The night was not merely dark; it was absolute.
The moon had hidden itself behind a thick veil of clouds, as if it refused to witness what was about to happen. The Tigris River flowed silently, a ribbon of black ink cutting through the sleeping land. Even the crickets, usually a deafening chorus, had fallen silent.
Inside the small mud hut, Ayon lay on his torn mat. His breathing was slow, rhythmic—the deep slumber of a man exhausted by a hard life.
Or so it seemed.
In reality, Ayon was wide awake. His eyes were closed, but his senses were expanded, reaching out into the fabric of the night like invisible roots. He could feel the shift in air pressure. He could smell the ozone scent of intruders.
They are here, he thought calmly. Right on schedule.
He didn't move a muscle. He kept his heartbeat slow, a perfect imitation of sleep.
Outside the door, the air shimmered. Two figures dissolved through the solid wood as if it were mist.
Sifer and Gard stood inside the hut. They were invisible to the mortal eye, their forms composed of smokeless fire and shadow. They looked down at the sleeping tea-seller with a mixture of contempt and curiosity.
"Look at him," Gard projected his thought, his voice a silent hiss in the psychic ether. "Sleeping like a dog. The man who wept over sugar."
"Do not be careless," Sifer warned, his aura pulsing with caution. "He fooled us once. We must be certain."
Sifer moved closer. He hovered over Ayon, his glowing, ethereal hand inching toward Ayon's forehead.
"I will enter his mind," Sifer signaled. "I will tear through his dreams. If he knows the location of The Nexus, it will be hidden in his subconscious. I will rip it out."
Gard sneered. "And if he is just a fool?"
"Then I will burn his mind to ash, and we will leave him drooling in the dust."
Sifer's fingers, cold and crackling with invasive magic, touched the skin of Ayon's forehead.
SNAP.
It wasn't a sound. It was the psychic equivalent of a bear trap slamming shut.
Sifer gasped. He tried to pull his hand back, but he couldn't. His spiritual essence was stuck, glued to Ayon's mind by a gravity that felt heavier than a black hole.
And then, the "sleeping" man opened his eyes.
In the pitch darkness of the hut, Ayon's eyes didn't just reflect the scant light. They glowed. Not with the fire of a Jinn, but with a faint, predatory luminescence, like a tiger watching from the undergrowth.
"Knock next time."
Ayon's voice was a whisper, but it hit Sifer like a physical blow to the chest.
A shockwave of pure, raw force blasted outward from Ayon's body. Sifer was thrown backward, slamming into the mud wall with a force that shook the hut's foundation. Gard stumbled, his invisibility shattering, forcing him into his visible form.
"What..." Gard stammered, backing away. "You can see us?"
Ayon sat up slowly. He stretched his neck, cracking it to the left, then to the right. He looked annoyed, like a man whose pleasant dream had been interrupted by a mosquito.
"See you?" Ayon asked, his tone dry and unimpressed. "My friends, you smell of burnt ozone and cheap perfume. A blind man could see you."
Sifer scrambled to his feet, his eyes wide with shock. "You... you are a Warlock! You trapped us!"
"I am a tea-seller who is trying to sleep," Ayon corrected him, standing up. He dusted off his tunic casually. "Do you have any idea how rude it is to enter a man's dreams without an invitation? It is very intimate. And my dreams... they are not for children."
Gard, regaining his arrogance, summoned a ball of green fire in his hand. The heat filled the small room. "Enough games! You are one mortal against two Highborn Jinn! We will roast you alive!"
Ayon sighed. He looked at the ball of fire with profound boredom.
"One against two?" Ayon mused. "You really need to work on your counting."
He closed his eyes for a second.
Then, he tapped his bare foot on the dirt floor.
Thump.
The sound was soft, but the reaction was instant.
The shadows in the corners of the room didn't just lengthen; they detached.
From the mud walls, from the floor, from the very darkness under the table, shapes began to rise. They were tall, thin, and humanoid, but they had no features. They were made of absolute darkness—a darkness deeper than night. They had no mouths, no noses.
Only eyes. Glowing, white, vertical slits.
The Guardians of the Tigris.
Sifer and Gard froze. The fire in Gard's hand sputtered and died, suffocated by the sheer vacuum presence of these beings.
"What... what are these?" Sifer whispered, his voice trembling with a primal terror he had never felt before. "These are not Jinn. These are not ghosts."
"No," Ayon said pleasantly, leaning against the central pole of the hut. "They are the landlords. And you are trespassing."
The shadows moved. They didn't walk; they flowed. In a blink, they were upon the intruders.
Gard tried to scream, but a hand made of smoke clamped over his mouth. It burned—not with heat, but with a freezing cold that sucked the warmth right out of his Jinn fire.
Sifer tried to teleport, to dissolve into smoke, but the shadows held him fast. They were solid to him. They were binding him with the weight of the earth itself.
"Let us go!" Sifer shrieked, struggling uselessly. "We are of the Coven! Our master will destroy you!"
Ayon walked over to them. The shadows parted to let him through. He looked closely at Sifer's terrified face.
"Your master?" Ayon asked. "The one in the silver mask? Tell him he owes me for a sack of sugar."
He leaned in close.
"And tell him," Ayon whispered, his voice dropping to a dangerous growl, "that the Earth remembers what the Fire did. And the Earth does not forgive."
He straightened up.
"Now," Ayon said, looking at the two captured spies. "What to do with you? I cannot kill you; it would make a mess on my floor. And I cannot let you go; you have bad manners."
He tapped his chin, pretending to think.
"I know," he said, his face brightening. "You need to cool down. You are too hot-headed."
He pointed to the door.
"Take them," Ayon commanded the Shadow Army.
The white-eyed shadows dragged the screaming Jinn out of the hut. They moved effortlessly, carrying the struggling spies toward the riverbank.
"No! Please!" Gard begged. "Not the water! It extinguishes us!"
"Only if you stay in too long," Ayon called out helpfully from the doorway.
The shadows reached the edge of the Tigris. The river was swollen, dark, and freezing cold.
Without hesitation, the shadows flipped Sifer and Gard upside down. They held them by their ankles, dangling them over the black water.
"Wait!" Sifer screamed. "We will leave! We will never come back!"
"I believe you," Ayon said. "But a lesson must be learned."
He flicked his finger.
Splash.
The shadows dunked the two Jinn into the icy water, submerged up to their waists.
Hiss.
Steam rose as the water hit their fiery skin. Sifer and Gard howled—not in physical pain, but in the shock of their energy being dampened. It was humiliating. It was terrifying. It was the ultimate weakness for a Jinn.
The shadows held them there, upside down, half-drowned, swinging gently in the current.
Ayon walked down to the bank. He looked at them hanging there like wet laundry.
"I will leave you here for a few hours," Ayon said casually. "The cold water is good for circulation. It helps with clarity of thought."
He turned to the Shadow Guardians.
"Make sure they don't drown," he ordered. "Just... soak them."
The white-eyed shadows nodded silently.
Ayon turned back to his hut. He felt lighter. The message had been sent.
As he walked back, he murmured to himself, "I really hope they don't scare the fish. The river has been so peaceful lately."
He entered his hut, closed the door, and lay back down on his mat.
The spies of the Coven were hanging upside down in the river. The Prince of the Jinn was humiliated.
But Ayon knew this was just the opening move. The Coven would not stop. They would send more. They would send stronger.
He closed his eyes.
Let them come, he thought. I have plenty of river.