The Everlasting (8 page)

Reality ruptured. Scott was still at the back door of his house staring out over his garden, but his perception of things changed. The world grew. The garden expanded to make room for the hundreds of wraiths there, and he knew their individual stories, their lives and hopes, deaths and fears. He felt the pain of limbo, but beneath that the vicious jealousy with
which they beheld the living. He could have dipped into any ghostly mind he wanted, but he held back because he did not wish to understand an echo. They continued to stare at him, and some of them tried to speak. He could hear them, he could answer, but he closed his ears and mouth to that impossibility.

The dark sky was larger than ever before. He could see the stars and the spaces in between, the scattered splash of the Milky Way bearing the potential of a billion new worlds, and all of them were touched by what he saw, what he felt. It was shattering. Scott tried to close his eyes, but when he did he saw and felt even more. For the first time ever he saw the spaces within his own mind, the vast gaps in his understanding surrounding the specks of knowledge that floated there, lonely and minuscule. He knew so little in an existence so vast. He opened his eyes again, but the pain of realization remained.

Time parted around him and closed in beyond, bypassing him like a rock in a stream. The past and future flowed both ways, clashing in thunderous impacts that made the greatest lightning storm look like the flare of a match.

Around him was the present, and in realizing this, he at last saw where Helen and Lewis were. Papa's dead friend was dragging Scott's wife away, hauling her across the garden. Her feet left a gleaming trail on the damp grass, and as she screamed her voice matched the volume of clashing aeons.

Scott could only watch as Lewis moved farther
away. He flowed through ghosts, brushing them aside like wisps of cigarette smoke. They tumbled about the garden, elongating as a flow of time sucked them in, spinning where they crossed the paths left by Helen's trailing feet, and though they tried to scream they had no voice.

He went to shout, but the noise of the Wide meant that he could not hear himself.

Helen was fading into a false distance. She seemed to be miles away, becoming undefined as mists closed around her, though Lewis was as clear as ever.
The book
, the old ghost said, and the words made Scott's head ring.

He moved forward at last, his step uncertain, his balance thrown. He swayed on his feet but kept moving. The feel of wet grass seemed to root him in reality, and glancing down he saw the ground as it should be, untouched by hallucination.

This isn't just illusion
.

He went on, aiming for Helen, only her scream drawing him onward now because he had finally lost sight of her. And even her scream was fading.

No hallucination
, he thought.
It's the Wide, the truth of things; I'm seeing beyond the veil and—

Helen was gone. No more screams, no more cries, no more strange words uttered or sung by Lewis.

“Helen!” he tried to shout loudly, but it seemed to arrive as a whisper. Ghosts milled before him and he moved to the side, stumbling over his own feet and falling to the ground. Wet grass welcomed him, startling
him with cold. He gasped, looked up, and the Wide was narrowing.

For a moment he felt panicked more than ever before. He was being crushed, his senses compressed, his eyes squeezed so tightly that they felt as if they would implode. He shouted for Helen, and his voice was far too loud, so he shouted again.
Getting control back
, he thought.
I'm fighting it down, the madness
. Things calmed but the panic grew, expanding to fill the spaces left in his perception. He called for Helen again and again, looking around the dark garden, seeing only fleeting shadows where the ghosts had been. The falling silence was as shocking as what had come before.
How can any of us believe in such solitude?
he thought.

And then the silence was complete, and it shocked him so much that he could no longer shout.

He lay on the lawn, spread-eagled like a dead man and staring at the sky. Stars were out, and wisps of cloud passed across the face of the moon. The ghosts surrounded him, though they could no longer be seen.

“Helen,” he said. He stood unsteadily and ran into the house, searching all the downstairs rooms before running upstairs, dashing through their bedrooms, the bathroom, looking in cupboards and under the beds, the attic, tearing a wardrobe door from its hinges in his eagerness to search inside, but he did not find Helen anywhere. He whispered her name, as though repeating it could bring her back, and when that failed he searched the entire house again.

The Chord of Souls
, Lewis had said as he retreated into the Wide.

“I don't know where it is!” he shouted, and his voice startled him to a standstill once again. Panting, gasping for air, he sat on the edge of their bed and started to weep.

A few minutes later he read Papa's letter again. And he began to understand.

When Scott walked downstairs and into his study, there was a woman behind his desk. Even with her sitting down he could tell that she was tall. She was also attractive, though not beautiful. No face like that could ever be beautiful. It had seen far too much of life.

Standing in the doorway, looking at the woman and forming his first impression of her, he realized that he was not surprised, shocked, or scared.

“We've been waiting for you for a very long time,” she said.

“He took my wife.”

The woman nodded slowly. There was an easy grace about her movements, and when she stood from the chair she seemed to flow. She moved like a piece of classical music. She was dark skinned, her hair was long and tied with several metal bands, and
there was a brutal mess of pink scars across the right side of her throat. It looked very old.

“She's at great risk,” she said, “but I can help you get her back.”

“How?”

“You need to help me.”

Scott nodded. He looked down at the drawer and its broken lock, and the woman inclined her head, offering a brief smile with one corner of her mouth.

“I apologize for your desk.”

“You were looking for this?” He held up the folded letter, ready to flee if she made any movement toward him.

“I'll read it soon, but I already know what it is. I watched through the window. I saw him, and you, and both of you in the Wide.”

“Who are you?”

That smile again, a brief twitch of the lip. Everything about her was subtle and elegant. “I don't suppose you have any real coffee?”

It felt dreamlike standing in the kitchen with this strange woman, brewing coffee as dawn smudged the shadows and his wife farther away from him than ever before. Scott tapped the spoon against a mug, hummed an unknown tune, looked up at the woman where she sat watching him from the breakfast bar. Her hands were steepled beneath her chin. Her eyes were timeless.

“Sugar?”

“No, thanks. No milk, either. Pure.”

Scott poured two coffees and added milk and several heaped teaspoons of sugar to his own. He was shaking and weak. Perhaps a sugar rush would help.

“How do I get Helen back?”

“Do what he said: find the Chord of Souls.”

“Who are you?”

The woman took a sip of her boiling coffee and closed her eyes, luxuriating in the flavor. She was startlingly sexy, an effect exaggerated more by the fact that she seemed not to know. This was all very natural to her.

The woman opened her eyes. “I'm immortal,” she said. “I'm one of a dozen. We've been looking for the Chord of Souls for some time.”

“How long?”

“Ever since it went missing.”

“How long ago was that?”

“Just after we wrote it.”

“And how long ago was that?”

The woman took another sip of coffee and sighed. “Too long for you to believe. And I need you to believe me, and trust me, if you're going to help.”

“You've just told me that you're immortal, and I'm supposed to believe and trust you?”

“Did you believe in ghosts before yesterday, Scott?”

“Yes. No. I . . .” Scott was angry at the doubt in his voice, but it was genuine. Papa had given him the gift of an open mind, and yet in many regards Scott had remained skeptical. In a strange way, the appearance of Lewis just after the funeral had rooted that skepticism in a strong foundation. It was a contradiction
that had confused him for thirty years. He had seen a ghost; therefore, he found it difficult to believe in them. He'd tried to convince himself that it was something to do with faith, or lack of it, or the belief in something wider, but really it was rooted far deeper than that. His disbelief was a facet of the fear he had in a world where Papa no longer existed. He would never again hear Papa call hello through an open back door, never hear his laugh, never go out with him on his birthday, never see the old man's scrawl inside his birthday cards, never kiss him or disagree with him or sit and listen to old tales that sometimes may have been true.

“Do you believe in ghosts this morning?”

Scott looked out into the garden and thought about muttering those singsong words. But maybe even they were simply a spell, something hypnotic and misleading that—

The woman sighed and Scott's world shifted sideways. The ghosts appeared and everything felt larger, more able to encompass the truth of things. She sighed again and the world returned to what he was used to.

“Of course I do,” he said. “One of them just took my wife.”

“He's not a real ghost,” the woman said, “but that doesn't matter. Your belief does. Belief can save your life.”

“Who
are
you?” Scott asked again.

“My name is Nina.”

Nina?
Scott raised his eyebrows. Was she fooling with him? “Strange name for someone who's been alive for so long.”

“I change it every couple of hundred years.” She sipped more coffee, and there was not an ounce of sarcasm or humor in her voice. She was simply stating a fact.

Scott continued to shake. His nose and eyes burned, and the weakness had not been touched by sips of his sweet coffee. Tears formed and fell, and he could not hold back a sob.

Nina seemed embarrassed. She did not step around the breakfast bar to comfort him, nor did she speak. She took another drink and left him to cry.

“You say you can help,” he said. “So fucking help!”

Nina nodded, finished her drink, and then stood from the stool. “Pack a bag,” she said. “We can talk while we drive.”

“Drive where?”

Nina shrugged. “I'm sure we'll know when we get there.”

“You're taking this very well.” She sat in the passenger seat, having declined his request that she drive.

“Apart from breaking down in tears and my heart feeling as though it's ready to explode in my chest?”

“Ah, it won't do that. Strong, hearts. Resilient.”

“What?”

“I collect them.”

“What?”

“Oh. Sorry. Something for later, perhaps. But I mean it, your reaction is . . . strong. Not just the missing-wife thing, but—”

“That's not just a
thing
!”

“Whatever.” Nina waved her hand as if shooing a fly. “I mean all this. Lewis, the Wide, me.”

“I have an open mind.”

“Really?” She paused, and Scott had to look across at her. He felt something heavy hanging between them that needed breaking. “How open?” she asked. And that scared him more than anything.

Dawn arrived and the roads came alive with traffic: people driving to or from work, their expressions the same whichever way they were going. Scott drove on, awaiting directions. The woman in the seat beside him seemed unconcerned as to which way they were going. She didn't even seem to notice.

“Cardiff,” Scott said. “Do I get on the motorway for Cardiff?”

“Could,” she said.

“Do I or don't I?”

“Do.”

“I could drive to the nearest police station. I don't know who the fuck you are, and I could drive there and tell them I found you breaking and entering.”

“If it'll make you feel better.”

“Do you have a record?”

“I don't exist. Not officially. And I'd just walk right out the door.” She glanced at Scott and smiled, that
disarmingly subtle twitch of her lip that had such great effect. “I've learned a lot over the years.”

“Such as?”

“Stuff from the Wide.”

“What is that?”

“The truth, of course.”

Scott eased the car into the flow of traffic on the motorway and kept to a steady sixty. Was he doing the right thing? The thought of going to the police and trying to explain just how Helen had gone missing was ridiculous, but wasn't there something else he should be doing?

Looking for the book, perhaps.

“Why are you helping me?”

“I'm not yet. We're just driving.”

“So fill the time for me. Tell me who you really are.”

Nina laughed, a real laugh for the first time. It made Scott realize just how grim she had been. She sounded like another woman, and he could not help glancing across to see how the laugh changed her face. He was shocked. It made her look like a much older woman.

“What's so funny?”

Her laughter quickly ceased. “I told you I was immortal, and now you want to know about the real me. It's like a date. Is this a date?”

“No. We're going to get my wife back.”

“Right, right.” She sniggered, but all the humor seemed to have gone. “Right.”

“So?”

“There are lots of Ninas I could tell you about. They weren't all called Nina, of course. They lived all over the world. They saw lots of things. They saw wars and revolutions, witnessed discoveries and things made secret forever. Fell in love. Fell out of love. Saw love die in the rot of flesh. Sometimes—most of the time, lately—all they want to do now is rest.”