Ill Wind Page 0,4

a shop that housed every piece of junk from the nineteenth century when suddenly the radio crackled on. Hair on the back of my neck stood rigid, and I knew there was a spell traveling with me. A big, powerful spell, coming, no doubt, from my friendly neighborhood Djinn.

The radio spun channels, picking out its message like words on a ransom note.

A high female voice. "Drive . . ."

Midrange male. "To . . ."

Full-throated Broadway show tune. "Oklahoma is OK!"

"What?" I yelped. "You're kidding, right?"

The radio flipped stations again. It settled on classic rock. "No-no, no, nuh-no, no, no-no-no-no-no no no no, nuh-no." Either the Djinn was putting me on, which would be seriously unfunny, or the spell was coming from Elsewhere, I hoped not an Elsewhere that began with the letter Hell.

"Very funny," I muttered. I shifted gears and felt the Mustang stretch and run beneath me like a living thing. "Any special place in Oklahoma? It's not exactly Rhode Island. There's a lot of real estate."

Letters this time. "O ... K ... C" Oklahoma City.

I got a bad feeling. "No offense, but can I at least get some proof this message is from Lewis?"

"No," said a female voice, decisively. Static. The radio clicked off.

It could be the Djinn. In fact, it was even likely; I'd embarrassed him, and he owed me payback for that. But he had made a call, and I couldn't waste the chance if he was honestly giving me instructions on how to find his boss. Djinn had a host of faults, but out-and-out lying wasn't among them.

And besides, I had to outrun the storm behind me anyway.

"Oklahoma City," I sighed aloud. "Home of heavy weather. Fabulous."

The only redeeming thing about it was that I knew the territory, and one of my best friends in the world had retired in OKC. It'd be nice to have a friend, right now. Somebody to count on. Some shoulder to cry on.

I had to look for the silver lining, anyway. Because the storm cloud was pretty damn dark, and only getting worse.

I'd met Lewis Levander Orwell at Princeton. He was a graduate student-already had a degree in science, then a Juris Doctor to practice law. His explanation, strangely, had been that he'd wanted something to fall back on, in case the whole magic thing didn't work out. Apparently he had the whole Magical Arts thing mixed up with Liberal Arts.

And for a while, it looked like having a fallback career was a good idea. Lewis had been recruited- or drafted-after demonstrating some definite weatherworking abilities at the age of fifteen, but that talent had seemed to fade. He had loads of potential but no actual . . . nothing concrete to show what his powers might be or what form they might really take. Then, his second year in the Program, he was spotted working in the garden. In the winter, knee-deep in snow. Growing roses.

Red, blooming roses the size of dinner plates. He was honestly surprised that it was hard to do.

He was originally identified as an Earth Warden- someone who could shape living things, alter the land itself, make crops grow in fallow fields, prevent or cause earthquakes and volcanoes. A strong, deep power, and very rare. Then, in his third year of the Program, they'd discovered he also had an affinity for fire. Dual specialties are vanishingly rare. Only five other Wardens in recorded history had ever commanded earth and fire together. Water and air-that was expected, even typical-but earth and fire didn't blend well. Lewis was talked about a lot. He was, we all heard, expected to do Great Things.

Must have been a lot of pressure, but you'd never have known it from the way he acted. Lewis was quiet; he did his work, went to classes, had some friends but gave the strong impression that if any man was an island, it was Isla Lewis. I admit, I pined after him. I had my reasons.

Unfortunately, Lewis avoided Program girls like the plague-which was kind of my fault, because our first encounter had been, shall we say, memorable. Anyway, he deliberately went for the normal girls. Sociology majors, psych grad students, the occasional goofy art student. Girls whose biggest aspiration was to get a secretarial job at Smith Barney and vacation with their bosses in the Bahamas . . . unlike those of