The Dark River

“All these cabinets contain student files,” the commissioner explained. “There are no children on the Island, but when we woke up that first morning this was a real school. There was chalk for the blackboards, paper and pencils, and canned food in the student cafeteria. Little details like that increase the level of cruelty. We didn’t just destroy an imaginary city, but a real place with stoplights and ice-cream parlors.”

“Is that why you brought me here?”

The commissioner of patrols pushed Gabriel past the file cabinets. Two small gas flares were burning from wall pipes, but the light was almost overcome by the shadows in the room. “There’s a reason why I picked this school as my headquarters. All the stories about visitors are connected to this room. There’s something special about this particular location, but I haven’t been able to discover the secret.”

They reached a central work area with tables, trays, and metal chairs. Gabriel was captive in the wheelchair, but he moved his head around, searching for the patch of infinite black space that would provide a passageway back to the Fourth Realm.

“If visitors can travel to this world, then there has to be a way out. Where is it, Gabriel? You have to tell me.”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s not an acceptable response. You need to listen to me clearly. At this point, I can see only two possibilities. You’re either my only hope for escape, or you’re a threat to my survival. I do not have the time, or the inclination, to guess which option is correct.” The commissioner drew his revolver and pointed it at Gabriel’s head. “There are three bullets in this gun-probably the last three bullets that exist on this island. Don’t make me waste one of them killing you.”

29

Maya was still carrying the snub-nosed revolver she had acquired back in New York. The weapon determined her choice of transportation. Avoiding airports, she used a rural bus, a ferryboat, and a train to travel from Ireland to London. She arrived at Victoria Station in the middle of the night without a clear idea of how to find Gabriel. Before he left Skellig Columba, he had promised to contact the Free Runners, so Maya decided to drop by Vine House on the South Bank. Perhaps Jugger and his friends would know if Gabriel was still in the city.

She crossed the Thames and walked up Langley Lane toward Bonnington Square. The streets were empty at this late hour, but she could see the glow of televisions in darkened rooms. Maya passed some renovated terrace houses and a redbrick school built in the Victorian era that had been transformed into an upscale apartment building. In such surroundings, the Vine House looked like a shabby old man surrounded by well-dressed bankers and barristers.

When Maya reached the six-foot-high stone wall that surrounded the garden at Vine House, she smelled a harsh odor that reminded her of a trash fire. The Harlequin stopped and peered around the corner of the house. No one was on the sidewalk or sitting in the little garden at the center of the square. The neighborhood seemed safe until she noticed two men sitting in a florist’s delivery van parked near the end of the block. Maya doubted that anyone had ordered a dozen red roses to be delivered at one o’clock in the morning.

There was no entrance to the back garden from Langley Lane, so she grabbed the top of the stone wall and pulled herself over. The burning smell grew stronger, but she still couldn’t see a fire. Light came from a streetlamp and the new moon glowing in the western sky. As quietly as possible, she moved down the garden pathway to the back of the house, found the door unlocked, and eased it open.

Smoke surged out of the open doorway and flowed around her like a flood of foul gray water. Maya stumbled backward, coughing and waving her hands. Vine House was on fire, and the eighteenth-century oak beams and floorboards gave off as much smoke as a coal pit burning underground.

Where were the Free Runners? Had they fled the house or were they dead? Falling on her hands and knees, Maya crawled into the ground-floor hallway. A door on the left led to the empty kitchen. A door on the right opened to a bedroom with a single electric lamp that gave off a feeble point of light within the darkness.

A man lay in the middle of the room-half on the floor and half on a mattress, as if he were too weary to find his way to bed. Maya grabbed the man’s arms and dragged him out the doorway and into the garden. She was coughing hard and her eyes were filled with tears, but she could see that the unconscious man was Gabriel’s friend Jugger. Straddling his body, she slapped him hard across the face. Jugger’s eyes fluttered open and he started coughing.

“Listen to me!” Maya said. “Is there anyone else in the house?”

“Roland. Sebastian…” Jugger began coughing again.

“What happened? Are they dead?”

“Two men came in a van. Guns. Put us on the floor. Gave us injections…”