She laughed. “Nice. I was waiting when she’d pull the old ‘You’re the bad twin’ on us. Come on. Who do you think’s going to believe you this time? I’ve got my memories back. You’re nothing but a cheap copy.”
That was an echo of what I’d been thinking. I blinked, startled. Either she could read my thoughts-icky, but possible-or her mind simply worked the same way. If she’d taken on my memories, my experiences that completely, if she could fool David and Lewis, then maybe she really had become me, as much as a Demon could.
That made my job a hell of a lot harder, because she wasn’t faking. As Venna had warned, she really was me, in all the ways that would count.
I looked desperately at Lewis, at David. “Guys. What if you’ve got the evil twin standing right there? What if I’m the one she stole everything away from? Kill me, and you’ll never be able to fix that; it’ll be too late-”
Evil Twin snorted, exchanged a wry look with David, and walked away, arms folded. Heading calmly back for the SUV.
“Wait!” I yelled. “David, you know me! You have to know that’s not me!”
That earned me nothing. Evil Twin opened the passenger-side door of the truck and climbed in, then slammed the door. Lewis and David exchanged another one of those unreadable looks. God, I’d never realized how scary it was from this end, faced with these extremely competent people. How desperate it was to be on the losing side.
She’s going to pull it off. She’s going to have David, live my life, and be happy until she pulls off whatever evil plan she’s concocted, and there’s not a goddamn thing I can do about it.
I hated losing.
Wind whipped across me, blinding me with grit and a mouthful of black smoke from the still-smoldering wreck of my car. “Then just get it over with,” I choked. “If you’ve got the guts, just do it.”
The SUV’s engine started up, and it drove away, slowly winding around the trees. Taking my future with it.
“We’re not going to kill you,” Lewis said with an eerie amount of calm. “We couldn’t, could we? If you’re a Demon, you’d just assume another form. The only way to destroy a Demon without sacrificing a Djinn is with another Demon.”
“Guess you don’t have one of those handy,” I said, and closed my eyes in exhausted relief.
When I opened them, David, expressionless, was taking a sealed bottle out of his coat. There was red wax around the stopper, and an ancient-looking seal dangling from a complicated knot of ribbons.
The knee in my back dug in harder when I tried to raise up, driving me flat and helpless. I struggled to reach for power, but whatever they’d done to me up on the aetheric was holding fast. I couldn’t move the weather, or fire, and when I tried to grab for the slow throb of energy in the earth, something slapped me back with stunning force.
Lewis. I’d recognized the handprint of the slap.
“No,” I said quietly. “You can’t. David, you can’t. I’m not a Demon! David, no!”
He walked toward me, put a hand in between my shoulder blades, and nodded to Lewis to let go. The relief of the pressure coming off my back didn’t last, because David’s hand might not have been as heavy, but it was just as effective in restraining me.
“This bottle contains a Djinn,” he said. “A Djinn infected with a Demon. Under normal circumstances the Demon wouldn’t migrate back to a human, but you’re different. Demons will destroy each other by preference. If there’s any good news, it’s that by destroying you, we’re going to save a Djinn’s life.”
“David, no! I’m not a Demon!”
It was no good. He was going to do it. I could see it in his eyes, in the fierce, focused determination on his face. “Please,” I said. I dropped all my defenses, and let him see me as vulnerable as I really was. “Please don’t do this to us.”
His lips thinned, and he flinched a little. “I wish you didn’t look so much like her.”
“I am her, and if you open that bottle you’re going to find that out, because the Demon won’t migrate, and then you’ll have a much bigger problem! David!” He wasn’t listening to me. I heard the crackle of the wax seal breaking. “David, God, stop it! Our daughter isn’t dead!”
It seemed like, for one second, time stopped. Even the wind ceased to blow. Then it all snapped back with a vengeance, as David snarled and grabbed a handful of my hair and yanked it painfully back, staring into my face with terrifying fury.
“You,” he said, “don’t talk about my daughter. Ever.”
It hurt to talk, but I had no choice. “David, if you open that bottle, you’re making a huge mistake. Imara’s alive. She’s become the Earth Oracle. Go check if you don’t believe me.” I tried to swallow, but the painful angle at which he was holding my head made it almost impossible. “Go on. I’m not going anywhere.”
He was about one second from killing me. Or popping the cork on that sealed bottle. I didn’t know what that would do, but it wouldn’t be good.
I got support from an entirely unexpected quarter: Lewis. He said quietly, “It couldn’t hurt to check.”
“Stay out of it,” David hissed at him.
“What if we’re wrong? Look, I’m the first one to want to believe in miracles, but Joanne’s memories came back too fast; we both said so. What if…” Lewis looked at me, then at David. “What if this one’s telling the truth? If you’re wrong and you open that bottle, we can’t make that right without a lot of death and destruction.”
“She’s lying!” David’s grip on my hair tightened. I squeaked faintly, sure my neck was on the verge of separating from my shoulders. That would be a real mess.
“Then go and check.” Lewis sounded awfully calm. Almost offhand about it. “She’s not going anywhere. It’s a short trip for you to Sedona and back.”
The pressure on my head relaxed so suddenly it was all I could do to keep my face from bouncing off the road. The push of his hand on my back went away at the same time. I struggled up to my knees, trying to put my shoulders at some angle that didn’t hurt like hell, trying to ignore the cutting ache of the zip-ties on my wrists, and looked around. The other Wardens were standing silently around. Nobody was shifting attention, including Lewis.
David vanished with an audible pop of air.
I let my head drop. Sweat ran down my cheeks, funneled to the point of my chin, and pattered on the stained fabric of my blue jeans.
I had no idea what he was going to find, or believe. But at least I had five minutes.
“If you try anything-” Lewis began.
“Yeah, yeah, you’ll kill me,” I finished in a tired mumble. “Save your breath.” What if Imara didn’t appear to David? I hadn’t even considered that maybe he wouldn’t be able to see her, or that she might not want to see him. It had seemed like my only shot, and now that I thought about it, it was thinner than a Hollywood starlet on diuretics. “I am so kicking your ass later, Lewis.”
He smiled. Cynically. “Always possible,” he said. “Shut up before I seal your mouth.”
He could do it, too. I shut up and concentrated on breathing, and wondering where the hell my Djinn cavalry had ridden off to. Venna had just left me. Cut her losses and skipped. I didn’t know if Ashan was dead in the wreck, or if she’d taken him with her; either way, nobody was stepping up for me when I needed it.
My fingers were tingling. I tried adjusting my wrists, and to my shock I found that the zip-ties were softening. Stretching like rubber bands. I stopped moving after the first second, holding my breath and praying that Lewis-or the other Wardens-hadn’t noticed. It didn’t look like they had. “How’s Marion?” I asked. “I didn’t hurt her, did I?”