Chill Factor Page 0,22

manipulated, or even that David was being put at risk. Again.

I swallowed a rush of bitter betrayal, and said, "Fine. I'll go, but you ought to know that Kevin's not going to keep his end of the bargain. He won't give up Jonathan. He's too scared to do that, and hell, maybe Jonathan doesn't even want to go. Ever thought of that?"

Lewis didn't look like he was listening. He was fixed on a spot somewhere beyond me, face blank.

"Lewis?"

He twitched. His eyes stayed fixed on the distance. I looked over at Marion, who took a step toward him.

Too late. His face went from pale to pallid, his eyes rolled up in their sockets, and his whole body went as rigid as that of a condemned man riding electric current. His face distorted, convulsed, and he slid out of the chair to thump down sideways on the area rug.

And then he began to convulse in the worst seizure I'd ever seen.

Everybody was eerily calm about it. Marion got down next to him and held his shoulders; Paul crouched at his feet. I watched Lewis's body spasm, fighting itself, tearing itself apart, and felt tears sting hot at my eyes. He was making choking sounds, and I could hear his muscles creaking.

Lewis was dying. Hell, the whole planet was tearing itself apart. This was just the small-scale representation of it.

The convulsions stopped after about two minutes. Marion sat where she was, stroking hair from his pallid, sweating forehead with gentle motions. Lewis stayed down, relaxed now, gasping in heavy breaths and blinking slowly up at the ceiling.

"Well," he finally whispered, "that was embarrassing."

I struggled for words. I wanted to hate him, but I couldn't. I just couldn't.

"I'll go quietly," I said. "That's what you want, right?"

He slowly focused on me, but I sensed he was too tired to lift his head. "Jo, this is so far from what I want..."

"I don't need your apology."

He nodded, sucked in a breath, and blew it gently out. His eyes drifted closed. "Then I'll take a nap, if that's okay."

West murmured something sotto voce, and his Djinn appeared-a cowboy kind of guy, wind-burned and tough-looking-and scooped up Lewis in his arms like a broken toy. He walked away, out into the sun. I was left staring down at the empty space on the rug, on the fallen cane that gleamed black and abandoned in the hotel lights, and in the silence the mad tinkle of that damn fountain sounded as loud as thunder.

Marion said, "Lewis is the Earth. He's tied to it. We never understood that before, but there's something inside of him that can't be removed, and can't be stopped. He's dying, and it's manifesting itself around us. That's why we can't end this, even with all the power of the Djinn we have left. We need to get Lewis's powers back from Kevin, and we need to do it now. Jonathan took those powers away. If we get Jonathan, we can set things right. It's the only way."

I nodded and shoved away the screaming panic at the back of my mind. My voice was surprisingly steady.

"Right," I said. "I'll go home. I suppose you're going to see me to the border."

Marion let me loose from the vine, once they were sure I was in a cooperative mood. I was allowed a last meal-this one in the Denny's restaurant in the motel parking lot, accompanied by my grim-eyed Warden guards and their invisible but ever-so-menacing Djinn. Not that I was planning on a great escape; I thought Lewis had a crap plan, but it was still better than the nonplan I had. I'd tried it my way for three weeks, and I was no closer to getting the situation resolved than when I'd started. Time for somebody else to take a swing, even if it was a swing and a miss.

"Chill Factor"

"So," I said around a mouthful of ham-and-cheese omelet, "which one of you lovely people is escorting me home? Because I don't think for a second you'll trust my word of honor."

Paul looked up, furious. His skin was splotched with red, his eyes bloodshot and raw. "Just stop it, will you?"

"Why?" I chewed another mouthful that tasted like ashes, and sucked coffee noisily just for the sake of annoying them. "Am I supposed to go like a lamb and say nice things about you? Screw you, Paul. You burned me."

I was almost sorry I said it when I saw the devastation on his face.