King Cage and the Worth Street Djinni Read online

  The King looked back as he planted his first foot on the platform. The inside of the djinni’s eyes burned like white hot plasma, so bright the King had to squint to see. If he’d even momentarily blinded the creature, that moment had passed.

  The King threw his other foot up, but he was out of time. The djinni wrapped a claw around the King’s ankle, and his bare flesh went instantly hot. Then it crackled.

  The King was burning.

  “Not again,” the King said. His eyes met the djinni’s, each now encircled by two crusted, aerosol veneers.

  The djinni tugged, and the King fell back into the crevice between the rails. The jagged edges along both sides dug into his shoulders, his back, his hips.

  “A man,” the djinni said, its voice crackling like leaves on the fire. “A little man.”

  “Not so little,” the King murmured. He shoved himself over the crossbeam behind him and down into the next crevice, determined to keep moving.

  But the djinni stalked forward, glowering as the King remembered from so many drawings. From so many memories. From so many mirrors. It grabbed the King by both his biceps and lifted. The King’s feet left the floor, and his arms flared hot.

  The King swung his leg forward, connecting with the djinni’s stomach. But the creature only sneered and squeezed more tightly. The King’s skin squished like raw dough between the djinni’s fingers and the fabric of his shirt caught fire.

  He screamed.

  Was it over? Would the djinni take his arms? His hands? His art?

  “No way!” the King growled, walking his feet up the djinni’s chest. “No fucking way!”

  The King kicked in an effort to break the creature’s hold on his arms. The pain was boundless, bottomless, thick. The King’s skin boiled and pulled with the force of his feet against the djinni’s breastplate. It blistered and cracked and cauterized the wound again and again as the Red’s grip—and the top layer of the King’s skin—slid down the sides of his arms.

  Already, his fingers felt cold and numb. Already, the end approached.

  And it was the King’s fault, wasn’t it? For giving in to the djinni’s manipulation? For putting the audience above the work? For leaving the piece unfinished and open to doubt? But the smell of the King’s burning flesh had overwhelmed even the pungent subway odor, and it was too late for regrets. The King had only one thought now. One all-consuming thought:

  How the fuck am I going to take the djinni with me?

  The King raised his left boot from the djinni’s chest, leaving a smear of thick, black rubber in its wake. Then he positioned it against the djinni’s eyes and pressed down hard.

  The djinni growled, and the King shrieked as the beast clamped down on his arms, its sharp nails digging deep ravines in his twitching muscles. Then the King’s left sole gave way, and his foot curled around the hook of the djinni’s nose, each of its painted eye sockets now filled with black tar.

  The King wedged his other foot in the djinni’s open mouth. He needed the Red to let go before his arms failed him. Before the pain knocked him unconscious. Before the blood loss took him down for good.

  The djinni gagged on the King’s melting boot. And even though the King was still seven feet off the ground, he thought he’d finally gotten the upper hand. But the djinni bit down hard on the King’s sneaker, its sharpened teeth cutting deep into the King’s foot.

  The King howled, and the djinni’s eyes again caught fire. The King’s left boot came apart at the sole, the top flapping around his ankle as the bottom dripped down the sides of the djinni’s face.

  Everything was pain, white and hot. The King’s forearms shook, his fingers curled like the gnarled limbs of dead trees. The djinni owned him, body and mind. And it owned him by ruining him.

  With what remained of his strength, the King swung his left heel against the djinni’s head. With every hit, he scalded his bare foot a bit more, but still he kicked.

  At least the kid had gotten away. He was the one person in the world who ever seemed to care. The King’s one true fan. Just one was all he ever wanted. One person to see all the cages and shackles and binds for what they were. One person to understand the need for lemons and pills and big, sopping-wet vaginas. One person to know what it all meant.

  But as the King’s blood boiled and his flesh burned and his mind filled with his uncle’s terrors, he knew damn well he had this coming. He was a waste of fucking space, and he had no business telling anyone what art was or wasn’t. No right to make excuses for what he did in the dead of night.

  The King couldn’t feel his fingers. He couldn’t bear to scream. His body had given up and waited only for his mind to die.

  But there was screaming. The King could hear it. And it wasn’t his, no. Not the djinni’s either. It was someone angry. Someone scared. Someone human.

  Cio.

  The kid sprinted toward them, racing up behind the djinni with one of the old, blackened two-by-fours out ahead of him. As he neared, he heaved, plowing the splintered edge of the post through the center of the djinni’s belly.

  The djinni swung around part-way. The King’s shoulder slammed against one of the support beams between the express and local tracks. He moaned and fell from the djinni’s grip.

  The wooden protector that hung over the third rail came down beneath him with a crack, and it was all the King could do to roll away before his blood made a circuit. But something was wrong with his right arm. Terribly wrong. The support beam had snapped his burned and brittle bicep clean in half, each side tight and flopping, blood pouring out of both ends.

  But the djinni lay still beside him, the two-by-four sticking up straight.

  Cio whooped. “Yeah, boy! You see that? I slew the motherfuckin’ beast! What, what!”

  The kid’s enthusiasm was short lived. The King shook uncontrollably, his sweat like an ice bath now. He couldn’t breathe. He was underwater. He was dying.

  “Oh, what the fuck, man?” Cio asked. “What the fuck he do to you?”

  “Get me up,” the King said.

  “What?”

  “Up.”

  The kid grabbed the King by the waist and lifted him to his feet, not caring a lick for the blood dripping out all over. The King could barely stand. One foot was broken and the other burned.

  “Up,” the King said again, his left arm raised to the platform. It was the best he could manage without his whole body shrieking from the inside out.

  “What’s your fuckin’ rush, man?” Cio asked. “I killed the motherfucker. Cio one, Evil nothin’.”

  One look from the King was all it took for the kid to squat down, wrap his arms around the King’s thighs, and lift.

  The kid groaned. “Yo, cheesecake much?”

  He rocked back and forth for a moment beneath the King’s weight before dropping him on the platform. The King wailed.

  “Sorry.”

  The King curled his body in slow, then rolled himself onto his knees. Everything burned.

  Cio climbed up behind him.

  “It ain’t evil,” the King said.

  “Sure. And you don’t look like shit.”

  “It just ain’t from around here.”

  “That part I got.”

  “And it ain’t dead.”

  The King watched the kid’s head swing back to the tracks, where the wooden post had already begun to smoke.

  Chapter Nine

  The King slid one knee in front of the other. He shuddered, and his vision narrowed. The universe was giving him a way out. Go, if you want it so bad. Go. But the King wasn’t going anywhere. Not with the djinni unbound.

  “Get the fuck over here,” he said, shoving his other knee forward.

  Cio stared down at the djinni. Had it already moved? Had it already opened its eyes?

  The King growled. “When I say come, motherfucker, you—”

  “I ain’t your dog, man.”

  “Grab the cans.”

  Beside Cio’s right foot were th
e cans of black and red. The cans the King would need to reset the binding. Cio squinted sharply, collected the cans, and followed the King to the wall the cellphone still lit, if darkly.

  The King’s eyes scoured the work. How the fuck was he supposed to clean this up? The kid’s mark crossed the top four letters. It broke the illusion of perspective. Of depth. Of truth. Any other night, and the King could’ve whipped something up. But with one arm hanging limply from his side and the other unable to make a fist, what the fuck was he supposed to do?

  “You need to bind it,” the King said.

  Cio turned. “I need to what?”

  “You need to lock the motherfucker down.”

  Cio looked at the wall, then at the smoking post, then back at the wall.

  “Fuck, man,” he said. “I ain’t good like you.”

  The King didn’t have time for this. But it was a delicate thing, being an artist.

  “Who told you that?” he asked.

  “Huh?”

  “Who fucking told you you suck?”

  “My bros. My teachers. Everybody.”

  “Fuck ‘em,” the King said. “You been practicing your curves, I know.”

  “So what if I can draw a circle?” the kid asked. “So what if I can shade an egg? I get one good for every hundred bad.”

  “You know the odds for your critics?” The King’s head lolled to one side. He was running out of time. “One in a million, if that. Fuck ‘em.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Motherfucker,” the King barked. “Do or die. That’s the situation.”

  “Shit,” Cio said, glancing again between the post and the piece. “Right.”

  “Take the black and the cork board,” the King said. “I don’t care if you stroke or spray or sketch. You need clean edges. And you messed mine the fuck up.”

  Cio winced, and the King was glad. Art is responsible. Art is accountable. Art is urgent. Maybe there was hope for them yet.

  The kid picked up the cork board and went to the wall. He raised the can and turned.

  “How long you been doing this?” the kid asked.

  The King thought back. It had been a long time since he left Uncle Joey without a slice of toast for dinner. A long time since he swore off paper for the permanence of a brick wall.

  “Thirty-three years.”

  “Shit,” the kid said. “I ain’t even been practicing for three, KC.”

  “Short bursts. Tight and close,” the King said. “Last thing you want is a drip.”

  The kid did as he was told. He sharpened the edges of the I all over again. Then the K and the N and the G. Fast too. He was good. And even though he’d clearly never used a board, he got the hang of it quick.

  On his last spray, Cio dripped, joining the hook of the G with the tail. He wiped it with his sleeve and undid most of the damage. The kid looked so full of shame, the King was sure the drip cut deeper than any of the djinni’s attacks.

  “It’ll hold,” the King muttered, and Cio relaxed.

  “Now what?”

  The two-by-four burst into flames.

  “Now fucking what, man?”

  The King looked Cio dead in the eye. “Now you make art.”

  Cio twitched. “Are you fucking out of your skull, man? I can’t fuckin’ do that shit. I—”

  “Cio—”

  “I’m a monkey, man. You tell me what to do and I do it. I can’t—”

  “Cio—”

  “I didn’t even come up with my tag, KC. My sister coined that shit.”

  In the firelight, the kid’s self-doubt flittered like a spirit in the sockets of his frantic eyes. It was a spirit the King knew well.

  “Why you think you’re still here, Cio?” the King asked. “You got it in you.”

  “Got what in me?” Cio asked.

  The King heard a clattering on the tracks behind him. He turned. The djinni stood, his eyes full of fire and rage.

  “Look, man. You do it. I’ll pick you up,” the kid begged. “I’ll hold you like a marionette and shit.”

  “Cio!” the King growled. “Shut your fucking mouth and look at me!”

  The kid did.

  “You think I’ll recover from this shit?”

  Cio bit his lip, his head rocking like it was on a loose spring. He didn’t have the heart to lie, nor even to meet the King’s gaze. Cio turned back at the piece.

  “Draw him in that cell,” the King said. “It don’t have to be good. It just has to be true.”

  “True?”

  “Draw what he means to you. Forget the teeth and the claws and the fire. Tear away the mask. Draw whatever’s left.”

  The air shifted and the platform shook. The King knew damn well the djinni had leaped up behind him. It wouldn’t be long now.

  “No,” Cio muttered, his eyes shut tight. “I can’t.”

  “Cio,” the King commanded, forcing himself to his feet. “Don’t block it out. Stay with it. See it. Feel it. It has to be true or we’re dead. Us and everyone else.”

  Cio opened his eyes. And he kept them open.

  “You got this, Cio.”

  The kid nodded, then he raised the red can to the piece. The King turned, and the creature snarled.

  “Do it, Cio.”

  The djinni charged for the wall, for the piece, for the kid. But the King couldn’t allow it.

  “Now!” the King screamed, and he heard the can’s first sparking spritz.

  The King threw his pain-wracked body in the djinni’s path, his left arm catching around the beast’s neck as its nails hooked between ribs on either side of the King’s chest.

  They tumbled forward, the djinni’s weight slamming the King hard against the wall beside the kid. Only the claws that dug in the King’s chest kept him from falling over.

  Cio stopped only long enough to see the King still lived, then went back to the piece. The djinni, meanwhile, raked his nails to either side, tearing the King’s shirt to shreds, and much of the skin below.

  Then the creature stopped dead in its tracks.

  “You?” The djinni’s eyes caught on the red grimace emblazoned over the King’s heart. “He will bear our mark, the prophets said…”

  The red djinni raised his eyes. “You’re the King.”

  “Damn right,” the King said. Then he swung his head forward, his brow slamming against the djinni’s.

  The creature reeled back. The King knew it would be only a brief reprieve, and it was. The djinni swung its right claw, latching onto the skin around the King’s scar. And with that familiar, putrid joy, the djinni twisted, snapping the ribs of the King’s left breast.

  The King moaned, too weak to do anything more.

  “I am of the first,” the djinni said. “He sees with my eyes, little king. He sees you now and knows you.”

  The djinni released its grip, and the King slid down, his mouth full of blood. It tasted hot, red, stale.

  It was over. There was no coming back from this. But of all the sorrows the King might have felt in his final moments, he cared only that he’d failed to teach the kid to use his gift.

  The King met the eyes of his murderer.

  The djinni swung his fist at the King’s skull, then froze just an inch from the King’s temple. The creature stood unmoving, only the fire of its red eyes conveying any life at all.

  “Finish it, Cio.” The King coughed. “Tie him down.”

  Cio turned from the suspended djinni to the piece. In a few short sprays, the kid completed a series of shackles around each of the painted djinni’s limbs, binding him to the bars of the cell within the King’s crimson I.

  With the final spray, the djinni burst into silken, red vapor. It pulled against the force of the cage, but it was nevertheless drawn back to the piece, bound by the kid’s painted restraints.

  Cio stood with his mouth agape, breathing heavy. “I did it. I motherfucking did it.”

  The King smiled as strongly as his weathered body would allow.


  “You did,” he said. Then he closed his eyes.

  Chapter Ten

  “KC, wake up,” Cio said, kneeling beside the King. “Wake the fuck up!”

  The kid slapped the King hard across the cheek, and the King stirred.

  “Huh?”

  The kid slapped him again. “Wake up!”

  And again.

  “Stop!” The King raised his left hand feebly. “What the fuck?”

  Cio shrugged. “I saw it in a movie.”

  “I don’t have a fucking concussion.”

  “No.” The kid glanced up and down. “But you got just about everything else.”

  “Do I?” The King squeezed tears from his eyes he was too weary to wipe away, and found the kid gaping, scared. The King smirked. “What?”

  “The cuts. The gashes,” Cio said. “Your arm is…”

  “Yeah?”

  “You’re fucking healing.”

  The King reached for the wall beside him and winced. “Not fast enough.”

  But he was healing, from the inside out. His shattered bones fused. His torn muscles weaved back together. His burned and crusted skin regrew. The scabs turned to ash like the lit end of a cigarette, and flaked off at the kid’s slightest touch.

  “There’s just a burn,” Cio said, the back of his fingers grazing the King’s old wound. “Like a face… It looks like the djinni’s fucking face.”

  Cio met the King’s gaze, and the King pushed his hand away. Then he gripped the wall for support and shoved himself to his feet. The effort brought tears to his eyes. His body shook with the memory of the attack. Despite appearances, he felt just as shattered and torn and burned as he had before. And he would for a long time after.

  “It ain’t him,” the King said, glancing down at the old scar.

  “But you’re healed,” Cio said, standing too.

  The King shrugged. “Magic fades.”

  “Not for the two-by-four. Or the floor. Or your shirt.”

  “Look, what do you want me to tell you?” the King asked, his eyes finding the black can on the floor beside the wall. He crouched slowly and picked it up. “Magic don’t stick to me.”

  Cio grinned. “Cowabunga, man.”

  “Where the fuck you pick that up?” the King asked, raising the can and the edge of his hand to retouch Cio’s lettering. He sprayed.