"Genie Dreams" by Haley K. Hoekstra

“I won’t! I won’t, and you can’t make me, so I –won’t-!”

The shouts of indignant outrage rang through the glossy corridors of the palace and Kazish watched with weariness as his daughter flew like the wind about the room, knocking over potted ferns and slapping down brass lamp-stands. She flitted up to the ceiling, gave –that- a good pounding with her fists, then dropped to the floor, wriggling, shrieking and slapping the gilded tiles until she was exhausted, panting.

“Are you finished, most tempestuous of daughters?” asked Kazish.

Sibhat whimpered and drifted up, hovering before her father, teary-eyed and flushed. “I won’t,” she finally panted.

“You –will-, for it is our law and you are not above it, even if you –are- a princess.” The elder genie’s gaze was stern as he regarded his youngest child. None of his other daughters had been this difficult. Sibhat had too much of her mother in her.

And her mother’s beauty as well, Kazish noted. He had as hard a time accepting that she was a young woman now as much as she, herself. Looking at her, though, it was impossible not to recognize how she’d changed.

Her skin was now a dusky sapphire hue, sleek and almost opalescent. Her hair was a rich plum, waves that tumbled and splashed to the small of her back. Her eyes were like jewels, a heavy, rich green that seemed to have living fire in them whenever she was displeased…which lately seemed to be often. The flare of her hips ended in a smokiness, a mist that was shaped into a long tail. With a sigh, he spoke again.

“I cannot destroy our traditions simply because you do not wish to accept what you are, Sibhat,” he told her reasonably. “We were created to serve- it is the price of our great powers.”

“Father, I can’t abide the idea of being someone’s –servant-,” she declared spitefully.

“You have known the life of a royal for sixteen years, my youngest daughter,” he replied softly. “Now, it is time you knew the life of servility. Only by living all facets of life can you ever hope to be happy. I wish you could understand that.”

“I –don’t- understand. All I understand is that you’re casting me away, like you did my sisters. It’s unfair.” She glowered, folding her arms under her breasts. The thin, silver circles that were layered together to make the covering for her bosom jingled with the movement.

“In time you will not think so,” Kazish assured her with fatherly tenderness. “Now, come. It’s time.”

“Flung into the Shadows to land who knows where,” she muttered as she floated behind her father toward the portal chamber. It was terrible, this fate. She’d known about her people’s highest tradition since she was young, but somehow always believed she’d escape it in light of her title.

The portal chamber was lavish, filled with freshly-cut jasmine and honeysuckle, offerings to the shimmering pool that lay in the center of the golden room. To the right was a wall, made entirely of a glass cabinet that hosted a myriad of shelves. On each of the long shelves rested bottles and lamps. Each was different; each ornate and a masterwork of crafting. Kazish led her to the huge cabinet, slid open the doors and nodded to her. “Go ahead. Choose your home.”

Sibhat fidgeted unhappily as she looked at the vast wealth of vessels. Lamps, she knew, were for male genies. She could not choose one for herself. The bottles- slender and curving with high necks- seemed to blend together in a maelstrom of glitter, jewels, gold, silver and glass. Her hands blindly reached out and took a random bottle. What did it matter which she chose? They were –all- prisons.

This particular prison, she noted as she focused again, was gorgeous. Oddly, it bore the same colors she, herself, was made up of. Sapphires, emeralds, amethysts and silver all interwove to create a dazzling effect for the bottle. Kazish smiled, pleased. “A fine choice, my youngest.”

Holding the bottle, she walked to the flower-lined pool and stared down into it. The water was merely an illusion- the pool was a portal, and an odd one at that. It was a random teleporter that was highly unstable. Therefore, whenever it was used, there was absolutely no way to predict where you might emerge. Millions of worlds on the other side of the pool, and Sidhat was destined for one of them. She shivered.

Her father took the bottle from her hands and faced her. “Are you prepared, my daughter?” he asked formally.

Her eyes narrowed at him, but she answered as she should. “I am prepared, O best of fathers.”

“Consign yourself to this vessel, then, for a thousand sunrises and a thousand sunsets,” he recited ceremoniously.

“Your will is my law,” she replied for the first time. It would not be the last, though. Not for a millennia. She felt the tingling run through her body, watched the smoke of her lower extremities creep up to consume her body, and then, as mist, she was sucked down into the magnificent bottle.

Inside, she reformed, now a miniscule fraction of the size she had been. The bottle’s interior was as lavish as it’s exterior, and housed her comfortably- there were pillows, silks, carpets, urns of brass and a canopy over a wide bed made of carpet and suspended by golden ropes. Spacious enough for her needs. She felt the bottle being lifted, and she scrambled on legs (that always were there when she wished them to be) to the side of the curving bottle, pressing her palms to it. She could hear her father’s voice.

“May the gods shine their favor on you, beautiful daughter whom I love, and may my love for you be a wind that sweeps you to a glorious destination…”

Sibhat whimpered impotently and closed her eyes. There was a rush, a moment of free fall, a chill that passed through the bottle and then the bottle –hit- something. It was unbreakable, but nothing could help the vessel from tumbling. She tumbled within, though her accoutrements and furnishings remained in place. Rolling and rolling, she gasped, trying to gain hold of something. Finally, the bottle struck something again and lay still. She, disheveled, shuddered and panted, got to her feet and wrapped her arms about her form. There was nothing to do now but wait. She could not leave the bottle until it was unstoppered for the first time.

That ‘first time’ might be centuries in arriving, if she’d fallen into a desert, or a crevice or an ocean.

She sat down and buried her face in her hands.