Chill Factor

was holding my hand, he was gone, gone from me. Even his skin felt insubstantial.

His eyes turned dark. Human. Brown.

Sad and quiet and-hiding just under the surface-wary.

'Good choice, kids,' Paul said. He looked tired and unhappy as he looked at David. 'Back in the bottle, please.'

I could feel David trying to fight, but the pull was irresistible, and in a sudden convulsive flicker he was gone. Paul reached out for the stopper, which I handed over as well. My fingers felt numb.

I watched as he worked the stopper into the bottle. The four Wardens seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. Paul handed the bottle to Marion, who took a black magic marker out of her pocket and wrote a rune on the bottle itself. A sign, I recognized, that was a kind of mystical DO NOT OPEN, CONTENTS UNDER PRESSURE. She opened a leather satchel sitting next to the chair and eased the bottle into special padding, then closed and locked it.

'Okay.' I pulled in a deep breath and tried to put the anger aside. 'Now you've got David out of the way. When do I go?' Paul looked up, startled, frowning, as if I knew something I shouldn't. 'Hello? Vegas? Meet and greet with Teen Psycho?'

Paul didn't answer me. Marion said softly, 'Kevin doesn't want you, Joanne. He has no reason to trust you. You can't negotiate with him on our behalf.'

My mind went blank. 'Then why all this-'

To get David. To get David away from me, to play us against each other.

I had a sudden premonition of disaster even before Paul said, 'You're going home, Jo. Now.'

'Like hell!' I rounded on Marion, on the case where she'd put David.

And I heard Paul say flatly, ' Marion, take her.'

THREE

I had a couple of choices-one, I could fight like hell and trash the hotel and probably kill a whole lot of people, or two, I could give up and see where it took me.

I didn't like option two, but I liked option one even less, and when Marion moved toward me, power at the ready, I just stood still for it.

'Easy,' she whispered to me, and wrapped something around my wrists behind my back that felt thick and organic. At her touch it stirred, writhed, and tightened into something tough and flexible. It couldn't cut me, but I wasn't likely to be breaking loose from it, either. Wind and water don't do much against the power of living things. It was probably some sort of vine she'd cultivated for times like these. 'Nobody's going to hurt you, Joanne. Please trust me.'

I'd never been able to trust her. Ever. I liked her, but her agendas and mine just didn't match and never had. Her hand rested lightly on my shoulder for a second, then pressed harder, guiding me to a chair. She sat me down, took out another vine from her pocket, and bound my ankles.

'Done?' Paul asked. She nodded and stepped back. Paul-my friend-got down on one knee next to the chair and looked me right in the eyes. 'Go ahead. Ask.'

'Okay,' I said. I kept my voice low and calm, even though I wanted to scream at him-it wouldn't do a damn bit of good, and I might need a good screaming voice later. Right now, they were in control. Wait for an opportunity. 'Use your heads. I can help you; you know I can. You can't afford to ignore the opportunity here. C'mon, guys. Wise up.'

He was sweating, I noticed. Paul, the iceman, was sweating bullets, and there were dark patches under the arms of his nice, neat golf shirt.

'This goes way beyond personal feelings. Sorry, babe, but we don't have a choice here. We thought we could contain the kid, but things are too serious now. We need to deal, and with Jonathan on his side, he'll know if we're not playing straight. So you go home. This gets done without you.'

'Who had that brilliant idea?' I shot back.

'I did.' A new voice, coming from the corner. Paul looked over his shoulder, and I saw someone step out of the shadows from beneath the stairs.

It was old-home week at the Holiday Inn. I looked up into the tired, drawn face of Lewis Levander Orwell, my friend, once upon a time my lover, and saw the bleak, black acknowledgment of just how fucked-up all this was. And then I really saw, because he wasn't walking on his own. He had a cane, a fancy carved affair that had dragons running up the sides. Extra long, because he was pretty damned tall.

He'd lost more weight, gone from lanky to thin and fragile. His skin had a translucent ivory cast to it, as if he were fading away like a Djinn.

It was an effort for him to walk the four short steps to the chair across from me. No one tried to help him, but I could feel the weight of their attention, their concern. He sank into the plush brown velour with a sigh, propped the cane against the arm, and folded his hands together as he looked at me.

'You look like shit,' I said bluntly. I surprised a thin smile out of him.

'Right back at ya. How much have you slept?'

'Averaged out, a couple of hours a day.'

'Can't survive that way, Jo.'

'You're one to talk.'

Silence ticked. Lewis's eyes flicked aside to Paul. 'Sorry about the drama. I'd have done this on my own, but frankly, I think you could kick my ass right now.'

'I could kick your ass anytime,' I shot back reflexively, but I was a little appalled by the fragility I saw in him. He looked… breakable. I'd never seen him like this, not even when he'd been hurt.

Lewis was dying. Really dying.

'Don't blame Paul for this. It was my decision.'

That got my attention. 'Since when do the Wardens take orders from you?' Because even though, technically, he was a Warden-the most powerful one in the world-he'd been on the outside a lot longer than he'd been in. Lewis wasn't a conformist, and he hadn't exactly risen through the chain of command.

In true form, he blew past the question. 'We can't defeat Kevin by frontal assault. You already understand that.'

'I'm having a hard time seeing how keeping me tied the hell up is winning the battle!'

'We need to talk to him. Persuade him to give up. It's our only real choice.'

'How the hell are you going to get him to talk at all? He's holding all the cards!'

'You let me worry about that part.' Lewis shifted, as if something inside hurt him. 'First things first. We have to get Jonathan out of his hands. You agree?'

I had to. I knew what Jonathan was, and how important he was to the Free Djinn-plus, Kevin wouldn't have the leverage and force multipliers necessary to destroy the world if we took his Djinn away. 'Sure.'

Did I imagine it, or did Lewis's knuckles turn a little whiter? 'That's our bargaining chip. To Kevin, one Djinn's pretty much like another. He doesn't know Jonathan. He doesn't know how much more powerful Jonathan is than any of the others. That's why we're going to offer a trade.'

'A trade?'

He held my eyes. 'Jonathan for David.'

'What?' I jerked upright, tried to pull my hands apart. Marion 's vine compensated by wrapping tighter. The slick, living feeling of it moving on my skin made me want to run screaming, but I forced myself to relax. Deep breaths. 'You're kidding. Tell me you're kidding.' Nothing from him but that slow, steady stare. Come on, Lewis, lie to me at least. Make a damn joke. Something. 'You can't give him David!'

'We'd be a hell of a lot better off,' Paul rumbled. 'That Djinn you've got ain't no small fry, but he's a quantum level of trouble down from the current situation. And he's been in bad situations before. He even knows the kid.'