Coven

seriously expect to confront Jervis again. Guns were out—obviously. It had already been proven that shooting Jervis with bullets was as effective as shooting him with rubber bands. Knives and blunt objects were equally useless. But what about corrosives, sulfuric acid or something? Yeah, Wade thought. They had all kinds of stuff like that at the sciences center…

He drove quickly. Several passersby headed for a mixer on the Hill. Wade envied their obliviousness. You haven’t seen a dead guy walking around, have you? he felt tempted to ask. He parked at the sciences center. The building stood dark, and, to no surprise, locked. Wade’s lack of reluctance would’ve impressed any criminal. He shattered the front glass doors with his tire iron and stepped in.

The chemistry wing was just around the corner. Slats of moonlight spread across the shiny labtops. With his flashlight, he found the door to the storage closet. It was unlocked and… “Shit!” he shouted…empty.

Then a car door slammed outside.

Wade stood stunned, like a figure in a freeze frame. Footsteps tracked across the parking lot. They sounded frightfully casual. Wade peeked out the blinds and saw Jervis’ Dodge Colt parked right beside the Vette.

Shit shit shit! he thought. He leapt for the door but the footsteps could already be heard in the hall. He glanced around, frantic and quite stupid. Then he slipped into the storage closet and bolted the lock from inside.

He held his breath. Jervis walked right into the lab and turned on the lights. He was whistling as he searched the room. Grimly Wade recognized the tune as Eno’s “Here He Comes.”

“I can smell you, Wade,” announced the voice beyond the door. “I can smell your fear.”

Wade swallowed his breath, wide eyed in the closet’s murk.

“The closet? No, Wade, I’m sure you’re not stupid enough to hide in the most obvious place.”

Yes I am, Wade thought.

In a split, exploding instant, the closet door was shorn down the middle. Its halves blew out, and in their place stood Jervis, lowering the massive beam hewer.

Wade cracked Jervis in the head with the tire iron. It made an awful sound, yet Jervis barely flinched. He took the tire iron and snapped it in half. “You know, Wade, I’m really getting tired of people hitting me in the head with things.”

“Sorry,” Wade apologized. “How did you find me?”

Jervis leaned the hewer against the wall and lit a Carlton. “Tom’s extromission key is on your front seat,” he explained. “The Supremate put a direction finder on it. It led me right to you.”

Wade wilted. At least he didn’t have to worry about finding Jervis anymore. “I want to know about the bomb,” he demanded.

“What do you care? By the time the bomb goes off, you’ll be halfway across the Milky Way.”

“I’m not gonna be your goddamned holotype,” Wade informed him. “I’ll kill myself first.”

“With what? Your flashlight?” Jervis grinned smoke. “You’re going back, and this time there’ll be no last minute escapes. I’ll be locking you into the hold personally.”

Wade remembered the extromitter installed at Besser’s office, which was right here in this building. Jervis would have him in the labyrinth in minutes. I just can’t win, Wade considered.

Jervis grabbed Wade by a handful of shirt and calmly dragged him out of the closet. Wade, the antithesis of calm, fought back for all he was worth—not much in this particular scenario. His heart felt huge with adrenaline, his limbs kicking like recoiling cannons, yet his most savage efforts amounted to squat when compared to the physical power of Jervis the Myrmidon, the true haunter of the dark.

Wade churned wildly, and uselessly.

Then he thought: The hewer.

Jervis had left the hewer leaning against the wall. If Wade could get his hands on it…

His arms surged forward, fingers stretching. His hands, not that he could believe it, touched the hewer’s handle. Get it! he thought. Get it! Venting all his strength at once, he surged again. His fingers closed around the handle. Then the hewer was coming away from the wall with him as Jervis dragged on.

“You never give up, do you?” Now Jervis was glancing over his shoulder. A mesh of disapproval and amusement shone on his gray face. He gave Wade’s body a quick jerk—

The hewer fell from his fingers to the floor.

Wade twisted, still reaching out in vain. The hewer got smaller and smaller as he was dragged farther and farther out of the room, down the hall, toward Besser’s office and the inevitable extromitter, which would return him, once and for all, to the labyrinth.

««—»»

At least the jerk had said he loved her. But what good was that if she never saw him again? He’d either be killed by the bomb or reclaimed by Jervis. Nor did her black eye or aching head help her to feel more obligatory. Son of a bitch, she thought.

Lydia was walking north on Route 13. She was fifty miles from Exham, and no cars in sight. She thought about Wade and about the times they’d had sex. But getting off did not equate to love, especially in this day and age. No, orgasms did not equal love.

But she knew she loved him anyway.

The question was, did he really love her? He’d said so, but guys said shit like that all the time, didn’t they?

She didn’t want to die. She’d already taken enough chances with her life in the last few days. She wanted to live.

She kept walking north, away from the campus.

What am I supposed to do?

A mile ahead in darkness, headlights appeared. A car was coming.

It was heading south.

—

CHAPTER 39

Jervis pushed open Besser’s office door, heaved Wade into the corner. So close to recharge, the extromitter dot was actually glowing. Black, but glowing.

Wade’s head wobbled. “Jerv, we’ve been friends for years!”

“Years are split seconds where we’re going. Quit bellyaching and accept your destiny.”

“Like you’ve accepted yours?”

“Yeah,” Jervis said, and lit another Carlton.

“Let me tell you something about your destiny. I know a lot more about it than you do.”

“You don’t know shit, Wade.” Jervis grabbed Wade’s arm, and with his other hand, took the key about his neck. He approached he extromitter. “Say goodbye to the world, Wade.”

But as Jervis inserted the key, Wade said, “The Supremate’s going to dump you.”

Jervis halted. Had the comment kindled a repressed suspicion? His hand wavered. His dead eyes blinked.

“Supremate’s going to make me immortal,” he asserted.

“No, he’s not. He’s going to make you meat loaf. When he doesn’t need something anymore, he gets rid of it.”

“The sisters are just toys,” Jervis justified. “They’re soulless. The Supremate can make them anytime he wants.”

“That’s true. So why does he need you?”

Another dead ember seemed to rekindle.

“You’re treating this Supremate asshole like a god,” Wade went on. “He’s not a god!”

“What is he, then?”