Free Djinn Rummy by Tom Holt

‘Apt,’ he said, as the glass in the windows began to creak with the pressure. ‘Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?’ The windows exploded and the Chair, Number Two and Number Three blacked out. Two seconds later, the pressure inside the room squashed them as flat as paper.
    Philly Nine smiled, wiped human off his sleeve, and soared away into the upper air.

    Faster than a thought he flew, breaching the Earth’s atmosphere in a shower of sparks and soaring in a wide, lazy orbit around the Equator. As he went he amused himself by catching satellites and crumpling them in his fist like foil jam-tart cups. The further away from the planet’s gravitational field he flew, the larger he became. A tail of fire flickered behind him, and dry ice knotted his hair.
    From this altitude, the planet was mostly white and blue. The genie considered it impassively. It had, he felt, a sort of glazed, ceramic look, like a spun-glass Christmas tree ornament.
    Or a very old bottle.
    And, like all his kind, he had this problem with bottles. Bottles, in his opinion, were there to be broken.
    And if one blue bottle should accidentally fall . . .
    Â 
    Kiss, genie-handling a huge roll of beige Wilton across the enormous expanse of the living-room floor, hesitated and glanced up through the window.
    He swore.
    Jane looked up. ‘Problem?’ she asked.
    â€˜Yes.’ Kiss nodded. ‘At least, there might be. Look,’ he said, ‘sorry to run out on you in the middle of the job, but could you see your way to managing without me for half an hour? There’s something I’ve got to see to.’
    â€˜Can’t it wait?’
    Kiss shook his head. With a crack the roll of carpet snapped open, flattened itself, hung for a moment six inches above floor level, and started to rise.
    â€˜I promise I’ll be back as soon as I possibly can,’ Kiss shouted. ‘Sorry about this,’ he added and vaulted into the middle of the carpet which bucked like an unbroken horse, pawed at the windows with its front corners, smashed the
glass and shot out into the air with Kiss sitting cross-legged on its back.
    Â 
    Philly Nine tutted. He was having trouble with the fiddly little knot the seed-sack was tied up with.
    â€˜Hey,’ said a voice directly below him. He glanced down, and saw a flat brown rectangle. The slight quivering of its outer seams reminded him of a stingray floating in clear water. He frowned.
    â€˜Is that you, Kiss?’ he queried.
    â€˜Philly!’ replied the voice. ‘Long time no see! And how’s the world been treating you?’
    The carpet closed in, drawing level with the hovering figure of Philly Nine, standing in the empty blackness trying to bite through a single strand of cord with teeth the size of office blocks.
    â€˜Not so bad,’ Philly replied. ‘What brings you here, my old mate?’
    Kiss shrugged. ‘Thought I’d catch a few spacewinds on my new rug. Like her?’
    â€˜Not bad,’ Philly replied. ‘Not bad at all. Like the stabilisers. You any good at knots?’
    â€˜I have my moments. Bung it over, whatever it is, and let me have a go.’
    Philly Nine hefted the bag, and then checked himself. Coincidence, he thought; there are only seven Force Twelve genies in the whole Universe, and at this crucial moment here’s two of them sharing one small, remote postage-stamp of empty space. ‘It’s OK,’ he replied. ‘I think I can probably manage. So,’ he added nonchalantly, ‘where’ve you been hiding yourself lately?’
    Kiss twitched his features into a rueful grin. ‘In an aspirin bottle,’ he replied, ‘of all places. And me, of all
people. Well, you know how brown glass gives me a headache.’
    â€˜Been out long?’
    â€˜Not very. And you?’
    Philly Nine shrugged. ‘I’ve been hanging out.’ he replied. ‘You know, ducking