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I inspected the place while my blinker clicked Iron Road was a small two-lane affair that disappeared into soht and shadow Picturesque, which was another word for isolated Why would Leant me off the beaten path? Why wouldn&039;t he just show up in the diner and, say, order an eggs Benedict and chat about the good old days? Well, of course, he had reason to be careful, too Leas, in many ways, the most wanted Warden in the world In comparison, I hadn&039;t even made the top ten

"What the fuck," I said to Delilah, and eased her back into gear as I turned the wheel She purred effortlessly down the hill onto Iron Road, into green shadow and smooth, deserted blacktop I kept the speed down On a rural road like this, anything was likely to jump out and present a road hazard, especially wildlife and far cow out of rille while a storm rolled up on me

Fields stretched beyond the trees, sundrenched and extravagantly green I rolled down theand breathed in cool, clear air spiced with earth and new leaves Lewis hadn&039;t said how far to proceed down Iron Road; I could only guess there&039;d be another sign

At the crest of the next hill, I saw a neat red far people paint for craft fairs; I&039;d never really seen one that, well, perfect before It even had a wind cud in the fields, ringed with a tumbledown rock fence and a riot of neildflowers in neon purple and buttercup yellow Perfect Tho velvet waves, and I re how similar the seas of water and air were to each other We swim in an ocean of air Come to think of it, that probably wasn&039;t a weather class It sounded like English lit to e names, but it should have; after the pretty little farm, it turned into Dirt Road, rutted and uneven I slowed Delilah to a crawl and fretted about the state of her suspension Nothing up ahead that I could see except a hill loo out their arms over the road

Delilah slowed downthe brake

It&039;s funny how you can just know these things, if you&039;re true partners with your car I could feel, as if it were my feet instead of Delilah&039;s tires on the road, that so through deep mud, but the road was dry, the ruts hard-caked and laced with brittle tire treads What was slowing us down?

I heard soe of the car I knew that sound It sounded like

Delilah shuddered, and I heard her engine take on a plaintive, unhappy tone She was struggling toharder, and harder, with every rotation of the wheels

It sounded like loose sand

The road was turning to sand, and ere sinking into it

"Shit!" I yelped, and went up into Oversight As soon as I soared out of body and above the car, I could see it; the earth was dull red, h dry soil was being crushed into tiny, slippery grains No, not sandthe road was turning to dust, finer than sand, and not just on the surface-this went deep, ten feet at least

I yanked the wheel, trying to get Delilah off the road and into the trees, where roots and plants would slow the progress of liquefying earth, but it was already too late, the wheel turned loosely in eysered into the dry air and puffed away on the waves of the ocean of air The car settled about a foot, and I knew that there was nothing keeping it up now except an even distribution of weight over a large, flat undercarriage That and possibly sooodwill

We floated, ht, I spotted h the underbrush-a blue-green aura, laced through with pure white for power, gold for tenacity, cold silver for ruthlessness

Marion Bearheart had found me

I dropped back intoout of the trees to my left She was just about as I renified, skin like burnished copper and hair of black and silver hanging loose over her shoulders Marion still had kind, gentle eyes, but there was nothing weak about her

"Joanne," she said, and her low voice see to run Wherever you go, I can dissolve the ground under your feet, tie you doith roots and grasses Let&039;s otten Marion was an Earth Warden

A rustle of underbrush on the other side of the car drew er than Marion, male I didn&039;t know him, but he had Scandinavian white-blond hair, fair skin, and summer-blue eyes Like Marion, he had on a plaid shirt and blue jeans, practical hiking boots Another Earth Warden Their fashion sense-or lack of it-was un next to him, was so small I al delicate about her clothes, though, which featured a lot of leather and attitude Her hair was cut pixie-short, streaked with unnatural greenish highlights, and she had face jewelry-a nose ring, to be exact, with a stud to ht friends," I said, turning back to Marion She sainst you? Naturally" She nodded toward the a storm, I&039;d advise you not to try it; Shirl is a damn fine practitioner, but she has a tendency to be a little heavy-handed"

Pieces of the puzzle started to drop together "Oh The salt?"

This tihted smile "I just wanted to talk to you, Joanne It see for someone It stood to reason it was another Warden I was only hoping it was someone with an Earth power, or that would have seemed a little odd"

Since Lewis had the whole collectible set, nothing would have seemed odd to meand didn&039;t that just su salt was odd on a percentage basis

Just ahtly darker thought "The lightning bolt?"

Marion looked startled "Of course not! We just want to talk to you, not kill you Shirl&039;s specialty is not weather, in any case"

I saw soht out of the corner ofout a palold and orange and hot reds It reflected in her dark eyes, and I felt a surge of dislike for the arrogance I saw there I know, better Fire Wardens than you, sweetheart Ones who don&039;t have to show off for the boss Still, fire gave me the willies, always had I&039;d seen what it could do, close up

"So talk," I said "Or give me back the road and let "

"I know" Marion speared Shirl with a look, and Shirl put the fire back where it came from "Let&039;s take a walk, Joanne"

She reached out and opened the car door A square stepping-stone of solid earth forh forDelilah rock like a boat in a pond, and bent down to test what ers passed into the dust with barely any resistance at all; it was so fine, so frictionless than I felt a second&039;s dizziness Fall into that, and you wouldn&039;t be co up

"This way," Marion said, and turned away I put my hand on Delilah&039;s dusty finish for a few seconds, trying to reassure her-and s weren&039;t as bad as they seeround and into the shadows of the trees

It felt like another world Marion&039;s world The Earth spoke to her, the way the sky did tofootsteps of living things, sht about the far That had been Marion&039;s equivalent of doodling, while she waited Perfect grass, artistic dottings of wildflowers Marion created beauty from chaos, or maybe just deh the right eyes

We carass stalks, silver tipped, that rustled and murmured and bent under the touch of a brisk northeast wind Overhead, white cirrus clouds shredded into lacework A plane crawled the blue and threaded a white contrail through the lattice It all looked flat, but I knew the plane was barely above the troposphere The cirrus clouds were at least twenty-five thousand feet, her, well above the level of even a weather balloon And those peaceful clouds were scudding fast, dragging the storm behind

Marion turned her face into the wind and said, "The Zuni always said, first thunder brings the rain But we&039;re far fro about the weather Most of it&039;s nonsense"

"Most of it," she agreed, and looked at entle eyes "Murder&039;s a serious charge, Joanne Running from it makes no sense You know you&039;ll be found"

"I didn&039;t murder him"

Her dark eyebrows rose, but her face stayed still and closed "You argued, he&039;s dead Do we really believe this is an accident?"

Well, no It hadn&039;t been an accident I&039;d been trying to kill Bad Bob Biringanine

I just hadn&039;t expected to succeed

She took my silence at face value "You were to wait for s to do"

"Such as?" She shook her head, brushed hair back from her face when the wind played it into a veil over her eyes "Tell me what happened between you and Bad Bob Maybe I can help you"

I opened my mouth to tell her about the Demon Mark, but of course I couldn&039;t; it would be suicide And she couldn&039;t see it-otherwise, Marion or a hundred other Wardens would have known about Bad Bob&039;s condition long before he passed the infection on to me Rahel had told me as much-they were impossible for humans to see, even Wardens, unless they asked their Djinn the right questions I felt sick and trapped andtime Help, I wanted to say But I didn&039;t dare, because I knew there was no help, no cure, nothing but a long and terrible dying If I didn&039;t get a Djinn, I would never survive, and the Association would never give up one of their precious store to save my life They were very firm on that point One Djinn per customer, rationed strictly on rank, and I&039;d blownood elemental They certainly wouldn&039;t sacrifice one just for little old ed Some of the truth was better than none

"There was so with him," I said "Bad Bob, I mean I don&039;t knohat it was, but he attackedto kill ," Marion round, held it lightly between her fingers It sprouted a bud, which exploded into luxuriant color Red, this one Brilliant bloodred, with a black center like an eye "You didn&039;t try to, say, immobilize him instead, as you must have been trained to do"