The strange man's expression darkened, shadows gathering in the hollows beneath his sharp cheekbones. "Stop that immediately." His harsh directive echoed across her living room with imperious force.
It was enough to startle her out of her shock, and back into reality. Her eyes flashed, temper flaring.
"Excuse me if I'm having a moment here." Mandy's voice quavered but held a thread of indignation. "It's not every day some strange man just... just... justapparatesinto my living room."
One heavy black eyebrow arched upward, and Mandy caught the suspicious quiver at the corner of his mouth.
"Apparates?" The word rolled off his tongue as if he were tasting something foreign and peculiar.
Mandy scowled up at him, momentarily forgetting her fear in a flash of literary indignation. "Obviously, you've never read the Harry Potter books." She infused the words with all the disappointment of a librarian discovering someone had dog-eared a page.
The man frowned, those pale eyes boring into her with glacial intensity. Mandy forced herself to take a deep breath, gathering her courage.
"Who are you?" Her voice came out steadier than she'd expected, though barely above a whisper. She swallowed hard,trying to calm herself; after all, he'd made no actual threat against her, and in fact had been thrown off-balance when she'd begun to kind of freak out. "How did you get in my apartment?"
His glacial gaze locked onto her with the focus of a hunter stalking prey. Mandy fought the urge to shrink back into her recliner, her fingers curling into the worn fabric of the armrest.
The air itself seemed to crackle with barely contained energy. When he spoke, his voice held the cold, commanding tone of someone long accustomed to wielding authority.
"I am Kieran." He studied her a long moment. "I am Djinn."
Something about the way he said his name - as if it should mean something to her - made her skin prickle with awareness. Djinn - she knew that word but in the foggy state of her mind she wasn't able to make the association immediately.
Mandy swallowed hard, her throat suddenly dry. "Should I... know who you are?"
Kieran's shoulders dropped slightly as he released a long-suffering sigh. "No."
“I'm Amanda,” she told him, since they were finally being civilized. “Though most people call me Mandy. And, um, I’m a human.”
The man's piercing gaze dropped to the pendant gleaming on her chest. His lips tightened into a thin line, the temperature in the room seeming to drop several degrees.
"Where did you get that pendant?" Each word came out clipped and precise, like ice crystals forming in the air.
Mandy bristled at his tone, her earlier fear giving way to indignation. Who did he think he was, materializing in her home and demanding answers? She crossed her arms over her chest, fixing him with her best stern Mom glare.
"How about you tell me how you got into my apartment first?" She lifted her chin, although her heart raced in her chest. "I know I locked the door."
Kieran’s icy gaze locked onto hers, unwavering. "I was summoned." His tone carried the same impatience one might use when explaining something obvious to a particularly dense child.
Mandy blinked up at the imposing figure before her, his words not quite computing. "Summoned?" The word came out as a squeak. "What do you mean, summoned?"
Kieran's pale eyes narrowed, becoming even frostier, if that was possible. He crossed his arms over his broad chest, matching her body language, the silver embroidery on his midnight blue robes catching the lamplight. "Precisely what I said."
Mandy stared at him, her mind struggling to process his words. "By who?" she asked suspiciously.
"By you."
"I most certainly did not! I..." Mandy's voice trailed off as understanding dawned. Her fingers found the pendant again, remembering how she'd been absently stroking its surface. Like Aladdin rubbing the lamp, and… no. No way. That was impossible.
Mandy's heart skipped a beat as Kieran's deep voice cut through her thoughts.
"Why is it impossible?"
Heat flooded her cheeks as she realized she must have spoken aloud. His piercing gaze held her frozen, those pale blue eyes seeming to look straight through to her soul.
"I... well..." She moistened her suddenly dry lips. "Because magic isn't real. Genies don't exist outside of fairy tales. Well," she added with a weak attempt at humor, "and Disney movies."
Kieran's black brows drew together, his expression somewhere between exasperation and amusement. One elegant hand gestured toward the pendant.
