.
Suddenly, a feverish ghoul explodes from the shrubbery ahead of me, swinging a machete. I fall back, barely escaping the blade… and nearly end up skewered on the point of a bayonet brandished by a leering soldier.
Twisting out of the way, I leap off into the cover as both of them slash and stab at me. I rush straight through the deep green jungle, panting for breath in the steamy air-and surge out of the vegetation in front of another set of double doors.
Plunging through the doors, I find myself in a maze. Through its frosted glass walls, I glimpse shadowy figures moving around me… but I have to go onward. I hear noise from the other side of the doors, so I can’t go back to the arboretum.
I move as quickly and quietly as I can, though it doesn’t matter. The enemy can see me as well as I see them through the frosted glass.
I zip around a corner, then another and another, always choosing right at the branches. Turning again, I spot a blurred figure on the other side of the translucent wall… and he spots me. He changes direction and follows me down the passage, keeping pace in a humpbacked trot, separated from me only by a few inches of glass.
Luckily, the next time I reach a branch, he hits a dead end. He howls, caught in a corner, as I dart down another passage, hoping for an exit.
I find one-a gleaming golden door inlaid with multicolored gems-but just as I charge forward, it crashes open, revealing a towering maniac.
He stands seven feet tall, at least, and his double-jointed limbs are like sticks. He’s naked except for a leather loincloth, and his skin is reddish-brown, like an almond.
His eyes and mouth gape wide as he scrambles toward me, drooling and whooping.
Suddenly, before I can do anything, he slows in mid-step. His movements stretch out as if he were the star of a slow-motion movie, and his whoops extend to one drawn-out tone.
I jump when I hear the normal-speed voice of Magda behind me. “That was one of my masters, two hundred and fifty years ago. Shall I tell you how he beat me?”
Looking around, I see another predator creeping from the maze in slow-mo. This one, muscular, blond, and bushy-bearded, wears the horned helmet of a Viking.
“Were these your masters through the ages?” I say.
She nods. “As you die, you will know what I’ve been through.”
Stepping toward the tall one, I gingerly touch his reddish-brown knuckles. “How can you be doing this? Disobeying Rudy?”
“I’m obeying him,” says Magda. “I’m slowing things down, but you will still be hunted and tortured.”
“Why talk to me at all then?”
Magda cocks her head and frowns. “What did you mean when you said you could help me?”
“I meant what I said,” I tell her. “All you have to do is tell me what you want. Just ask for it.”
She narrows her eyes. “I know what this is about now. You want me for yourself, don’t you?”
“No.” I shake my head. “I want to save you.”
“You’re not the first to say that.” Magda snorts and folds her arms over her blue satin bodice. “Somehow, saving me always ends with hurting me.”
“Not this time.” I spread my arms wide. “I swear, I’m here to help you.”
“You want my help collecting Rudy’s taxes,” says Magda. “For all the riches I’ve given him.”
“Actually,” I say, “you’re the only reason I’m here.”
Magda stares, her expression split between confusion and disbelief.
“This time, I’m not as concerned about tax evasion,” I say, “as I am about slavery and abuse.”
She looks like she’s thinking hard… and then her stare becomes an angry glare. “Liar. You’re a liar, just like all men.”
“I’m telling you, I came here only to save you.”
“Liar!” She lifts her hands overhead to weave and conjure, and I see the tall man start to move faster. “You better run, liar!”
Without another word, I dash around the tall man, heave open the door, and race into the hallway. I can tell she’s run out of patience, at least for now. I can tell she doesn’t believe me.
Even though I told her the absolute truth.
I don’t care about the mystic taxes. This time, I came only for her.
As I run down the hall, I open every door, but I’m not looking for a way out. I’m looking for something else.
A lamp. Her lamp.
Now that I’m on the inside of Gunza’s mansion, I’m determined to find it. I’m going to end this perverted jerk’s most heinous crime: genie abuse. The bastard’s a djinnophile.
Here’s how it works. The genie must obey her master. The genie has magical powers that can heal any wound, repair any damage. Even to herself.
What better scenario can there be for a twisted sicko who likes to hurt women? He can brutalize her any way he likes, then wish away the damage, removing any sign of the crime, expunging any guilt… and leaving a clean slate for the next round of abuse.
That’s what makes it especially evil. The genie becomes an accomplice to her own abuse. She literally has no choice.
And it goes on and on and on like that, again and again and again. Forever, if he wishes eternal life for himself.
So it’s no wonder Magda doesn’t trust me… but she should. There’s much more to me than meets the eye.
For one thing, I’m state police now, not Department of Mystic Revenue. I work for the Paranormal Victims Unit.
For another thing, I’m someone altogether different from any of that or anything Gunza could ever guess.
But Magda could figure it out. At least I hope she does before it’s too late.
I’m hustling through the gymnasium when they catch me. Two of the ghoulish thugs burst in through the far door from outside the mansion, and another drops down from the ceiling on a rope.
The one from the rope has dark skin and a tribal headdress of tattered fur and feathers. One of the other two has silver hair and wears a tuxedo, and the last one bulges with muscles and pads under a football player’s uniform. More echoes of Magda’s former masters.
As they surround me, I look for the best escape route. My eyes keep flicking to the open door to the outside, where my partner waits. If my text message got through to him, he could come charging through that door at any second, guns blazing.
Just as I have that thought, he pops up in front of me out of thin air. He’s standing, and at first I think he’s still alive… but then he literally falls to pieces- arms and legs and head and torso tumbling to the floor.