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didn’t look at me for permission, or apology. “Cassiel has always been on Ashan’s side,” he said. “A True Djinn, very old. Not exactly an ally to mankind in the past. I can’t tell you much about her. Among the Djinn she’s known as being stern, unforgiving, and arrogant, but Ashan cutting her off from the other Djinn seems to have mellowed her. A little.”
    Mellowed? I glowered at him. Of all he had said, that was the most offensive.
    â€œWill she keep her promises?” Lewis asked.
    â€œDon’t ask him,” I said. “Ask me. They would be my promises.”
    They all looked at me. David gave me a trace of a smile. “She’s right,” he said. “But if you don’t mind me saying it, Cassiel’s never been one to lie. She wouldn’t deceive you. It would be”—his eyebrows quirked; such a human gesture—“undignified.”
    I couldn’t disagree with it. I fixed Lewis with a long, challenging look, and got a half-bitter smile from him in response. “You don’t exactly come begging, do you?” he said. “Hungry?”
    For a moment, I thought he meant hungry for food, but then I knew what he was offering. I didn’t look at Joanne or David. I held his stare. “Very,” I said evenly.
    â€œWant a taste?”
    Lewis held out his hand to me. I stood up, looking down at him, trying to read his expression. It was a test, I knew that. But what kind of test, I couldn’t tell.
    I slowly reached out and took his hand in mine, as if we were merely shaking hands in the human fashion. A complicated set of emotions sped through me . . . fear, most strangely. Hunger. Longing. An almost irresistible urge to take, and take, and take . . .
    I allowed myself to merely touch on his power, drawing a thin thread of it into myself. It flowed through my veins like gold, and despite everything, I could not resist a slow, trembling sigh.
    And then I let go, stepped away from him, and settled back in my chair.
    Lewis lowered his hand back to rest on his knee. There had been no change in his expression at all, but suddenly I knew what he was thinking and feeling. The power I’d taken from him granted me that kind of access, an intimacy that was startling because it was so different from what I’d experienced with Joanne. It was as if for a moment I was Lewis, and I could see all his past . . . his longing for Joanne, never to be truly sated. His solitary life. His discomfort with the responsibility he now held. His deep, abiding wish to simply be .
    â€œYou should have been a Djinn,” I said, surprising myself, and Lewis blinked.
    â€œProbably,” he said. “But here we are. So, you obviously have control of what it is you do. I know you could have grabbed for all the power you could hold, but you didn’t. Why?”
    Because it was a test. That was true, but also not true. “I am not a beast,” I said. “I can control my needs, just as you can.”
    I didn’t look toward Joanne, but I saw a spark go through him, a tiny tremble that meant he’d understood precisely what I meant. “How can I be sure of that?” he asked, a little more sharply. He didn’t like a stranger knowing his secrets.
    â€œYou have my promise,” I said. “I will never take more than I need, and I will never deliberately injure or weaken a Warden in the process, unless they are attempting to do harm to me.” I had with Joanne, but I’d been new and afraid. I understood better now.
    â€œAnd you’ll ask permission first,” Lewis said.
    â€œYes. I will ask, unless it is an emergency.”
    â€œYou realize this is a promise,” Lewis said. “You sure you can keep it?”
    â€œIt’s no more than the promises humans make with each other to live in peace together.”
    â€œPeople break those all the time,” Joanne murmured.
    I knew that far better than