The Key (57 page)

Anna-Karin turns round. The blue light makes Rickard’s and Nicolaus’s faces look sculpted in ice.

‘Look.’ Rickard points at the ceiling.

Anna-Karin’s eyes follow his pointing finger. Above the circles, the signs of the elements have been carved into the stone.

Fire. Earth. Air. Water. Metal. Wood.

Fire and wood glow faintly. These are the elements that have already reacted in the school.

And below the elemental signs, letters form before her very eyes, creating words she doesn’t understand.

TENEBRIS APERIAR
.

‘Is that Latin?’ Rickard asks.

Nicolaus nods. ‘When darkness falls, I will open,’ he translates. ‘Walter said that the portal will become accessible when darkness falls over Engelsfors.’

Anna-Karin places her hand on the wall. Now she senses the presence of something on the other side. Something that vibrates, resonating in her body.

‘This is where it is,’ she announces. ‘This is the portal. Behind this wall.’

‘Yes,’ Nicolaus agrees.

‘That makes sense,’ Rickard says.

Anna-Karin observes him. His face is turned up and his eyes are closed. The blue light gleams in his glasses.

‘We are under the school,’ he says, and opens his eyes. ‘Somewhere between the gym and the dining area.’

‘Are you sure?’ Anna-Karin asks.

‘Positive.’

‘You must not tell Minoo about this,’ Nicolaus says.

Surprised, Anna-Karin turns to him. He looks authoritative, in a manner that reminds her that he was once a minister of the church.

‘We must not let the Council know that we have found the portal,’ he continues.

‘But Minoo won’t tell anyone if we ask her not to,’ Anna-Karin says.

‘Can we be absolutely certain about that? We don’t know where her loyalties lie any longer. She spends almost all her time with the members of the other circle.’

Anna-Karin wants to protest. But she can’t. She is not at all sure who Minoo would be loyal to. She wonders if Minoo herself knows.

‘Gustaf would never agree to keep a secret from Minoo,’ Rickard points out.

‘In that case, we won’t tell him either,’ Nicolaus says. ‘We’ll say that this was another dead end.’

‘I’d feel terrible about lying to him,’ he says.

‘If the Council finds out that we know where the portal is, they will see to it that we never come anywhere near it.’

‘But what if it is the Council that’s meant to close it?’ Rickard’s voice echoes in the cave. ‘I know that Linnéa is sure it isn’t. But the rest of us have put off the whole debate while we’ve been running around down here. Now that we’ve found the portal, isn’t it time we made up our minds?’

He looks from one of them to the other. Anna-Karin knows that he is right.

And then, suddenly, everything becomes clear to her.

‘This place wanted us to come here,’ she announces. ‘It called us. Not the Council’s circle.’

‘Yes,’ Nicolaus says. ‘Perhaps the Council’s circle has a chance to close the portal. But so do we.’

‘I’m with you.’ Rickard sighs. ‘And I won’t tell Gustaf.’

It’s such a relief to have made a decision. Anna-Karin just hopes that Vanessa and Evelina agree.

And that, when the time comes, they will be able to convince Minoo.

Two years
.

That’s how long you’ve been gone. That’s how long I’ve missed you
.

Now I’m sitting here again, at the place where you died. And I try to fool myself that I feel your presence
.

But I don’t. I am alone here
.

And, E, there is something I must confess
.

I have forgotten your voice. I have forgotten the sound of it. I see your face almost every day when I look at the photos we took. But it is becoming ever harder to remember how you moved, your posture, how the shadows fell on your face
.

I have tried to draw you but every picture is crap. Flat and lifeless. The opposite to all that you were
.

Tomorrow, I face them in court. Those who hurt us so many times. I tell myself that I do it for you, too. I try to draw strength from that thought. That I do it for us
.

I wonder what you would do if you were here now. You would not tell me to be strong. You would just hold me
.

I was stupid to tell V that all was over between us. I ought to have let her in, let her be with me throughout this time
.

I regret it every day. But I did do it. And that alone – that I could bring myself to shut V out – proves that I’m the wrong person for her. Someone who deserved to share her life wouldn’t be able to act as I did
.

If you can hear me despite everything, you must be sick of my whining
.

When you lived, we could at least laugh at it together
.

And that is perhaps what I miss most of all
.

That together, we could laugh at all the shit that happens
.

I love you
,

L
.

Linnéa closes her diary. She has settled down on the floor next to the sink and can look up to the windowsill. The tokens, the photos and flowers – there are not as many as last year. But she isn’t the only one who tries to keep his memory alive.

She wonders if Olivia is also thinking about him right now.

Her mobile pings. A message from Anna-Karin, who has just arrived at the school. She has to see her tutor and wants to meet in the entrance lobby immediately afterwards. Then, she and Linnéa will go to the cave together.

Linnéa wants to see it with her own eyes. The place deep inside the rock beneath her. Where the portal is.

It surprised her that Nicolaus wanted to keep it secret from Minoo. Not that she’s complaining.

Linnéa went too far in the park, she’s perfectly aware of it. She gave her feelings free rein at a time when she should’ve been clever and controlled. Because, however wrong she thinks Minoo is, they need her. Without her, they won’t be able to save the world. And they must make Minoo understand that and make her believe more in the Circle of the Chosen Ones than the Council’s circle and the guardians.

Vanessa was right all along. Linnéa has driven Minoo straight into Walter’s arms and now she worries that they won’t be able to persuade her to come back to them.

Still, if they can’t convince her, there are other ways. If the end of the world is nigh and only the Circle knows where the portal is, surely Minoo will have to join them? It is blackmail, but Linnéa tells herself that it is only a last resort. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

She hears steps outside the door to the toilet and gets up. No one comes in, though.

‘Here it is,’ a girl’s voice says on the other side of the door. ‘And today, it’s exactly two years ago. My big sis says that they’ve taken all the mirrors away so that nobody can do it again. And if you speak his name three times and turn quickly, he stands there. With a piece of glass dripping with blood in his hand. Do you want to check it out?’

The door handle goes down. Linnéa gets ready to shout at the stupid brats to go to hell.

‘Shit, no!’ a boy’s voice responds with a little laugh. ‘I’m too fucking scared.’

The girl giggles and the door handle goes up again.

‘Let’s write something anyway. It’s like, traditional.’

Linnéa hears the squeaking sound of a marker pen on the outside of the door. Then the steps disappear and she opens the door to have a look.

The two kids have dyed their hair the same shade of green. They jog towards the main stairs hand in hand. It is obvious that they are best friends.

Linnéa’s eyes follow them. And then suddenly fill with tears.

The marker ink hasn’t quite dried when she touches the letters on the door.

R.I.P. ELIAS

* * *

Anna-Karin walks upstairs. The tiredness that always hits her in the caves is still with her, and now she can also feel the resonance from the rock wall deep beneath the school.

When darkness falls, I will open.

She, Vanessa and Linnéa have taken turns to be at school these last few weeks. The idea is that one of them is on hand to recognise the next portent of the apocalypse. It’s Linnéa’s turn today.

But Ylva wants to have a talk with Anna-Karin, who already has a pretty good idea of what it is her tutor will say.

Kevin comes downstairs. His baseball cap is pushed well down over his forehead, but Anna-Karin notices that he’s glancing at her from underneath the peak. She has a feeling that he wants to say something, but he continues down the stairs without saying a word.

The classroom door is open.

Ylva sits on the desk, looking through an evening paper. She looks up when Anna-Karin enters.

‘Hello, Anna-Karin,’ she says. She puts the paper down. ‘Good that you could come. Please close the door behind you.’

Anna-Karin does as she is asked.

‘Why don’t you sit down?’ Ylva suggests. Anna-Karin sits down on the desk opposite her.

‘Anna-Karin,’ Ylva begins, ‘I realise that you have had a difficult time since … the spring.’

Ylva looks at Anna-Karin with a questioning expression. As if wanting to assure herself that she doesn’t need to put the phrase into words.
Since your mother died
.

Anna-Karin nods.

‘We need to discuss your marks,’ Ylva says. ‘You have told me that you want to go on to study for a degree in veterinary medicine.’

She goes on to explain gravely about how difficult it is to get into popular fields of study in general, and how the competition for places is growing tougher every year. Anna-Karin is perfectly aware of all that. It used to worry her. Now, she realises how long it has been since she thought about the future in those terms.

‘You’re one of my ablest pupils,’ Ylva tells her. ‘I know that you can do so much better than you have been recently. As for your attendance … well, Anna-Karin, I am terribly disappointed.’

Ylva looks sternly at her. Anna-Karin wonders what she is expected to say next. Should she say that she misses her mother so much that she hasn’t been able to focus on school? Or perhaps excuse herself by saying that, since Minoo left, it has been especially tough, because she has no other friends in her class? Should she promise to get her act together? Promise that she will make a real effort from now on?

But what promises can she make? She can’t postpone the apocalypse to make sure she gets a decent grade in maths.

‘Is there anything I can help you with?’ Ylva says.

‘No, but thank you for talking to me about this,’ Anna-Karin replies.

Ylva stands and looks relieved. As though she feels that she has done all she can for Anna-Karin.

‘Well, we’ll let it rest for now. And I’m always around if you need to talk.’

‘Thank you,’ Anna-Karin replies. At last she can get out of the classroom.

She hurries downstairs with her mobile in her hand, ready to text, when she sees Linnéa waiting in the lobby.

People glance at Linnéa as they pass. The atmosphere is charged. Whatever happens in tomorrow’s court session, it will go down in the history of Engelsfors senior school, and will be told to each new generation of students.

Linnéa doesn’t respond to the curious looks. Anna-Karin knows no one who can look as unapproachable. Her black fringe almost hides her heavily made-up eyes. The purple skirt that stands out around her might have looked girly on anyone else, but the black lace around the hem looks razor-blade sharp, a defence against any approaches.

They have been distant with each other ever since the time in the pavilion, when Anna-Karin used her magic to stop Linnéa talking. Anna-Karin has no regrets. Or, maybe one, that she didn’t do it sooner. The possibility that they might have lost Minoo worries her. But then, she is worried about Linnéa as well. She is in free fall, and Anna-Karin is concerned both for her and for the people she might drag down with her. By extension, that would be all of humanity.

Are we leaving?
Linnéa thinks, and Anna-Karin nods.

They follow the flow of people leaving through the front door and down the steps.

Anna-Karin is completely unprepared when Julia and Felicia intercept them.

* * *

They must have been waiting for me, Linnéa thinks, and backs up, feeling the bottom step push against her calves.

Julia and Felicia stand close together, once more a united front. Linnéa’s anxiety, a constant presence inside her, suddenly increases.

If Julia and Felicia are friends again …

‘Hi, Linnéa,’ Julia says.

‘What do you want?’

Julia doesn’t reply, just smiles. This isn’t the weak, almost hysterical Julia who spat at Linnéa in the City Mall. This is the smile of someone who holds a trump card.

Felicia smiles, too.

If Julia and Felicia are friends again …

Linnéa releases her power. Directs a probe towards Felicia.

Felicia thinks about Robin. How she held his hand and pleaded with him. ‘Don’t you get it? Just think of what you’re doing to yourself. You’ll ruin your own life. And mine. Julia won’t talk to me any more. And think about your mum. She has been out in town, off her head on drink.
At midday
. One of our neighbours met her in ICA and she couldn’t
speak properly
.’ Robin looked shaken. It was the first time either of them had mentioned his mother’s drinking openly. Felicia noticed the effect. ‘It’s you who doesn’t get it,’ Robin said all the same. ‘I can’t get away. I must confess.’ Felicia felt so frustrated that her grip on his hand tightened. ‘But you’ve confessed once already,’ she said. ‘And you’ve been stuck in here for ages. Even if that stuff with Linnéa is true, you’ve taken your punishment now, haven’t you? It’s enough.’ And Robin hesitated. ‘Don’t totally destroy your future for her sake,’ Felicia said. ‘Linnéa Wallin is trash. Why let yourself become like her? Look, tell them that you and Kevin were scared of what Linnéa might do. Everyone knows that she’s a junkie and a mental case and hangs out with criminals. You’ll be let off.’ Robin hid his face in his hands. But he nodded.