Day of the Djinn Warriors (14 page)

W
hile Groanin, Finlay, and John were traveling to and from Padua, Nimrod and Philippa went to the Piazza San Marco, which is the largest public space in Venice — a square with a famous church, a palace, a tall redbrick tower, lots of cafés, open-air orchestras, hundreds of well-fed pigeons, and thousands of tourists.

“Do you think Faustina will be all right where we left her?” Philippa asked Nimrod. “Lying on the terrace.”

“If the maid comes, she’ll just assume she’s sunbathing,” said Nimrod. “Besides, after twelve years inside, the hot sun will do her good. It’s only mundanes who get sunstroke.”

He bought a guidebook that he gave to Philippa. “Here,” he said. “So you’ll know what you’re looking at when you go sightseeing.”

“Aren’t you coming, too?” she asked him.

“No,” he said flatly. “For one thing, I’ve seen everything many times already. And for another, I want to do some serious thinking.”

He sat down outside the Caffé Florian and ordered afternoon tea. Philippa didn’t like tea very much. So, resisting the temptation to tell Nimrod he was being pompous, Philippa did as she was told, although it wasn’t long before she almost wished she hadn’t. Indeed, it wasn’t very long before she almost wished she were somewhere else other than the Piazza San Marco. The heat didn’t bother her. Extreme heat never bothers djinn very much. But the huge numbers of people did make her a little annoyed because it seemed that everyone was intent on seeing the same things she wanted to see. She had to wait in a long line to see the Doge’s Palace, and another even longer line to go up the bell tower. She had never seen so many tourists, and from so many different countries. She began to understand why Nimrod didn’t want to see anything, just to sit outside a café and drink tea and think. Even from the top of the 323-foot-tall tower, it was easy to see him in his red suit. He was, she realized with a smile, just about the easiest person to see in the whole of Venice.

The line for St. Mark’s Church was especially long, and Philippa found herself in the middle of a large tour group of elderly Chinese tourists. All of them were friendly and polite and she was soon reproaching herself for originally wishing they would all disappear. Few of them spoke any English, however, and if she’d had any djinn power she might have
wished she could speak Chinese so that she might say something nice to them as they shuffled along the front of the magnificent historic old church to the entrance door at the side.

After a while, her mind wandered a little and she found herself thinking about her mother and wondering how she was and hoping that Faustina might still recover in time for her to make it to Babylon and take over as the next Blue Djinn. Mrs. Trump was also in her thoughts; it was very worrying that she was still in a coma. Most worrying of all, perhaps, was the disappearance of Mr. Rakshasas. Was he dead, as John seemed to think? She hadn’t dared to ask Nimrod what he thought. And she decided that maybe that was what he was thinking about: Mr. Rakshasas and the warrior devils. Quite probably he was trying to figure out the identity of the mysterious Ma Ko who had been mentioned in the emperor’s
Jade Book
.

That was when she heard it.

Not once but several times. And snapping out of her hot afternoon reverie, she almost felt like pinching herself as she thought she heard one of the Chinese tourists use the words “Ma Ko.” Instead, she tapped the shoulder of the Chinese man standing in front of her and smiled at him. He bowed politely back to her.

“Ma Ko?” she said, and shrugged, trying to indicate that she didn’t know what it was.

“Ma Ko,” he said, and grinned.

This time she threw up her hands. “Ma Ko? What is that?”

The Chinese man pointed to the church. “Ma Ko,” he said.

“What is Ma Ko? A church?”

“Ma Ko.” More pointing.

Philippa shook her head. The Chinese man’s guidebook was the same as Philippa’s, except that hers was in English. He took her book, turned to the relevant page detailing St. Mark’s Church, and pointed to a mosaic picture of St. Mark.

“Ma Ko,” he repeated.

“You mean Mark?” she said. “St. Mark?”

The Chinese man nodded. “Ma Ko,” he said.

Another Chinese man was being pushed back along the line toward her. He was all teeth and glasses, his face one huge smile. It seemed he spoke some English. “Ma Ko?” he said. “That’s how we say ‘Mark’ in Chinese. Ma Ko or sometimes Ma Ho, depending where you come from.”

Philippa thanked him several times so that he wouldn’t think that she was rude. Then she ran off to find Nimrod.

She found him where she’d left him, his eyes closed, his curious, intelligent face with its slightly crooked nose angled toward the sun like a satellite dish. On the table were the remains of a plate of sandwiches, scones, cakes, and several pots of tea. Pulling up a chair and flicking away a pigeon with Nimrod’s napkin, she sat down, ate a little cake, and
stared at him while trying to restrain the triumph she was feeling.

“How’s the thinking coming along?” she said.

He opened his eyes slowly as if he had been asleep. “I was thinking about poor Mr. Rakshasas,” he said. “To be absorbed, at his age. It’s most worrying.” He let out a sigh and drank some tea. “What’s the matter with you? You look like you just found a pearl in an oyster.”

“I did,” she said. “In a manner of speaking. Ma Ko. I know who it is. You’re looking at it.”

Nimrod kept on thinking for a moment. Then he smacked his forehead hard with the flat of his hand. It sounded as loud as if someone had struck him in anger, and an amorous couple drinking champagne at the next table gave Philippa a funny look as if they suspected her of doing it.

“Of course,” groaned Nimrod. “Saint Mark. How could I have been so stupid? And me a Grand Commander of the Order of St. Mark, too. Light my lamp, however did you guess?”

Philippa told him about all the Chinese people who were in the line to get into the church, and how she had overheard their conversations about Ma Ko.

He tutted loudly, exasperated with himself. “I’m afraid this business with Mr. Rakshasas has quite destroyed my powers of concentration,” he said.

“According to my guidebook,” said Philippa, “the church contains the bones of St. Mark.”

“That’s what they say,” said Nimrod.

“Those must be the bones mentioned by the emperor in that
Jade Book
.” She pointed to a picture in the book. “Look. That’s the sarcophagus where he’s buried.”

Nimrod was looking doubtful.

“What?” she demanded. “Isn’t the book right?”

“Oh, the book’s right insofar as that is certainly what is claimed,” said Nimrod. “But many people, myself included, think the body of the saint perished in the great fire of 976. It was certainly missing in 1094 when the Venetian authorities conducted a search for it. A few months later, there was a small earthquake and, it is believed, the saint’s body was miraculously found again.”

“Miraculously?”

“Not to say conveniently.” Nimrod shrugged. “Wouldn’t you agree?”

“So the bones aren’t there at all? Is that what you’re saying?”

“No, they might actually be there,” said Nimrod. “Somewhere. Just not in that sarcophagus beneath the high altar. My own theory is that they are most likely lying rather more anonymously somewhere in the church reliquary. That’s a place where all sorts of holy relics are kept. Bones, teeth, hair, bits of wood, blood, you name it. People used to claim all sorts of bits and pieces had come from one saint or another. Relics were big business back in the Middle Ages. The reliquary in St. Mark’s is one of the biggest and oldest in the world. My guess is that if the bones are in there, that’s where we’ll find them. If the Emperor Chengzong and his
Jade Book
is right, we’re going to need them when we go to China.”

“Are we going to China?” asked Philippa.

“Just as soon as we’ve helped Faustina,” said Nimrod. “I don’t doubt she’s right, too — that something strange is happening in the world of spirit that we need to find out more about.”

“The trick is letting the bee sting without killing the bee,” said Signor Medici.

“Is that possible?” asked Nimrod.

“If you know what you are doing,” he said.

“Sorry about this, Faustina,” said Nimrod, “but it’s for your own good, I think.”

“I’ve never actually revived someone with the bee sting before,” confessed Signor Medici. “This is a first for me. Where would you like the bee to sting her?” And holding one of his “little friends” with a pair of tweezers, Cesare Medici sat down on the sun lounger beside Faustina’s immobile body. “On her back? On her shoulder? Please. You say where.”

“On her earlobe,” said Nimrod. “That’s what Mr. Rakshasas told me, anyway.”

“Oh, I say,” said Groanin, covering his eyes, “I don’t know where to look.”

“On her earlobe?” repeated Signor Medici.

Nimrod nodded.

Signor Medici smiled and said something in Italian that Philippa took to be the Italian word for “earlobe.” And still holding the bee by the head with the tweezers, he tapped it on the thorax a couple of times just to make it mad enough to sting. The bee did its job, stinging her almost immediately, and soon there was a livid red mark on Faustina’s earlobe.

“Ouch,” said Philippa, biting her lip.

Faustina twitched, quite noticeably, it seemed to Philippa, and then remained motionless.

“Two bees or not two bees,” said Nimrod. “That is the question. Once more I think, Signor Medici. On the other earlobe this time.”

The Italian nodded and extracted another bee from the little tackle box he had brought from Padua. Philippa had looked at it while he was going about his work with the tweezers; each bee lived in its own little glass-topped compartment with a few drops of honey to feed it. Like a little prisoner.

The second sting produced a much more violent twitch of Faustina’s head, as if someone had passed a strong current of electricity through her. Like a frog in some school biology experiment. That was what Philippa thought. She’d always hated that part of doing biology.

“Ouch,” said Philippa, more loudly this time.

“I do bee-lieve we’re almost there now,” said Nimrod. “One more should do it. This time, on her bee-hind. No, perhaps not. On the inside of her wrist, I think, Signor Medici.”

“I don’t know how you can joke about this, Uncle Nimrod,” said Philippa. “That looks painful.”

“Okay,” said Signor Medici. “Now I use my special bee. This bee, he’s a very tough bee. Very angry. Got a real attitude problem. Not sweet and friendly like most of my bees. He doesn’t even like honey. He doesn’t like anything. It’s why I keep him in a separate box. I call him Silvio.”

From another box he took out a bee much larger than the other two, which had a buzz that sounded like a small chain saw.

Philippa looked at the bee and winced as Signor Medici held the bee on Faustina’s wrist and then flicked it casually. The bee buzzed angrily, bent his abdomen down, braced himself against the flesh with his hind legs, and then stabbed his stinger into the girl’s wrist with all his strength, delivering, for good measure, an extra amount of bee venom.

“Yarooo!”

Faustina let out a loud shriek, grabbed her wrist and then her earlobes with both hands, which knocked the tweezers out of Signor Medici’s hands. Silvio, the bee, now free from his owner’s control, settled on Faustina’s forearm and then stung again. And then again.

“Yarooo!”

Faustina jumped up from the sun lounger, scrambled up onto the high balcony, and, seeing the bee come after her a fourth time, launched herself off the side of the hotel in an elegant swan dive straight down into the waters of the Grand Canal.

Nimrod and Philippa ran to the edge and looked over just in time to see Faustina rise to the surface and swim to the side of the canal. A small crowd gathered to watch. And quite quickly, it seemed to Philippa, it grew even larger. She grabbed a terry cloth robe and ran out of the door and downstairs, ready to save Faustina’s blushes. Nimrod laughed loudly.

“A result, I think, Signor Medici,” said Nimrod. “Mission accomplished. Well done, sir. Well done.”

Signor Medici looked around and then shrugged. “I lost my best bee,” he said unhappily.

Nimrod handed him another handful of banknotes. “Here,” he said. “Get yourself a hiveful.”

F
austina walked back into the hotel with Philippa. She hardly cared about the sensational effect her appearance in the water had worked on the gondoliers — Venice’s famous boatmen — who were already calling her
“la sirena americana,”
which is Italian for “American mermaid.” All that mattered was that she was in her own skin again and that everything felt just great. She was deliriously happy. Even her dip in the Grand Canal had been enjoyable — especially as it had relieved the pain of five bee stings. What was even better was the realization that the djinn power was back in her body. Just feeling the hot Venetian sun on her face had told her that much.

They were walking toward the elevator when Faustina heard a voice she recognized.

“Faustina?”

“Mom?”

Jenny Sachertorte hugged the daughter she hadn’t seen for twelve years and tried to control her tears. Faustina hugged her back, hardly caring if she got her mother wet or not. She was so happy to see her.

“Mom, what are you doing here?”

“Did you think I could stay away from my own daughter?”

“I was so mad at you,” said Faustina. “I’m sorry.”

“I know,” said Jenny Sachertorte. “So am I.”

“It wasn’t your fault. What happened, with Dybbuk. I know that now. It wasn’t your fault. I’m sorry I blamed you. I’m sorry I did what I did to the British prime minister.”

“Let’s talk about it later.”

“But how did you know I was here?” asked Faustina.

“Nimrod, of course,” said Dr. Sachertorte. “As soon as he heard your spirit had been found, he telephoned me. At first, I didn’t dare come in case it didn’t work. I mean, your getting back inside your own body. But then I realized I had to come, regardless of what happened.”

“It very nearly didn’t work,” said Faustina, laughing. “When I got back in my body I sort of seized up. I couldn’t move a muscle. I could hear and see everything around me, but I was paralyzed. But for the help of some bees I might still be that way.”

“Bees?”

In the elevator, Faustina and Philippa explained about Signor Medici and his bee therapy.

“I never imagined I could be so happy to have my daughter stung by a bee,” said Dr. Sachertorte.

“That’s the way I feel about it, too.” Faustina laughed out loud and hugged her mother again.

In Nimrod’s suite of rooms, they found him drinking champagne in celebration of Faustina’s restoration to good djinn health. Groanin was reading his newspaper and sipping a cup of tea. Finlay and John were watching television. The two boys greeted Faustina coolly because each was trying to pretend to the other that he didn’t feel anything very much for her, but failing miserably because, of course, it’s impossible to keep anything secret when two different people are sharing one physical body. And it goes without saying, Faustina knew that, too.

Nimrod stood up and embraced Dr. Sachertorte fondly. “It looks as if you have a daughter again,” he said.

“Isn’t it wonderful?” said Dr. Sachertorte.

“I thought you’d come a cropper, my lass, when you jumped off that balcony,” said Groanin. “Must be thirty feet down to that canal. Water’s absolutely filthy, of course. I mean, you do know that all the lavatories in Venice get emptied straight into it. That’s why it smells the way it does. If I were you, miss, I’d have me stomach pumped immediately. Just in case you pick up some kind of tummy bug. Mind you, having said that, it’s lucky you jumped off that side and landed in the canal. The other side, you’d have landed in the street. All that fuss over a few bee stings. I never saw the like.”

“No harm done,” said Nimrod. “That’s the main thing.”

“I was so sorry to hear about Mr. Rakshasas,” Dr. Sachertorte told Nimrod. “Is there no hope?”

“I’m afraid we shan’t know that,” said Nimrod, “until we have discovered more about the being that absorbed him in the spirit world.”

“Does that mean you’re going back to New York?”

“Actually, no,” said Nimrod. “I think we may have to stay here in Venice for a while. To do some further research.”

“That’s great,” said Finlay. “I love Venice. I think Venice is cool.”

“Do you?” murmured Groanin. His nose wrinkled with displeasure and, producing a small bottle from his jacket pocket, he dabbed some more aftershave behind his ears.

“How about it, Faustina?” asked Finlay. “Are you going to stay here in Venice with us for a while?”

“I’m afraid not,” said Faustina. “I have other plans, as I think you already know.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Finlay. “Babylon. I forgot.”

“Why don’t you come and visit me when I’m the Blue Djinn?” she asked. “At my official residence in Berlin.”

“Who, me?” said Finlay.

“Both of you.”

“Is that allowed?” John asked. “I mean, I thought guys weren’t allowed to visit with the Blue Djinn.”

“That’s only true in Babylon, John,” said Faustina. “Besides, I intend to make some changes when I’m supreme
djinn. Ayesha was in charge for so long that people have quite forgotten what it was like before her. You see, a lot of what we believe about being Blue Djinn came from her. And it doesn’t have to be that way. Living beyond good and evil is one thing. Being that way is quite another. I did quite a bit of research on the subject.”

“But I was there,” said Philippa, “in Babylon. At one point, I thought I was going to be the Blue Djinn myself. I remember the effect the place had on me. I hardly recognized John when he showed up to rescue me.”

“It’s true,” said John. “She was a real pig.”

“I worked out a way for none of that to affect me.”

“This should be interesting,” said Nimrod, exchanging a glance with Dr. Sachertorte.

“I’ve learned a lot while I’ve been out of my body for twelve years. I spent two whole years studying the
Baghdad Rules
. Not the
Shorter Baghdad Rules
, compiled by Mr. Rakshasas, but the longer version. All two hundred volumes. If Ayesha had ever read them, she would have discovered that there’s plenty in them about how a female djinn must spend thirty days in Iravotum if she is physically to become the Blue Djinn of Babylon. But there’s nothing that says her spirit has to stay there, too. It’s so obvious that I wonder why someone didn’t think of it earlier.”

“Are you suggesting that your spirit could be elsewhere?” said Nimrod. “That my mother could have been the Blue Djinn and still have managed to keep some warm feelings for my sister, Layla, and me?”

“I’m not suggesting it,” said Faustina, “I’m stating it as a fact. As soon as I get there I’m going to leave my body and take my spirit somewhere else, for thirty days. I do believe I might go to Mount Olympus. I’ve heard it’s very good for spirits there.”

“So you’re saying that while your body might be affected,” said Nimrod, “your spirit can remain unchanged.”

“That’s exactly right. I can be the Blue Djinn without having to change very much at all. Isn’t that marvelous?”

“But what about your ability to be impartial in the making of judgments between good and evil?” said Nimrod.

“Judges manage it all right,” said Faustina. “They can seem totally inhuman in their administration of the law without actually being inhuman. They’ve been doing it for centuries.”

“So you
can
have your cake and eat it, too,” said Nimrod.

“Yes, isn’t it wonderful?” Faustina smiled at Philippa and then at Finlay/John. “Which is why you guys can come and stay with me in Berlin.”

“Great,” said the three children.

“Well, I must say that’s the best news I’ve heard all day,” said Nimrod. He looked at Jenny Sachertorte. “Did you know any of this, Jenny?”

“No. It’s the first time I heard of it.” Dr. Sachertorte shook her head. “If only someone had discovered all of this sooner. You and Layla might have been spared the loss of your own mother.”

“Yes,” said Nimrod quietly.

“Which reminds me,” said Faustina, “I had better leave right away if I’m going to stop Layla from becoming the Blue Djinn instead of me. You know, it’s a pity Dybbuk’s not here. I’d like to have seen him again before I left.”

“You can see him now,” said John, pointing with Finlay’s hand at the TV. “There he is.”

Everyone moved slowly toward the TV and watched as Jonathan Tarot, wearing a fabulous black, diamond-encrusted jumpsuit, performed a spectacular feat of close-up magic, making a mouse appear in a girl’s hand. The studio audience applauded with huge enthusiasm.

“Except that he’s not calling himself ‘Dybbuk’ these days,” said John. “Now he’s called Jonathan Tarot. And he’s a huge star. You can hardly open a magazine or a newspaper without seeing his face.”

Nimrod shook his head sadly. “Dybbuk, Dybbuk,” he said with a sigh.

“I tried to talk him out of it,” said Jenny Sachertorte. “But he wouldn’t listen. I even tried to put a binding on him. But he’s become too powerful for me to control, Nimrod.”

“Djinn power was always strong in him,” said Nimrod. “Stronger than his judgment.”

“What did you expect?” said Dr. Sachertorte. “Look who his father is.” She smiled apologetically at Faustina.

“He makes it look like it’s a real illusion,” said John. “If you know what I mean. Like it’s just a trick. A good trick. But a trick nonetheless.”

“If people ever thought it was real,” said Philippa, “they’d probably start to question their whole world.”

“Wise words, Philippa,” said Nimrod. “That is the real danger of Dybbuk doing what he’s doing. That he’ll go too far and they’ll find out that it’s not an illusion at all.”

As they watched, the TV cameraman cut away to a shot of the audience applauding a feat of magic that was remarkable to anyone but another djinn. In the audience was a fair-haired man with a chin beard who was wearing a curious white jacket. It was Adam Apollonius.

“He doesn’t seem to realize the dangers of such profligate use of his djinn power,” said Nimrod. “Using it all the time like that, on cheap conjuring tricks, will have serious consequences.”

“Don’t you think I told him that?” said Dr. Sachertorte. “He said he didn’t care. And that it’s his life, to do with as he wants.” She sighed. “What’s a mother to do? I sure don’t know. It’s not like I can threaten him with his father anymore. Especially now that he knows his father is not his father. He doesn’t seem to care about what I say anymore. And after all I’ve done for him.”

Everyone, apart from Groanin, continued to stare at the TV in silence.

“Hey,” said Faustina. “That’s the man from the cavern with the pyramid and the silver lake. The one I heard use the words
Dong Xi.”
She waved her hand at the studio audience on the TV screen. “Him.”

Faustina pointed to the man sitting next to Adam Apollonius. Almost immediately, the camera cut back to a smiling Dybbuk and only Philippa was quick enough to see the hard-looking young man to whom Faustina was pointing and to realize that she, too, had seen him before. At the Djinnversoctoannular Tournament in New York the previous Christmas. She most vividly remembered him for the amount of serious swearing he’d done after she’d defeated him in the first round. Her ears started to burn again as she recalled the many unpleasant things he had called her on his way out of the Algonquin Hotel.

Adam Apollonius had been sitting next to Rudyard Teer, one of the sons of Iblis the Ifrit, and half brother to Dybbuk. Not only that, but Philippa had half an idea that Teer had been sitting in front of another equally unpleasant Ifrit: Palis the Footlicker. She told all this to Nimrod and Dr. Sachertorte.

“Now I’m really worried,” admitted Dr. Sachertorte.

“Calm yourself, dear lady,” said Nimrod. “Calm yourself. Things may not be quite what they appear.”

“Nimrod’s quite right, Dr. Sachertorte,” said Groanin. “I say, there’s no point in getting upset by something that might turn out to be nothing at all. It’s perfectly possible that these villains were there quite by chance. On the other hand, it may be that there is some evil design behind their being in that audience. That Dybbuk is in grave and mortal danger, right enough. But I wouldn’t start worrying about that until you have to. I have found — yarooo!” A very
red-faced Groanin leaped out of his armchair, threw down his newspaper, and, grimacing with pain, sprinted into the bathroom, slamming the door firmly shut behind him.

“Well, that’s a relief, I must say,” said Dr. Sachertorte.

“What did he say he’d found?” asked John.

“I think he just found Signor Medici’s missing bee,” said Philippa, trying not to laugh.