A Dead Djinn in Cairo
By P. Djèlí Clark, first published in Tor.com
While investigating the mysterious suicide of a djinn, a young female special investigator with the Egyptian Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments, and Supernatural Entities ends up in an intense battle to stop a plan to destroy humanity.
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Plot Summary
Fatma, an androgynous young female investigator, is sent to investigate the strange suicide of a djinn, but finds more questions than answers. An angel's feather found at the site of the djinn's body lead her and her partner, a local policeman, to the house of a known angel, called "Maker". The angel points them to the owner of the feather, the "Harvester."
Fatma and the policeman enter the abode of the Harvester, and are attacked by ghuls, who are feeding on the flesh of the newly dead Harvester. Strangely, after a short scuffle the ghuls clear out without harming the two. Later, while trying to figure out this strange case at a coffee shop, Fatma is attacked by a dark robed woman (Siti) who tells her to come to a fortune tellers house.
The fortune teller, as well as the prostitute who had found the original djinn's dead body, explain an old djinn prophecy that could open doors to another world. Fatma realizes that the angel Maker was involved in fulfilling this prophecy, and has Siti fly her back to Maker's house.
Upon their arrival, the Maker kills himself, as the final sacrifice in the prophecy, and his machine, a sort of clock, begins the process of opening to another world. Fatma and Siti must fend off living tentacles that begin to reach out of the machine while trying to somehow stop the clockwork. In the end, Fatma jams the gears using her prized pocket-watch, and the portal collapses in on itself. Siti asks Fatma out for dinner before she leaves.
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