Eric had almost fallen down and he was now cursing. He turned the flashlight towards me and cursed again when he saw me.
'Do you want to blind me or what? Take that light away from my eyes and do something!'
'Right away', he said and it got dark around me once more.
I could not help myself.
'Are you serious? Without any comments? Really nothing?'
And the last spot of light above us disappeared.
'Eric', I shouted even louder just to get a big fat nothing from him.
I don't really enjoy being alone – and definitely not in the dark in some cave somewhere. And as it always happens when we want time to go by quicker it seems to be passing in slow motion.
One second ... two seconds ... as if captured by the darkness...full of despair...fear...how long until sunrise?
Without moving I waited...and waited...ten minutes...one hour...how long had it been? Damn it, I cannot stand to be in this place anymore.
Ah...and the pain just won't stop. I cannot remember when was the last time I whined so much...and I feel the need to keep whining.
'Someone please help me!' I yelled in despair although I knew it was in vain.
Some people where probably now rolling in their beds sunken deep in their dreams. Some were probably squirming over some nightmare and some were sound asleep enjoying the soft mattress and the fluffy pillows, while others – me – well – were struggling not to fall into despair while longing for a way out of some cave.
In a short while it started to get lighter. I startled when Eric showed up behind me. I was so happy to see him that I could have hugged him.
'I...I thought that...you abandoned me here', I told him in trembling voice while struggling with the tears that were going to give away my true state of mind.
'You though wrong. Can you walk?' He asked and then offered me his hand to help me get up.
'I guess so.'
We moved towards a partially lit area and I felt slightly awkward as we were facing each other. He was checking me out and stopped when he saw my face. He frowned as he was pointing to my forehead.
'That doesn't look very well. We are going to see Doctor Phill right now.' He grabbed my hand and pulled me after him without giving a damn about the fact that I was protesting against it.
'I'm alright', I said again and again. I took my hand to my forehead. 'Look, see? It's just a little scratch.' He offered me a tissue. 'Done, it's solved!' He gave me that same look. 'Well...it could have been better but I guess it will just have to do. Wait a minute...you didn't tell me how you got here. And what is this place?'
He stopped in front of a big iron ladder propped against the wall.
'We'll have time for this later', he said vocally.
'And why not now?'
'You go first!' He said calmly and pointed me to the ladder.
I took the flashlight from him and looked around. I stopped and looked at a
hole in the wall from across.
'A tunnel; an underground tunnel. I am curious about what it is hiding', I said and then screamed when a mouse appeared where I was flashing my light. This made Eric laugh.
'It's not funny. Rats scare me.'
'Everything scares you.'
'And where does this ladder take us?' I asked him while ignoring his comment.
'To Aaron's office.' He pulled a key out from his pocket. 'I managed to make a copy a few days ago. I was suspecting for a long time that he was hiding something in there. I found one of his vaults. It was pretty difficult to find out his password - but that's a different story. Inside there were some papers with some combinations. Put together they gave clues pointing to the library in Aaron's office – behind it there was the key to a storage room. Under the hideous purple carpet that he got from Christine was the entrance to this place.'
I wanted to kick myself.
'And if you are so smart to discover all these then why were you hovering around the house?'
'It's only when I saw you here that I realised that something had to be in that storage room.'
He ran his hand through his scruffy hair and sighed. He seemed tired. I was also tired but this did not mean that I was not going to listen to him and then be on our way. I could not wait until next time to find out what this tunnel was hiding.
'This is none of your business anyway.'
'You are free to leave if you want.' Perhaps it was none of my business but I was not going to admit that. 'Oh, and I assume that you don't need the flashlight anymore.'
I went into the tunnel at a slow pace but it was difficult for me to walk. My feet hurt and for sure I would end up with some nice bruises. Eric obviously came after me babbling something about how I should have stayed in my room as we had planned.
'You could have told me that you were planning to come back and that it would take you some time', I told him after about five minutes walking. 'I could no longer bear the silence between us.'
'I was back in about ten minutes, if not less.'
'I could swear that it had been at least one hour. In any case, thank you.'
The tunnel seemed to date long back. Every now and then we would see fragments of drawings on the walls, dusty paintings that had been worn out by time. The moon, a cat's head, twisted lines, half of something that looked very much like a very large diamond, a crystal globe, parts of people and many other things.
Not long into our walk we ended up at a split of roads.
I sighed.
'What do we do now, Miss Mysterious?' Eric asked.
'I haven't the slightest idea. Shall we just take our chance? There are four roads. How do we know which one is the correct one?'
'You are joking, aren't you?' He refrained from laughing. 'The right road? What do you expect to find? Come on, let's go back!'
'I don't know', I shrugged my shoulders. 'Perhaps you are right. Let's go...'but I stopped as I felt a chilly airflow. 'Do you feel that?' He looked at me and didn't understand why I was asking that. It's coming from here – I showed him the road on my right hand side. I got that same look from him. 'Come on. It's like an air conditioning blowing towards us.'
'Are you alright?'
'Do you mean...that you...' – I refrained my words – 'aaa ... you don't feel anything?'
'Are you sure you didn't hurt your head worse than you think?'
Was that possible?
'I have to see something.'
We started walking towards the draft and had the strange sensation that this was going to be the answer to some questions, as well as the chance for me to ask some more. I kept hearing how Eric shouted for me until his voice vanished into an echo. Our only source of light was the flashlight that I now had. I was afraid to be alone but every time I attempted to go back to Eric, there was something that stopped me before my mind could put things in motion.
A fluorescent light flew before my eyes. I knew what was coming next. I could already feel how I was getting goose bumps from the cold air. I should have left but since I was already here, I continued to walk until I could no longer feel my legs. I had to stop for a short while. I leaned on the wall and that's when I heard a sound.
I was scared. I moved away. A part of the wall moved to the side opening up an entry into the unknown. It was a narrow hole through which you could only crawl.
I didn't think about it too much. I thought that this had to be a sign. I grabbed the flashlight tightly to make sure I wasn't going to drop it and I went through slowly. I dropped closer and closer to the ground as I advanced. My back hurt terribly and it was getting harder and harder to breathe.
I clenched my teeth. I had to do whatever was needed.
Not very long after that I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. At first I thought I was only imagining it. My eyes hurt from how tired I was and I probably would have fallen asleep had I closed them even for a few seconds. I heard the echo of some voices but I could not understand what they were saying. As I got closer I realised that someone was having an argument.
At the end of the tunnel there was a big room that was strongly lit. I could tell that I was in a ventilation shaft.
My heart pounded and I was breathing heavily as if I had just ran for six kilometres – not that I could actually run that long. I stayed on the ground with my face down as I was trying to calm down. I did the only thing that I could possibly do at that time. I opened my ears wide and listened.
'There will be more', said a man with a coarse voice.
Then a trembling voice followed.
'But...is five not enough?'
A powerful laughter. Silence and then another voice – this time a woman.
'Don't tell me you are backing down? Because once you have decided to do this you cannot come out of it – not alive. And you know that a few extra inert bodies don't mean a thing to us.' I flinched when I heard this. 'We will do anything to meet our goal. Do you understand? That's what I was saying.' The tone of her voice became relaxed all of a sudden. It was a sign of falsity. 'Aaron' – please tell me that this is not who I think it is – 'dear, you have sent your best people and they still haven't returned although they should have been back by now. I hope they did not fail in releasing the morh. You do understand what this means, don't you?' Her voice resembled that of someone who was almost crying. 'I don't even want to think about it. The first part came out perfectly. It could not have been any better. The veil is sending only faint signals that it is weakening – lines, ruptures that are invisible to the human eye. But this is just the beginning. We need the morh that escaped and I still don't understand how he did that.' 'For your sake' – she yelled again – 'I hope that he is the injected one. This way we will see if our experiments are working or not. Next! She commanded.'
I was trying to get a better view so I crawled a bit on my elbows until I got to the very end. The place looked like a huge laboratory fitted with the latest technology – all sorts of devices and big screens on which there were drawings, sketches and different calculations. On this island that apparently did not even exist, there was a secret laboratory – go figure – an underground one. Many people were moving around avoiding as much as they could some tall glass tubes covered with a black cloth so that you could not see inside.
Five white cloths were lying on the ground. Given their shape I had a pretty good idea what they were hiding.
I could hear meaningless words being said which resounded in that room. It sounded like an incantation. Three of them stuck into my mind – morh, noctis and blood.
After the incantation was done, one of the bodies covered with the white cloth started to float – I blinked several times hoping I was imagining it. The body kept lifting up into the air and then disappeared leaving a sort of fine dust behind it – or was it fog? – that evaporated immediately. A powerful noise – like a wallop – came out of one of the big tubes that were covered with the black cloth.
Then the crowd applauded.
'Enough', said the female voice from before. I tried to see where it was coming from but there were too many people. 'You should applaud when we have a real victory. Now, the next body!'
The white cloths moved aside. The impulse of running away from that crazy place was so strong that I had to bite my lip in order to refrain from screaming. I clenched my teeth hard and it hurt – the result of cruel reality. As I was expecting it, the white cloths were covering dead people, inert bodies covered in blood. The women who had said the incantation leaned down and began moving her fingers on the body of one of the victims leaving silver tracks behind. A man came close to her and he – ah, disgusting!!! – he sucked her bloody finger. The woman let her head fall back and I froze. It was Meya.
'Ah...yes...that's it', she said as she moaned.
I cannot believe this! She moaned! She was completely mad! She babbled something and a shield made out of shady glass formed around her and around the man next to her who was probably Aaron. As if nothing had happened, the rest of the people continued minding their own business. The bodies were taken into another room.
I could not stand to see whatever was coming next. But that is when I felt the cold. The ghost-like shapes appeared before me one at a time in the middle of the room. It seems that I was the only one who could see them and this did not make me feel any better. One of them came close to me. It had the size of a child who did not seem to be more than eight years old. I got to see those sad eyes again; the constant crying, the kind that cannot be comforted. The ghost pointed to Meya and Aaron. I refused. I wanted to leave. I suspected what was going to happen next and I definitely did not want to witness that. But every time I was more and more convinced that I wanted to leave, the cold got to me; it froze me and would not allow me to go back. I didn't stand a chance. In order to be able to leave I had to watch the next scene of a very bad movie; a reality that provokes nothing more than disgust.
Meya was in the same position. She seemed to be in a trance. During this time, Aaron had taken off her blouse and was now working on the pants.
I turned my eyes towards the ghosts.
'I beg you ... I don't want to see this!' Their eyes were just as sad but they could not be convinced. I was either going to freeze to death or to continue watching.
Aaron was sucking her breast and was moving frantically his hands all over her body. He squeezed her butt strongly and then slipped his hand in her panties. Meya moaned and arched her back even more. Aaron grabbed her by the waist and put her down. He kissed her all over her body stopping at the intimate area. When he was done, he took off his clothes and just before he got deep inside her, Meya woke up and moved her lips. Aaron was thrown to the side.
'The pleasure that the partner has to offer; his strong desire to penetrate a witch; the disappointment of not being satisfied; the taste of the blood of the right victim and my own fluids on his tongue.'
Meya began rambling sentences with words that I had never heard before.
'Apesta fioni dare kalku.'
A dark circle formed around her. Hazy lights began spreading through the room until they circled every person there.
The black cloths moved aside by themselves and before I could see what was in those glass tubes I lost myself.
I woke up facing Eric and I had a terrible headache. I wanted to ask him where we were, but despite my efforts, I could not. I was so powerless as if someone had drained almost all life out of me. The images flashed before my eyes – we just passed by a marble pole. I blinked strongly a few times and then the mist went away. I was in Eric's arms. His eyes were sparkling and he looked sad. Why was he so sad?
'We'll get to Doctor Phill any minute now. You will be alright. I promise.'
I was struggling to keep my eyes open. Why did he seem even sadder when he looked at me?
'The doctor is...'
'No', I shouted and I felt that my forehead was going to explode in pain, as if every inch of it were struck by arrows. 'The tunnel?'
'This is what you're thinking about now? I should not have let you go there in the first place. But if this will make you feel better, then we'll go back when you get well.'
Every inch of me screamed for me not to go back. This had been real...
'We have...to talk.' I had to fight off the pain that got stronger towards the middle of my forehead.
'Just a bit longer and we'll get there.'
I wanted to get away from here but I could barely feel my arms and legs.
'NO!' I said with as much determination as I could. Damn this headache, damn everything. I had to say something. 'Why don't you just feed me to the rats? It's just the same as bringing me here.' Eric stopped in front of the door and looked at me as if I was delirious. 'I am not crazy. I am only shocked by what I have just seen and I am tired. I only need to get some rest. I beg you. No one has to know and especially no one close to Meya.' He raised his hand and he was preparing to knock on the door. I grabbed him by the collar of his t-shirt and I begged him to look at me and to listen to what I have to say. 'If you do not take me back to my room right this instance then you can just as well consider me dead to you. I am leaving this island the first time I have the chance and I am going to save my ass while you all are going to sink deeper and deeper into the ground. Do you understand? They were dead! And, think about it. He is the one who saw Maggie and now she is a prisoner in her own room. Why aren't we permitted to see her? It's clear that the doctor is in cahoots with that mad Meya and her acolyte Aaron.'
'I know we should not trust them. And now I know that you are not a part of their plans. I am sorry I thought this about you. I will take you to one of the guest rooms – someone is probably still guarding Maggie's room. But you should know that I don't agree with this.'
He sat me carefully on the bed and returned with a first aid kit after five minutes. He first offered me a glass of water and a couple of pills.
'One of these is precisely for your headache and the other one is meant to help you sleep better.'
I took the pills and I thanked him with a weak voice. He smiled at me bitterly and then cleaned my face carefully with a cloth dipped in a colourless liquid that smelled strongly of lavender. He did the same for the scars on my hands. My palms were worse – especially the left one. He looked at my left palm with great interest.
'What is it?'
'Your sign is a bit strange ... have you had it like this since you were born?'
'What?'
There was a half-moon tattooed on my left palm. The half-moon was vaguely contoured in silver.
'So it was real, but it was not. The dream...'
He looked at me and seemed more confused than ever. And he had good reasons to feel like that. Even I could not make sense of what I was saying. Everything sounded much too strange.
'I am sleepy', I said. I felt how my eyes were shutting but I was fighting to stay awake. I was afraid that if I closed my eyes then all sorts of shattering images would come to my mind.
'Try to sleep! We'll talk more tomorrow.'
I did as he told me to, but I almost instantly saw bloody spots.
I am afraid, I told him trembling and I grabbed his hand.
That's when I saw myself in front of that veil and I saw a lot of blood and I saw Eric as he was struggling to get past the veil and Meya...she was trying to kill me.
I screamed and I let go of his hand. Eric looked at me shocked. He sat by my bedside and ran his hand through my hair.
'It's you, he said. 'After all this time I finally found you. And now I am sure that it's you. The Magic Pawn...is...is right here...'
'Eric...I...I don't know what you are talking about.'
'You had a vision and you led me there also. You are the wizard who's born every other thousand years. You are so innocent and so new to the world of magic and you have no idea how important your role is.'
'If this is a vision does it mean that those things will happen? I am scared', I told him trembling.
'I am here and as long as I am next to you, nothing bad will happen to you. And now that I found you, we must leave this island. Thanks to Meya I managed to get past the barrier. If she finds out about this, she will take away my access and I will be sent back behind the barrier.'
'I don't want you to leave! I do not know you but I feel safer with you; safer than I have felt with anybody else.'
He covered my cheek with his hand. I did not expect that to have such a calming effect.
I laughed a bit and that made him confused.
'This is the first time when you are calling me Kate...'