Cadet blue, which had just looked pale on the mirror, turned out to be gray on paper.
Jenny was no artist, but she could draw simple things. Like a square-that was her grandfather's basement. Steps, going out of the top of the picture up to the house. A desk against one wall. A couch. Three or four large bookcases.
That was all she could remember. She hoped it was enough.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that Julian was gone again. Good.
She put the slip of paper on the floor in front of the blank wall.
The flash of light was exactly like a flashgun going off in her eyes, leaving her with dancing afterimages. Score one for Zach, she thought. When she could see again, she found herself looking in a mirror.
It had worked.
She could feel her pulse in her wrists and throat as well as her chest. God, don't let me run away, she thought.
After so many years of fighting not to remember this, she was going to throw herself right into it. It was going to be bad. How bad, she'd have to find out when it happened.
She pressed the red button. The blue light went on. The mirrored door slid open.
She didn't give herself a chance to look at anything before she stepped inside.
Golden sunlight slanted in from small windows set high on the walls. To Jenny's utter surprise she felt a thrill of excitement and recognition.
I remember those windows! I remember...
The door slid shut behind her, but she was already stepping out to the center of the room, looking around in wonder. Taking in the colors, the profusion of objects.
It's smaller than I thought it would be-and even more crowded. But it's my grandfather's basement.
Her grandfather, though, wasn't there.
That's right. He wasn't here that day. I remember. I let myself in the house and went looking for him, but I couldn't find him anywhere upstairs.
So ... I looked down here-I think. I must have. I don't remember doing it, but I must have.
Jenny turned toward the stairs, which ended in a blank wall at the top. No door, of course, because this was a nightmare. The wall was as blank as her mind-her sense of delighted recognition had stopped cold. She had no idea what came next.
But as she stared, she seemed to see the ghost of a child looking down from the top step. A little girl wearing shorts, with wind-ruffled hair and a scab on her knee.
Herself. At age five.
It was almost like watching a movie. She could see the little girl's thongs flap as she ran down the stairs. She could see the child's lips open as she called for her grandfather, see the child standing in surprise at the bottom when he turned out not to be down here.
As long as Jenny watched without trying to guide the images, the ghostly movie went on.
The little girl was looking around, green eyes opening wide as she realized that she was alone down here, a thing which had never happened before.
That's right. The door to the basement had always been locked when Jenny's grandfather wasn't down there-but not that day. Jenny remembered the feeling of delicious wickedness at being where she wasn't allowed to be. But she couldn't remember what happened next.
Don't try to remember. You're trying too hard. Relax and see what happens.
As soon as she did, she seemed to see the little girl again. The ghostly image was standing uncertainly, swaying on her toes, considering whether to stay or go.
It was stay. The child looked around with elaborate casualness, then, sucking on her lower lip and affecting an air of nonchalance, she wandered over to the first bookcase.
All right, Jenny thought. So let's see what's in the bookcase. She followed the child's image. The little girl was idly running a grimy finger along a row of books-which, of course, she couldn't read. Not even the titles. But sixteen-year-old Jenny could.
Some of them looked fairly normal, like Goethe's Faust and UFO's: A New Look. But others were completely unfamiliar, like The Qabalah and De Occulta Philosophia and The Galdrabdk.
The little girl was moving on to the second bookcase, which held all sorts of objects. One whole shelf was crowded with small wooden boxes with glass tops, filled with what looked like spices. No-herbs, Jenny thought. Dried herbs.
The little girl was running fascinated fingers over some balls of colored glass attached to strings. Sixteen-year-old Jenny was more interested in the looped cross next to them-she was sure it was an ankh. Summer's dad had said the ankh was an Egyptian life symbol that kept away bad luck.
And that diamond-shaped thing made of yarn-that was a Mexican Eye of God. A string design that was supposed to protect you from evil. Jenny's mother had one in the kitchen, for decoration.
But what about the bracelet of cobalt and turquoise beads, alternating with little silver charms? And the gold-plated religious pictures? And the wooden flute wrapped in fur?
... items of protection? Jenny thought. She wasn't sure what put the idea in her mind, but the longer she looked at the things in this bookcase, the more certain she felt.
But... it wasn't just this bookcase. Slowly Jenny turned to look around the basement again. All these things, all these beautiful, exotic things-could they all be for protection?
Who would need that much protection? And why?
The little girl was fingering a large silver bell in the
bookcase, but Jenny's eyes were drawn to a group of
charts on the wall. The Theban Alphabet, one was labeled, and underneath were strange symbols. The Alphabet of the Magi. The Secret Etruscan Alphabet. The Celtic Tree Alphabet. Numerical Values of the Hebrew Alphabet. There was also a rather frightening engraving of a skeleton holding a raven on one bony hand.
The ghost child was moving again, wandering over to the large writing desk. Going on tiptoe in her thongs, she leaned her elbows on the felt desk pad. Jenny found herself looking down through a transparent blond head at the papers there.
Lots of papers-which held no interest for the five-year-old Jenny except that she wasn't supposed to touch them. Intrinsic naughtiness was the fun.
Sixteen-year-old Jenny could read them. One was a chart like those on the wall. It was titled The Elder Futhark but Jenny recognized the slanty, angular symbols.
Runes.
Like the ones she'd seen on the drinking horns of the young men in the forest. Like the one on the inside cover of the white box. Each had its name written beside it in her grandfather's strong black handwriting, with notes.
Uruz, she read. For piercing the veil between the worlds. She recognized the inverted V shape, the two uneven horns pointing downward.
Raidho-it was shaped like an R drawn without any curved lines-for journeying in space or time.
Dagaz, which looked like an hourglass on its side. For awakening.
One of the runes was circled with a thick pen stroke.
Nauthiz, Jenny read. Shaped like a backward-leaning X, with one stroke longer than the other. For containment.
The last word was underlined heavily.
Jenny took another slow look around the room.
Oh, my God.
She couldn't keep the truth away any longer. She'd been holding it at arm's length, refusing to look at it, but now it burst on her with the force of absolute certainty. There was no way to deny it.
Oh, my God, he was a sorcerer.
Her mother's father had been a sorcerer.
Don't think about it... don't remember, the voice in her mind whispered. Nobody can make you remember. Stay safe behind your walls, or else ...
It was going to be very bad from here on, she realized.
She had to remember-for Tom. But Tom's image eluded her. So much had happened since she'd seen him last night-could it only be last night? She'd changed so much since then. She tried to conjure up his rakish smile in her mind, his green-flecked eyes, but the picture she got was like a distant, faded photograph. Somebody she'd known long ago.
God, I can't get any feeling for him.
Her palms were tingling. Her stomach felt sick.
I still have to remember. For Dee. For Zach. For Audrey and Michael-and Summer. Yes. For Summer.
All the others had faced their nightmares. Even Summer had tried. Pictures skittered through Jenny's mind: Dee thrashing like an animal; Audrey huddled and moaning; Michael screaming; Summer's blue-white lips; Zach's glazed gray eyes. They'd all been terrified out of their wits. Was Jenny's nightmare any worse than theirs?
Yes, I think so, the little voice in her mind whispered, but Jenny wasn't listening anymore. From Don't remember, don't remember, the chant in her head had changed to Remember, remember...
Maybe this will help, she told herself rather calmly, and with a feeling of meeting her doom she picked up a leather-bound book on the desk.
It was a journal of sorts. Or at least a record of some kind of experiment. Her grandfather's heavy black writing degenerated into a scrawl in places, but certain sentences stood out clearly as she leafed through.
"... out of all the methods from different cultures this one seems safest... the rune Nyd or Nauthiz provides an eternal constraint, preventing travel in any direction.... The rune must be carved, then stained with blood, and finally charged with power by pronouncing its name aloud...."
Jenny flipped through more pages to a later entry.
"... interesting treatise on the traditional methods of dealing with a djinn, or, as the Hausa call them, the aljunnu. Why anyone should think this could be accomplished with a bottle is beyond me.... I believe the space I've prepared to be just barely sufficient for containing the tremendous energies involved... ."
Good grief, he sounded just like a scientist. A mad scientist, Jenny thought. She flipped more pages.
"... I have achieved the containment at last! I'm very satisfied... foolproof methods... not the slightest danger... the tremendous forces I've harnessed ... all in complete safety. ..."
Toward the end there was something stuck in between the pages like a bookmark. It was a torn sheet of yellowing, brittle paper. It looked very old. The writing on it was quite different from her grandfather's-thin and shaky-and part of it was obscured by rusty-brown stains.
It was a poem. There was no title, but the author's name, Johannes Eckhart, and the date, 1943, were scrawled at the top.
I, slipping on the slime-edged stones, To that dark place by rusty foxfire lit, Where they lie watching, fingering old bones, Go with my question. Deep into the pit Of the Black Forest, where the Erlking rules And truth is told but always at a cost, I take my puzzle. Like the other fools who've slipped on these same stones and played and lost
I come because I must. I have no choice. The Game is timeless and ...
The rest of it was covered with the dark stains, except for the last two lines:
I leave them waiting there below. I hear them laughing as I go.
Jenny leaned back and let out her breath. Obviously this poem had impressed her grandfather enough for him to keep it for forty years. She
knew her grandfather had fought in World War II-he'd been a prisoner in a German POW camp. Maybe he'd met this Johannes Eckhart then. And maybe this Johannes Eckhart had started him thinking. ...