F. Paul Wilson: The Tomb

"Returning it with interest," he managed to say as he dropped both necklaces into the extended palm, avoiding contact with the skin.

Kolabati either did not realize or did not care that she now possessed both necklaces. She made a slow, tottering turn and hobbled off toward the bedroom. For an instant she was caught in the light from the hall. Jack turned away at the sight of her shrunken body, her stooped shoulders and arthritic joints. Kolabati was an ancient hag. She turned the corner and Jack was alone in the room.

A great lethargy seeped over him. He went over to the chair by the front window that looked out onto the street and sat down.

It's over. Finally over.

Kusum was gone. The rakoshi were gone. Vicky was home safe. Kolabati was turning young again in the bedroom. He found himself possessed by an insistent urge to sneak down the hall and find out what was happening to Kolabati… to watch her actually grow young. Maybe then he could believe in magic.

Magic… after all he had seen, all he had been through, he still found it difficult to believe in magic' Magic didn't make sense. Magic didn't follow the rules. Magic…

What was the use? He couldn't explain the necklaces or the rakoshi. Call them unknowns. Leave it at that.

But still—to actually watch it happening…

He went to stand up and found he couldn't. He was too weak. He slumped back and closed his eyes. Sleepy…

A sound behind him startled him to alertness. He opened his eyes and realized that he must have dozed off. The hazy skim-milk light of predawn filled the sky. He must have been out for at least an hour. Someone was approaching from the rear. Jack tried to turn to see who it was but found he could only move his head. His shoulders were fixed to the wing back of the chair… so weak…

"Jack?" It was Kolabati's voice—the Kolabati he knew. The young Kolabati. "Jack, are you all right?"

"Fine," he said. Even his voice was weak.

She came around the chair and looked down at him. Her necklace was back on around her neck. She hadn't got all the way back to the thirty-year-old he had known, but she was close. He put her age at somewhere around forty-five now.

"No, you're not! There's blood all over the chair and the floor!"

"I'll be okay."

"Here." She produced the second necklace—Kusum's. " Let me put this on you. "

"No!" He didn't want anything to do with Kusum's necklace. Or hers.

"Don't be an idiot! It will strengthen you until you can get to a hospital. All your wounds started bleeding again as soon as you took it off."

She reached to place it around his neck but he twisted his head to block her.

"Don't want it!"

"You're going to die without it, Jack!"

"I'll be fine. I'll heal up—with out magic. So please go. Just go."

Her eyes looked sad. "You mean that?"

He nodded.

"We could each have our own necklace. We could have long lives, the two of us. We wouldn't be immortal, but we could live on and on. No sickness, little pain—"

You're a cold one, Kolabati.

Not a thought for her brother—Is he dead? How did he die? Jack could not help but remember how she had told him to get hold of Kusum's necklace and bring it back, saying that without it he would lose control of the rakoshi. That had been the truth in a way—Kusum would no longer have control of the rakoshi because he would die without the necklace. When he contrasted that against Kusum's frantic efforts to find her necklace after she had been mugged, Kolabati came up short. She did not know a debt when she incurred one. She spoke of honor but she had none. Mad as he had been, Kusum was ten times the human being she was.

But he couldn't explain all this to her now. He didn't have the strength. And she probably wouldn't understand anyway.

"Please go."

She snatched the necklace away and held it up. "Very well! I thought you were a man worthy of this, a man willing to stretch his life to the limit and live it to the fullest, but I see I was wrong! So sit there in your pool of blood and fade away if that's what you wish! I have no use for your kind! I never have! I wash my hands of you!"

She tucked the extra necklace into a fold in her sari and strode by him. He heard the apartment door slam and knew he was alone.

Hell hath no fury…

Jack tried to straighten himself in the chair. The attempt flashed pain through every inch of his body; the minor effort left his heart pounding and his breath rasping.

Am I dying?

That thought would have brought on a panic response at any other time, but at the moment his brain seemed as unresponsive as his body. Why hadn't he accepted Kolabati's help, even for a short while? Why had he refused? Some sort of grand gesture? What was he trying to prove, sitting here and oozing blood, ruining the carpet as well as the chair? He wasn't thinking clearly.

It was cold in here—a clammy cold that sank to the bones. He ignored it and thought about the night. He had done good work tonight… probably saved the entire subcontinent of India from a nightmare. Not that he cared much about India. Gia and Vicky were the ones that mattered. He had—

The phone rang.

There was no possibility of his answering it.

Who was it—Gia? Maybe. Maybe she was wondering where he was. He hoped so. Maybe she'd come looking for him. Maybe she'd even get here in time. Again, he hoped so. He didn't want to die. He wanted to spend a lot of time with Gia and Vicky. And he wanted to remember tonight. He had made a difference tonight. He had been the deciding factor. He could be proud of that. Even Dad would be proud… if only he could tell him.

He closed his eyes—it was getting to be too much of an effort to keep them open—and waited.