Free jinn 01 - ember by Liz Schulte Page A

was there to tell Holden about me?
    “Depends on what he has to say,” Holden said.
    Oh shit.
     

 

     
     

     
     
    “I CAN’T DO it.” Olivia shoved her hands against her hips when the door shut. “I understand how this could help, but I don’t understand how you think I could do this.”
    “Just hear me out before you rush to judgment.”
    She nodded and went to sit down. She felt strongly about jinn. Liv had a hard time separating them from demons, and maybe she wasn’t really that far off base. A lot of jinn were cruel, callous, and sociopathic—but a lot of people would have described me that way too. Directing Olivia to where I needed her to go wasn’t always easy. She could spot the disingenuous at a hundred paces. The best way to get her to consider anything was to make it emotional—unfortunately, emotion wasn’t something that lived near the surface for me. I had to make the jinn sympathetic if I had any hope of getting her on board with this.
    “You asked me once what it was like to be a jinni, and I showed you, remember?”
    She nodded, those aqua eyes staring into my soul as they always did. Even when my soul wasn’t in my possession, she still saw it.
    “I showed you what it was like to be a free jinni. At the time, I was still coming to grips with the changes in my life and I didn’t really recognize them for what they were. You asked me if it was different and I told you no, but I was wrong. It’s completely different now.”
    Her eyes softened. “How?”
    “The beast is gone.” I rubbed my lower jaw, trying to think of a way to describe the change so she would understand it. “Remember the first time you came into my mind?”
    “The desert.”
    “That is where I always was before you pulled me out. I can’t really explain it, but I am not there anymore and the beast no longer calls to me. When I first met you, it wanted me to kill you. It would become restless if I was not following orders or doing my job. I had to manage it always to keep it happy, but not anymore. It’s gone and I am free to do what I want.”
    She nodded. “But what does this have to do with them? You’re different, Holden. You aren’t like the rest of them—you never were.”
    “I am exactly like the rest of them. A little more controlled perhaps, but they have all the same urges and cravings I did. There is no reason to think they couldn’t handle being free, especially if they have a leader and an occupation. Will all of them be perfect? No, but I don’t think the jinn were meant to be enslaved to demons. Maybe this is what you are supposed to do. Correct the imbalance that was created so long ago.”
    She shook her head. “The risk is too great. I have met other jinn, touched other jinn. They aren’t like you.”
    “If we free them, Hell loses an earthly hold. I’m not saying it would solve all the problems, but it would be a big win for Heaven. Not all of them can be saved, but saving a handful of jinn is better than having the thousands of them working for the other side.”
    “Heaven won’t see it that way. It would put a bigger target on our backs. I know it seems like the best choice right now, but it isn’t. There has to be another way.”
    “The target is nothing new. It’s never scared us before.”
    “Okay, let’s pretend for a second we free the jinn. What will Hell come up with next? Right now, we know what to expect from the jinn. If we take them away, who knows how they will adapt. Isn’t there a saying about the enemy you know…”
    Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t. She looked at me, calm and serene, all traces of the agitation she’d had when she came in gone. The angel was sticking pretty close to the surface of her mind. Olivia was easier to reason with, but right now I was going to have to win them both over.
    She ran her fingers through her hair. “Let me ask this. Why do you want to do this? You have shown no interest in the jinn for the past