The Key (82 page)

‘Step away from Adriana!’ she orders Vanessa.

‘Sigrid …’ Viktor begins.

‘Let go of the wheelchair!’ Sigrid says. ‘And step away from Adriana now!’

The fireball in Nejla’s hand is growing. It is a warning. Vanessa steps away from the wheelchair. The mink runs down from Sigrid’s shoulder, shoots across the room and climbs up on the bookshelf behind Vanessa.

‘Adriana is not permitted to leave the manor house,’ Sigrid says, looking at Viktor and Clara. ‘And neither are you. What are you doing? We are meant to be closing the portal!’

‘No, you’re not,’ Vanessa says. ‘The Chosen Ones are to close the portal. And we must do it now.’

She fixes her eyes on Nejla and Felix.

‘Please,’ she says, trying to keep her voice calm and determined. ‘You can pretend you never saw us.’

Nejla looks inscrutable. Her fireball is still burning steadily. Felix’s gaze is lost somewhere behind Vanessa’s head, as if she is still invisible.

‘Let’s go,’ Viktor says.

Vanessa is just about to take hold of the wheelchair handles when something hard hits her in the chest. Her back slams into the bookshelf and the glass doors break. A stuffed owl hits the floor next to her. The mink is hissing from somewhere just above.

‘You’re going nowhere,’ Sigrid says. She stands in precisely the same spot where Vanessa just stood.

Vanessa knew that Sigrid could move very quickly, but she is still shocked. She pats her back for injuries, grateful for Mum’s thick jacket. At least she’s not skewered on a shard of glass.

‘Have you gone fucking mad?’ Viktor shouts. Sigrid backs away. ‘You have to let us go! The world is on the brink of destruction and only the Chosen Ones can save it!

‘He’s right,’ Clara says. ‘Walter doesn’t even know how to go about closing the portal.’

‘He does so! Walter—’

‘Is lying to us!’ Clara says sharply.

‘No, he’s not!’ Sigrid says, staring angrily at her. ‘He is our leader and leaders have to take tough decisions and—’

‘We’re going.’ Vanessa gets up from the floor. ‘We haven’t got time for this.’

She turns to Nejla.

‘Go ahead and set us on fire. But then there’ll be no one who can stop the apocalypse.’

Vanessa sees movement out of the corner of her eye. Suddenly Sigrid is standing next to Adriana, pressing the sharp tip of a silver-coloured letter opener against her neck. There is a small depression in the skin just where the knife tip rests. If Sigrid presses a little harder, the skin will break. The mink is scratching excitedly on top of the bookshelf.

‘I’ll do it,’ Sigrid says. ‘I’ll kill her if you leave.’

Vanessa looks at Viktor, who is frowning.

‘She isn’t lying,’ he says. ‘She is desperate enough.’

Sigrid
looks
desperate. Her eyes are darting all around her.

‘You must do what Walter tells you!’ she says. ‘He’s the only one who knows how to save the world, don’t you get that?’

Vanessa is close to panic. How much time do they have? Sigrid is keeping them here just because she can’t admit to herself that Walter is wrong.

‘Bullshit,’ Nejla says.

The fireball goes out. She lowers her hand. ‘I’m fucking sick of this,’ she continues. ‘I’m fucking sick of you, Sigrid. You’re so false. You spy on the rest of us, and then run off to Walter with the information. Don’t you think we’ve worked out what you’re doing? And what you and he are doing?’

She sounds disgusted.

‘It’s not true!’ Sigrid says.

‘Let go of the knife,’ Viktor says.

‘No!’ Sigrid screams, and Vanessa sees her press the knife so hard on Adriana’s neck that the skin is going white. Sigrid doesn’t even seem aware of what she is doing. She could easily puncture the large artery in the neck by mistake.

‘Felix, go and get Walter!’ she says.

He stares at his clenched right hand. He seems not to hear Sigrid.

‘Felix!’ she screams.

He takes a deep breath and drives his fist into the wall.

Vanessa feels a terrible pain in her hand, as if she has broken it. Clara screams. The knife drops from Sigrid’s hand to the floor. Viktor leaps forward, pushes her away from the wheelchair so hard that she stumbles and falls. Grimacing with pain, Viktor grabs the knife and begins to push the wheelchair towards the door.

Vanessa follows and feels the pain in her hand fading. Clara is wiping away a few tears.

Nejla backs out of the room with them. She lets the ball of fire flare up again and keeps her eyes on Sigrid. Felix follows them. His face is contorted with pain and he holds his injured hand against his chest. Vanessa feels sorry for him. She knows exactly how much it hurts. She turns round to have a last look.

Sigrid is getting up. Tears, heavy with mascara, are pouring down her cheeks. The mink clings to her tights, trying to climb up her legs.

Vanessa dislikes her enormously but can’t forget what Mona said about Walter.

‘You can’t trust Walter,’ she says to Sigrid. ‘You ought to get out of here, too.’

Sigrid says nothing, just shakes her head, and Vanessa knows she can’t reach her. She lets the door close between them.

* * *

Minoo studies Walter. It’s almost time.

‘Have you forgotten our deal?’ he says.

The deal? He means his threats. That he would hurt those she loves.

Love.

She likes the feeling, in theory. It makes her curious, interested. It is simultaneously so simple and so complex, so predictable and so unpredictable. She can still experience it when she returns into her own memories of being with Gustaf. She would very much like to explore it more. And she would prefer that neither Gustaf nor the others were harmed. It would be a shame.

‘I haven’t forgotten that you threatened me,’ she says. ‘But what can you do now? The darkness has fallen.’

Walter leans forward.

‘I know I can’t get at you,’ he says. ‘But I can get at Viktor and Clara. Would you like to have that on your conscience?’

Minoo looks at him. The moment is here. Now, he will be told.

‘Your role will soon be over,’ she says. ‘The guardians have used you. Your circle never had a hope of closing the portal. The Chosen Ones are the Key.’

Walter goes rigid.

‘Are the guardians telling you all that?’ he asks.

It takes a moment for her to understand the question, and before she knows how to answer it.

She meets his eyes. His grey eyes that used to frighten her so much.

‘I am saying it,’ she says. ‘The guardians are saying it. It is the same thing.’

* * *

Now
.

Minoo’s order arrives in Linnéa’s mind.

She releases her power simultaneously with Anna-Karin and they look at each other in surprise. Their joint magic is stronger than ever before.

Anna-Karin’s control thoughts ring out inside Linnéa.

DO NOT MOVE. DO NOT SPEAK
.

Anna-Karin opens the door and they step into Walter’s office hand in hand.

Linnéa sees him at once. He sits absolutely still, leaning forward a little. He doesn’t look at all like the man she had imagined. His hair is greyer, but at the same time he looks younger, more athletic. And, even when paralysed by Anna-Karin’s magic, something about him makes Linnéa sense danger.

‘Minoo!’ Anna-Karin whispers.

Minoo, sitting relaxed on the sofa, turns her head to look at them. Linnéa feels suddenly cold. There is something wrong with the look in Minoo’s eyes. It is like when she was examining their magic in Kärrgruvan. Only worse.

Minoo gets up and calmly picks up the three objects from the table. She walks past the armchair where Alexander is sleeping and stops in front of Linnéa and Anna-Karin.

‘Come with me,’ she says.

It is Minoo’s voice, and yet it is not. She doesn’t wait for them to answer, only walks out of the room. Linnéa exchanges a glance with Anna-Karin, who looks alarmed, but follows Minoo.

Linnéa casts a last glance at Walter.

He smiles, a barely noticeable twist of the corners of his mouth. And then he looks at her.

Panic freezes her to the floor. Walter gets up and the lynx emerges from behind the desk. The fucking lynx. She had forgotten about it.

‘You are Linnéa Wallin, aren’t you?’ Walter’s voice is deep and melodious.

She runs into the ballroom, crashes into Anna-Karin and gives her a push.

‘Run!’ she screams.

Minoo is standing at the door on the other side of the room. The light from one of the windows falls on her and makes the silver cross in her arms gleam.

‘Come,’ she says. ‘This way.’

Linnéa runs towards her and doesn’t dare look behind her. What if Walter is chasing them.

They know we’re here!
she calls out to Vanessa.

Minoo hurries though the manor house with Anna-Karin and Linnéa at her heels. She is clutching the silver cross, the box and the skull to her chest.

Any moment now, Walter will follow them.

Everything is progressing as it should.

She runs through the hall and opens the front door. When the cold hits her, her magic immediately resets and coats her whole body with a layer of protective warmth.

Vanessa has responded to Linnéa’s warning. She and the Ehrenskiöld twins are waiting in the yard.

At the same time, Nejla and Felix run towards the canal.

At the same time, Sigrid, crying and holding Henry in her arms, hurries through the corridors of the manor house.

At the same time, Walter is approaching the hall.

Everything is progressing as it should.

Minoo carries on walking across the snow. Linnéa and Anna-Karin are close behind her. She stops a few metres away from the others.

‘Where is Walter?’ Clara asks.

‘Don’t know,’ Linnéa replies. ‘But we must get out of here.’

Vanessa
, Minoo thinks.
Come here
.

Vanessa looks surprised, but does as she is told.

Stand in a circle
, Minoo thinks to the other Chosen Ones.

They all look bewildered but obey her instruction.

‘What are you doing?’ Viktor says. ‘We must leave now!’

Minoo considers him. And Clara. And the sleeping Adriana. What is about to happen is indeed regrettable. But necessary.

She turns, catches a glimpse of Walter in the open front door, outlined against the hall light. Then she wraps the Chosen Ones in her magic and they are on their way.

* * *

It feels like being thrown into a centrifuge, being whirled around at a breathtaking speed. All the air seems to be squeezed out of Vanessa’s lungs.

Then, suddenly, she is lying on her back in the snow.

Her head is still spinning. She takes a deep breath. Tries to focus on the blue light that is dancing above her.

She sits up, feeling the cold snow against her hands. Linnéa and Anna-Karin are also about to get up. Minoo stands in front of them, her face looking like a strange mask in the light of a blue fireball hovering above her. She is dressed in jeans and a cotton sweater but doesn’t seem to feel the cold.

‘What did you do?’ Vanessa asks her.

‘Moved us.’

Vanessa tries to orientate herself and realises that they are on the ledge outside the opening to the tunnel. The steep rock face is right behind her. The forest below is rustling quietly but it is too dark to see anything.

‘Did you …
teleport
us here?’ Vanessa asks.

‘Yes,’ Minoo confirms.

It is not just
how
they got here, but the fact that they got to this particular place. Minoo obviously knows about the tunnel leading to the portal.

‘Come along,’ Minoo says. ‘We haven’t got much time now.’

She takes Anna-Karin’s hand and pulls her towards the opening in the mountain. Vanessa notes that the snow is melting in front of Minoo’s feet.

‘Hurry,’ she tells them, without turning to look at them.

The fireball divides in two so that one floats along to light the way for Vanessa and Linnéa. The other one escorts Minoo and Anna-Karin into the tunnel.

Are you all right?
Linnéa thinks to Vanessa.

Vanessa nods as she gets up on shaky legs, then helps Linnéa to stand and brushes the snow from her fake fur coat.

What’s up with Minoo?
she thinks to Linnéa.
How come she has all those new powers?

I don’t know
, Linnéa says as she looks towards the tunnel.
I tried to read her mind a moment ago, but she’s so deep inside her magic I’m not even sure how much of Minoo is left
.

Their fears flow from one to the other. The darkness is drawing closer, surrounding them.

If we follow Minoo now, we will be following the guardians
, Vanessa thinks.

Do we have a choice?

Linnéa’s dark eyes glitter in the light from the fireball. And Vanessa remembers when Mona traced the lines in her palm and talked about the love of her life, she who turned out to be Linnéa.
These two lines are intertwined all the way to the end
.

Is this the end?

At least they are together.

‘Let’s do this,’ Linnéa says.

* * *

Minoo walks through the underground spaces. The blue light is there to guide Anna-Karin through the tunnels. Minoo would find the way without it. She no longer needs her eyes.

She makes the cross, the skull and the box float along in front of her. Her fingers touch the stone walls and she senses echoes of pain. So many of the guardians have existed in these tunnels for hundreds of years. They have waited. Tried to husband their waning powers. They never wanted to hurt, but now and then they have had to entice people into the caves to gain strength from their souls, their life-forces. All those who have disappeared over the years in the forests around Engelsfors have ended their lives here. Sacrificed for the good cause.

And when the Chosen Ones and their friends explored the tunnels, the guardians had to take a little of their energies, too. Keep them weak, so that Minoo would think that the Council’s circle was the stronger one. She had to be persuaded to believe that in order to make the choices that have ultimately taken her here. She understands all that now.