Obsidian Pebble (33 page)

Oz stood frozen on the threshold. Nothing else was different about the study, but there was something very different about the clock. The drawer beneath the pendulum lay shattered, the wood splintered and broken. Stomach writhing, he took a step forward into the room, his eyes drawn to the broken clock drawer. It was empty.

“Ellie! Ruff!” he yelled, and heard rapid footfalls as they responded to the urgency in his voice. In a couple of seconds they ran along the landing and through the doorway of the study, where they both froze.

“Oh my God,” Ellie said, hand over her mouth.

“Buzzard,” spluttered Ruff.

“They've got them all,” said Oz dully. “The letters, the dor, the pebble. Everything.”

“What should we do?” said Ellie. “Ring the police?”

“And tell them what?” Oz said angrily, not taking his eyes from the broken drawer of his dad's clock.

“That there's been a burglary,” Ellie said.

“But has there?” Oz said.

“We'd better check the rest of the house,” Ellie whispered urgently, and ran out, yelling, “I'll check downstairs. You two do up here.”

But the TV was fine, and so were the CD player and Oz's Xbox and his iPod. All the things that burglars usually burgled remained untouched, and after ten minutes of searching it was clear that nothing else had been disturbed. Not one other thing had been taken.

“But it's still a robbery,” Ellie protested as they gathered back in the study. “At least ring your mum.”

“And tell her that someone's stolen Morsman's artefacts?” Oz shook his head. “She'd probably get up on the table and do the Macarena.” He slapped the desk angrily. “I should have hidden them somewhere else. Somewhere away from Dad's study.”

“No good beating yourself up, Oz,” Ellie said.

“We've still got the message,” Ruff added hopefully.

“I thought you needed the letter,” Oz muttered, his words leaden and bitter.

“It was just to double-check,” Ruff said. “See if I'd copied everything down right.”

Oz looked at his friends. They were desperate to help.

“Come on, Oz,” Ellie urged.

Shrugging despondently, his heart iron-heavy and his mind whirling full of self-recriminatory what-ifs, he allowed himself to be led back up to the library. While Ellie and Ruff pored over the coded message, Oz sat in one of the chairs watching them, his appetite for the mystery suddenly gone. If only he'd put the artefacts somewhere really safe, like in the garage with the boxes of old tools. No one would have thought of looking there. Or even in a plastic bag taped to the underside of the lid of the cistern in the unused bathroom. That's what they did in all the films when they wanted to hide something. Oz's mind went round and round in ever-decreasing circles. He hardly noticed how much Ruff and Ellie were concentrating and how they'd pause occasionally to give him a worried glance.

No one spoke for almost ten minutes.

But it was in one of those tense, silent moments that a new sound appeared, faint but definite—the creak of a floorboard twice in quick succession, followed by the dull tattoo of someone, or something, crossing a room.

Footsteps.

Ellie and Ruff paused and Oz sat up. Could it be that their ghost still had the answers to what was going on?

“Hear that?” Ruff whispered.

“It's coming from behind this wall,” Oz said, getting up from his chair and putting his ear against the panelling.

“Should we go over there?” Ellie said, but there was doubt in her voice.

“To the orphanage? Tried that, remember?” Oz said, suddenly buoyed by this new twist. “No, the answer's here. In this library, I'm convinced of it. It's here in these books, or the symbols, or something…”

“Maybe we could get a wizard from one of Ruff's Xbox games to cast a spell and reveal it to us,” Ellie said drily.

Ruff gave her a long-suffering look. “Very funny.”

“Just a suggestion,” Ellie said.

“Don't give him any ideas,” Oz said.

“Heeps had ideas,” Ellie muttered, her face glum. “He'd written them all over the poster I saw on Kate's phone. What does ‘orthographic' mean?”

“I dunno,” Oz said. “Something to do with printing?”

Ruff's face had gone strangely slack. “Spell,” he whispered, his eyes focused on something far away. Oz and Ellie stared at him.

“For crying out loud, I didn't mean it about the wizards. It was just a joke, Ruff,” Ellie snapped.

“No, it isn't,” Ruff whispered, his eyes burning. “Spell, don't you see? There's a whole section on the Cypherspace page about it.”

Oz and Ellie just stared at him.

“I don't mean ‘spell' as in jiggery-pokery and wands and stuff. I mean ‘spell' as in spelling. That's what orthographic is all about.” He pointed towards the wheel of symbols. “I reckon the message spells out an instruction. Look, take the first letter of all of these symbols.”

Ellie took a pencil and quickly did as Ruff suggested. “I, n, g, r, e, s, s,” she mouthed and scribbled at the same time. Two seconds later, she sat back and announced, “It spells ‘ingress at sunrise.'”

“Great,” Ruff said, sounding deflated. “I thought it might mean something.”

“It does mean
something
, obviously,” Ellie said.

Ruff collapsed into an armchair. “Well, if we have to wait until sunrise, we'll need to get some snacks.”

But Oz was frowning. He knew this house better than anyone else. “You can see the sunrise through that window.” He pointed at one of the huge panes in the turret above.

“And the wall below it has the same pattern of twenty-six symbols as the other one,” Ellie said, walking over to it. Behind that same wall was where they'd heard the footsteps moments before.

Ruff got up, walked over to join Ellie and examined the symbols. “They are the same, but they feel different. Look here, see? These faint lines around each one? It's like they were carved on blocks and placed here.”

“You mean, like a mosaic?” Ellie said.

“Or a jigsaw,” Ruff mused. “Maybe we could prise them out?”

Ruff tried to get his fingernail into one of the faint cracks, but the symbols had been inlaid with great workmanship and the spaces were barely visible. There was no way he could get between them. “I'll probably need some tools,” he said.

Ellie nodded and sighed. “Or we wait until the sun comes up.”

But Oz was shaking his head. “It can't be that difficult. Morsman built this place. It doesn't make any sense that he set a cipher that could be read for just one small part of the day. We're missing something. It's another puzzle.”

“Well, ingress means entry, doesn't it? Entry into what, though?” Ruff pondered.

“A place?” Ellie said. “Like an address?”

“Maybe, or numbers or coordinates to do with sunrise or…oh, I don't know.” Ruff shook his head in frustration.

Oz listened to his friends voicing the words that milled about in his own head. Ruff was right. They needed some directions. He looked at the ancient globe atlas standing in the corner, with its compass symbol. He went over and spun the globe, watching the countries roll by beneath his fingers. Watching the sailing ship moving around and the compass rotating into view with each revolution…

“That's it,” Oz said so loudly that the other two jumped. “It's a place.”

“Like a fish?” Ruff said.

Oz pretended he hadn't heard that. “This library is perfectly aligned on compass points. That wall,” he pointed right, “is directly north from the centre of the room. And that one…” he pointed towards where they were standing, “is where the sun comes up.”

“The sun rises in the EAST,” breathed Ellie.

“Essence, Alum, Soap and Tin,” Ruff said, running his fingers over the symbols. “Here's essence.” He frowned at the symbol. “Funny, it looks a bit faded and worn compared to the oth…”

He didn't get any further. The slight pressure of his finger had caused the wooden block on which the symbol was carved to move inwards slightly. Ellie caught her breath, and in a second Oz had joined her to watch with barely restrained excitement as Ruff pushed the symbol in as far as he could. It slid in a full inch and stopped. Then he did the same with the alum symbol and the soap symbol. Both slid in the exact same amount and clicked to a stop.

“Oz,” said Ruff, his voice a low murmur, “I reckon you should do the last one.”

Trembling slightly, Oz put his finger on the tin symbol and pushed. This time, when it stopped moving, there was a faint but definite click, followed by a discernible creak, and the whole six-foot-by-six-foot panel in front of them gaped open an inch on one side.

“Awesome,” Oz said.

“I knew it! I knew there'd be something behind these panels,” Ruff added triumphantly.

“Ingress,” Ellie whispered in awe. “The way in.”

Beyond the door was a very narrow passageway, just wide enough for someone to get through sideways. Ruff stuck his head in.

“Wow, looks like they built this inside the walls.”

Ellie immediately edged forward, but Oz stopped her.

“Let me get some torches.” Oz ran down to his bedroom and found a couple of pen torches which, miraculously, worked. Back in the library, Ellie and Ruff looked as if they'd been arguing.

“What's wrong?” Oz asked.

“Nothing. It's just that…” Ruff began.

Ellie threw him a withering glance and then said, “Ruff thinks we should call someone.”

“Well, don't you?” Ruff protested.

“I told you, my mother isn't interested,” Oz explained. “She's too busy partying with Heeps and Gerber.”

“Yeah, but…” Ruff frowned.

“And Caleb doesn't answer his emails or texts, so who else is there?” Oz demanded.

The other two didn't answer, but both wore slightly troubled expressions. Doubt suddenly clouded Oz's mind, too. Maybe Ruff was right. None of them had any idea what was inside these walls.

But then Ellie shook her head. “Look, we've just found one of Penwurt's big secrets. I mean, it's a hidden passageway, for crying out loud! Come on, where's your sense of adventure?”

Ruff glared at her. “Oh, that's just typical you, isn't it? Just doing stuff without thinking it through.” His face had gone bright red. “What if something happens? Guess who'll be blamed for solving the cipher and opening the door…”

But Oz was sold. Having already lost the artefacts, he wasn't about to turn away from this new opportunity to find out who the footsteps belonged to.

“Come on, let's do it,” Oz said, and saw Ellie grin delightedly, while Ruff's shoulders slumped. Oz went first, his feet crunching on rough stone, the torch beam picking out the thick curtains of cobwebs that hung off the walls and the roof of the narrow passage. A couple of steps in, he heard footsteps behind him as Ellie and Ruff followed. They inched their way along, and after ten yards or so they came to some steps and descended before turning sharply to find themselves in a wider walkway, this one with wooden floors which creaked ominously as they crept forward. On one side, the rough stone wall remained, but on the other, Oz's hand brushed against a rough texture of interwoven wattle and daub. Here, it was broad enough for them to walk facing forwards.

“How far down do you think those steps were?” whispered Ruff.

“Eight feet, maybe,” said Oz.

“So that would have just about taken us to the first floor of the orphanage,” said Ellie.

Oz heard an audible gulp from Ruff. “Where we thought we heard the footsteps.”

“Not thought,
did
hear them,” Oz whispered excitedly. “This floor is the same one as on the other side of that wall.” He pointed at the wattle and daub. “We didn't find any sign of footsteps in the room, because whoever they belonged to was outside in this passage all along. Someone knew…” Oz didn't finish his sentence. Ahead of them, close by, a floorboard creaked. They froze.

“If this was an Xbox game, we could pause it and get some hot chocolate,” Ruff whispered shakily. “That usually helps.”

“Switch off your torch,” Ellie said.

“Why?” Oz said.

“Trust me.”

Oz did as Ellie asked and saw why immediately. Five yards ahead of them at floor level, a thin, rectangular strip of light suddenly appeared, the exact size and shape of a gap under a door. They crept forward, and then stopped again as they heard something that plucked at their already stretched nerves and sent their imaginations into overdrive. Something howled behind the wall. And it didn't sound like a wolf or a dog; it sounded like nothing any one of them had ever heard before—an unearthly, wailing screech followed by an urgent, tremulous whisper.

“Oz, this is really buzzard,” Ruff hissed.

“Come on,” Oz said, sounding a great deal braver than he felt. He turned his torch back on and aimed it at the wall above where the light had appeared. The beam picked out a rough wooden frame in the mess of plaster, mud and vegetable matter that the builders had packed between the wooden lattices. An iron ring halfway down the right side of the frame served as a handle for what was obviously a door.

Oz could feel his heart banging against his rib cage. Somehow, he knew that behind this wall lay the answer to the ghostly footsteps. And yet, he sensed that something wasn't right here. All this time, he had harboured the secret hope that the footsteps had something to do with his father. But the noises they now heard were of something wretched, something ill at ease and disturbed.

“Ready?” Oz said, feeling his fingers tremble as he swapped the torch to his left hand. He heard both a “no” and a “yes” as a response. But there was no time for debate. Oz reached for the iron ring, turned it and pushed the door open. What light there was came from a single lantern in the centre of the room. It threw up a watery beam that showed two figures, one standing and holding something beseechingly, the other crouched on its haunches, regarding the standing figure with wild and feral terror.