The Hunter's Prey (The Fay Morgan Chronicles Book 5) by Katherine Sparrow Page B

creature’s unique magic, the Marid was a mystery to me. Like a dragon, it would be so easy for him to end me with a flick of his wrist. A bat of his eyes. I might be the world’s most powerful witch, but I was nothing compared to him. Which made the fact that I was still alive all the more interesting.
    The Marid filled his plate high with orange slices and an aura of deep contentment surrounded him. I guessed he did not frequently have the ability to talk candidly with another. Such was the way of the truly powerful: they traded away the camaraderie of peers for their power. Who better for him to speak to than his prey? Let him talk and tell me too much. Let him see me only as a victim.
    “Let me ask you a question, young witch, how many Marids do you think there are in the world?” his voice nearly purred.
    I shrugged. “I have always heard of Marids and their exploits, of course, but I have never met anyone who has met one face to face. So I would guess very few. A dozen. Perhaps less?”
    He laughed and clapped his hands. “Wrong. There is only one. There has only ever been one! But I have made sure that in every legend and story about me there were always at least three mentioned. I have even gone so far as to burn every tome that states otherwise, but the truth of it is there has always been just one. Me.” He beamed. “I’ve never even had need for a name besides Marid because when you are the singular of your species, there is no need for naming. I am Marid.”
    “And yet you have a daughter. Lila,” I said.
    “Lila,” he said slowly. “Is that her name? She is no Marid. Not fully. She cannot be. For I am one. Solo. Only. Which is not to say she is not important. On the contrary: I need her.” He smiled. “Another question, clever witch, did you notice any similarities in those who hunted you today?”
    I sipped tea and smiled back at him. “Besides their failed attempts to capture me? They were all in desperate need of a wish,” I said and willed my exhausted mind to come up with some other answer. “I assume that is how you got them all engaged in your hunt.” I paused again and thought about the vampires, the unicorn, and the spider, as well as all the other monsters I'd glimpsed in this palace. “They were also all old or wounded in some way. Suffering the ravages of time.”
    “ Why is the tall, straight figure that divided the ranks like a spear now bent almost double? Why is it that the lion’s strength weakens to nothing? ” The Marid asked.
    “I take the beautiful clothes back, so that you will learn the robe o f appearance is only a loan,” I answered, quoting from the same Rumi poem that the Marid quoted. It had always been a favorite of mine.
    The Marid clapped his hands and grinned. “ Indeed! The beautiful clothes of life are taken back for all of us. Which is to say, time destroys us all, even those of us who are immortal, for there is no true immortality, is there? Not without some massive source of replenishment. Time breaks all of us down, and we are none of us able to stay strong and untouched by its slow degradations.”
    I nodded, for I knew all about the weight of immortality. The dread of my own years, and how so recently I’d almost ended my own life for the weight of all the terrible mistakes I’d made over the years, decades, and centuries. They had come close to crushing me. “Though I am sure time does not affect you as it does most. You are far too powerful,” I said.
    He looked pleased with my words, as I’d intended. “One would think so, wouldn’t one? Alas, it is true for me as well. Time erodes the Marid. Hard to believe, I know.”
    “Truly?” I asked, willing him to say more.
    “Truly. Though I am so strong that for a time my vitality slowly leaked away and I did not even notice. But then one day I awoke and I was half the Marid I had once been, for each wish granted had depleted me, ever so slightly. What was I to do? I could not ask my fellow