Fire, page 49
‘Hang on, wait,’ she says and gets up.
‘Where are you off to?’ Vanessa says, but Linnéa doesn’t answer.
She opens the door and looks along the empty corridor. Stands still and listens. The only sounds are distant voices from the classrooms, steps of someone running in the stairwell.
She closes her eyes and releases more power than she has ever dared to do before, ever been able to do.
It is like sticking her head into a beehive. The sensation is as it felt in the beginning, before she knew anything about her power, when she still thought she was going mad, that all her years of anguish and chemicals had finally ruined her brain.
So many people, so many thoughts. But in the middle of the buzzing, the same thought recurs, over and over again.
They mustn’t get away with this.
Above her, below her.
They mustn’t get away with this.
It is a mantra repeated endlessly, from different directions, everywhere in the school.
They mustn’t get away with this.
They mustn’t get away with this.
They mustn’t get away with this.
Hatred is such a temptation. How good it would feel to let go and enter into it, to be allowed to hate without limit, unthinkingly. Linnéa is almost pulled along and she shuts her power down. Opens her eyes. An eternity seems to pass before there is silence inside her head once more.
The soles of her shoes grind against the floor when she turns and looks back at the others.
‘They’re all thinking the same thing,’ she says. ‘We’d better beat it.’
She looks over her shoulder and sees Tommy and Backman at the far end of the corridor, approaching briskly.
‘Come on!’ Linnéa shouts and the others leap up from their seats, finally energised.
Like a herd of terrified animals, they rush out from the headmaster’s office, down the spiral staircase and out into the ground-floor corridor.
They swing round a corner and there is Kevin, waiting for them.
They’re here!
Instantly, the thought rattles onwards through the school, like a row of falling dominoes.
They’re here! They’re here! They’re here! They’re here!
Kevin grabs hold of Linnéa’s jacket, but Vanessa gives him a push and Linnéa tears herself free.
They run into the lobby. Footsteps behind them in the corridor. Footsteps coming down the main staircase.
They mustn’t get away with this.
They push their way out through the main doors and keep running
I deeply, truly detest this school, Linnéa thinks.
67
When they get to the City Mall, Minoo has such a bad stitch it feels as though a red-hot iron stake has been plunged into her side. She can hardly breathe, except in little shallow gasps, and she stops, bending over with her hands on her knees.
‘What are we supposed to do here?’ Vanessa says. ‘The Crystal Cave doesn’t open until twelve o’clock.’
‘I thought we could hole up in there,’ Linnéa says and points at Sture & Co.
Minoo turns and looks at the darkened pane in the glazed door. Remembers the talk about drug dealing and knife fights. The wasted figures who stumble into the street after an afternoon session, people who are banned from Götis but don’t yet have to seek refuge in Storvall Park. She hopes Linnéa doesn’t pick up what she’s thinking.
‘We could go to my place and wait,’ Minoo suggests.
‘No, too dangerous,’ Linnéa says and shakes her head.
‘What, do you think they’ll come after us with pitchforks and burning torches?’ Vanessa says.
‘I wouldn’t rule it out,’ Linnéa says earnestly, before going along to knock on the door of Sture & Co.
A thin man, with a nose like a largish cauliflower streaked with red, comes to the door. He recognises Linnéa and smiles.
‘Hi. I know you haven’t opened yet, but is it okay if we hang out here for a bit?’ she asks.
‘No problem,’ he says and lets them in.
Once inside, Minoo looks around. The walls are covered in mirrors and flesh-coloured woven wallpaper. When they walk on the wall-to-wall carpet it gives off the stink of cigarette smoke. Grubby curtains, originally in a yellow check, have been pulled across the windows and prevent any scrutiny from the outside.
Linnéa leads them right into the back of the space, where there are small cubicles with dark brown wooden tables, marked all over with scribbles and carvings.
Minoo sits down inside one of the cubicles. The vinyl upholstery creaks underneath her when she slides over to sit nearest the window.
‘Has anyone got any money?’ Linnéa asks. ‘We’ll have to buy something.’
They pool all their cash. Minoo pulls at one of the curtains and sneaks a look outside. The window faces into the Mall and from here they have a view of the Crystal Cave.
She lets the curtain drop back when Linnéa returns, carrying a tray with five cups of tea.
‘Sture says we can stay here as long as we need to,’ she says as she crams herself into the seat next to Ida.
They look at each other in silence. Minoo thinks about what’s just happened and the full extent of it begins to sink in.
‘What were they going to do to us?’ she asks Linnéa. ‘Did you sense anything?’
‘I don’t think they knew themselves. They hadn’t had their orders yet.’
The hairs on the back of Minoo’s neck are standing on end.
‘It must be the necklaces,’ Linnéa continues. ‘It felt as if they were all connected to each other. If one of them spots us, all the rest of them will get to know at once.’
‘How many do you reckon are going to the school party tonight?’ Vanessa says.
‘Must be more than a hundred,’ Minoo suggests.
‘I think it’s more like two hundred,’ Linnéa says.
‘So if all of them are wearing the amulets, Helena and Krister have recruited two hundred pairs of eyes to keep a lookout for them,’ Vanessa says.
‘We aren’t safe anywhere.’ Ida’s voice sounds dead, as if she has already given up hope.
Minoo thinks about Gustaf. He promised not to wear the necklace. But what if he gets it into his head that he should, after all, in order to blend in more easily?
‘But remember the Council,’ Vanessa says suddenly. ‘We have to face two lots of enemies. Positive Engelsfors and the Council. What if we could turn them against each other? Helena and Krister have broken every magic law in the book. If we reported them – maybe, to Viktor – then the Council ought to try to stop them. Perhaps we could use the Council.’
‘I think it’s too big a risk so soon after the trial,’ Linnéa says. ‘Perhaps they won’t just be happy with taking away our title of Chosen Ones. They might just be waiting to catch us out over something else. If we’ve learned anything about the Council it’s that they use information whatever way suits them. We can only trust each other. Which is precisely what Matilda told us from the start.’
‘I miss Nicolaus,’ Anna-Karin says. ‘I wish he was here.’
Minoo nods, then checks her mobile. Still no signal.
‘Do your phones work?’ she asks.
The others shake their heads.
Minoo places the mobile in front of her on the table. She would like to phone Dad and warn him, but she couldn’t tell him what about. She would like to get hold of Gustaf and stop him from going to the party. She would like to call Mum just to hear her voice.
Time moves endlessly slowly. Finally, it’s twelve o’clock, but there is still no sign of Mona.
Stress makes Minoo’s skin crawl. They have no time to lose. But they don’t know what they can do. So by one o’clock, the Chosen Ones are sharing a big plate of chips that Sture has let them have on the house.
By half past three, Minoo is close to tears. She has turned all their problems over in so many ways she can’t think at all any more. Anna-Karin keeps a silent watch over the Crystal Cave. Ida has fallen asleep at the table, her head resting on her arms.
Suddenly, she sits up. Looks around, dazed, then wipes a little saliva from the corner of her mouth.
‘She’s there now,’ she says.
‘Who?’ Minoo says. ‘Where?’
‘Mona,’ Ida says. ‘It must be her.’
‘But no one has gone into the shop,’ Anna-Karin says.
‘Maybe there’s another way in,’ Vanessa says. ‘Actually, that would explain a great deal.’
Minoo peeps through the window and sees the lights go on in the Crystal Cave.
‘There’s somebody in there,’ she says.
They all stand up simultaneously. They thank Sture as they hurry past and run towards the shop.
When Minoo enters, a nauseating smell hits her. The mixture of incense and cigarette smoke is so overwhelming it almost knocks out her other senses.
Most of all, the Crystal Cave resembles an over-stocked gift shop. The shelving looks ready to collapse any time soon under the weight of china angels and pyramids.
Behind the counter, a woman with big hair coloured a yellowy blonde stands counting receipts. A cigarette is gripped between her glossy pink lips.
And Minoo understands why the Crystal Cave is the perfect cover for Mona’s other activities. Nobody who sees her or her shop could believe that Mona is a real witch.
‘Now what’s up?’ Mona asks, looking at them all.
Vanessa locks the door and turns the sign round to ‘CLOSED’.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Mona says.
‘We need help,’ Vanessa tells her.
Minoo opens up the rucksack pocket again, extracts the necklace and holds it up.
‘Do you know what this is?’
Mona grabs it irritably. Examines it.
‘It’s an amulet. Obvious to you too, I should’ve thought!’
She throws the amulet to Ida who catches it with one hand, looks at it for a moment and then pockets it.
‘Do you sell these?’ Vanessa asks.
‘I’ve never seen it before.’
‘She’s lying,’ Linnéa says. ‘She has sold amulets to Helena and Krister.’
‘You leave me alone!’ Mona snarls, spitting her cigarette out. It lands on the counter and she picks it up again, dragging angrily at it.
‘Get out of here,’ she says. Then she turns to Vanessa. ‘Mona would never grass. You know that.’
Minoo used to think that Vanessa’s stories about Mona were mostly exaggeration. By now, she realises there’s no need for that.
‘I begin to think you have no idea what is going on in this town,’ Minoo says, making an effort to sound sympathetic. ‘Or what these amulets are being used for.’
‘As long as my customers pay for their goods, it’s none of my business what they get up to afterwards. I mean, you wouldn’t go around hurling accusations at a car dealer because a fucking drunk driver runs somebody over.’
‘We’re not accusing you of anything,’ Minoo says. ‘But you should know that Helena and Krister use the amulets to exert control over people. They’re controlling almost everyone at school.’
‘And they’ve murdered four people already,’ Vanessa says. ‘For example, Svensson. Remember him? You saw in his future that he would die soon. You were right. He was one of their victims.’
Mona looks away. Minoo hears Linnéa’s voice inside her head.
I can’t read her mind any longer. She’s blocking me. Shouldn’t Anna-Karin get her to talk?
Minoo just shakes her head. Anna-Karin sends her a grateful glance.
‘We’re pretty sure that Helena and Krister get their power from the demons,’ Minoo says. ‘And we know that the demons are about hurrying up the apocalypse.’
‘Surely you must’ve noticed that something’s going on,’ Vanessa says. ‘And if the world goes under you won’t have any customers at all.’
Mona glares at them, inhales so deeply that sparks fly from the glowing tip of her cigarette, and then blows out a cloud of smoke that makes Minoo’s eyes sting.
How could I ever have liked smoking? she thinks.
‘How did they die?’ Mona asks. ‘The four characters you’re talking about?’
‘The police are clinging to some mad theory about “electrical accidents”,’ Minoo says. ‘But we know that the deaths were magical killings.’
Mona sits down on the stool behind the counter.
‘Okay. I’ll make an exception, just for you,’ she says with her eyes fixed on Minoo. ‘But only because things are getting out of hand, not because you lot are so fucking special, just because you’re the Chosen Ones or whatever you’re called these days.’
The combination of being clairvoyant and rude is amazingly unattractive, Minoo thinks.
‘Actually, we don’t give a shit why you do it,’ Linnéa says.
‘I won’t hear another word from you,’ Mona scowls. ‘In the summer, Helena and Krister turned up and placed a large order for amulets. The spec was that they should be fit for control by a metal witch. It was short notice and I couldn’t fill the whole order there and then. For a start, they bought what I had in stock.’
‘How many?’ Minoo asks.
‘A dozen. Since then, I’ve been ordering new batches from China all autumn.’
‘So you’ve no problem with flogging any number of zombie-amulets to PE?’ Vanessa says.
Mona snorts and lights a new fag on the stub of the old one.
‘Come on. That type of amulet can be used for a lot of things. For instance, you can charge them with extra energy if you’re planning to run a marathon.’
‘And that’s the kind of thing you really believed they were going to use them for?’ Vanessa says.
‘I believed nothing,’ Mona snapped. ‘Not my job, believing this or that. What was the thing about your school and the amulets?’
‘They’ve doled out amulets to everyone who is going to the school party tonight,’ Minoo says.
‘What, do you mean the bash at the centre?’
‘No. They’ve arranged a separate do at the school.’
‘At the school,’ Mona repeats and stares thoughtfully at the pillar of smoke rising from her cigarette. ‘Are you telling me that tonight, everyone there will be wearing amulets?’
‘Yes,’ Minoo says, trying not to sound impatient.
‘Not so good. Bloody awful energies in that place. And today is the spring equinox.’
‘So what?’ Ida says hoarsely. ‘Why is everyone going on and on about the sodding equinox?’
‘There’s always been a lot of hocus-pocus talked about the spring equinox. Amateurs get themselves out into the forests to find their inner child and howl to the moon. But people who know about true magic know that only one rite matters on this particular day.’
She falls silent, blows a large cloud of smoke through her nose.
‘And that’s human sacrifice,’ she says.
Minoo feels an icy chill gripping her.
‘What do you mean?’ she asks.
‘What do you think I mean? A sacrifice of a human being. Or, ideally, a lot of them.’
‘But why?’ Anna-Karin asks feebly.
‘Magic potential is part of being human. It is part of our living energy. Kill one human being and the magic energy is set free. Kill many … it leads to a fucking great freeing up, to put it simply. If you can make that energy your own, you can use it as you see fit. But only a powerful natural witch can carry this off.’
Minoo remembers what Nicolaus told them about the time when he murdered the members of the Council.
It was a wooden church and burned quickly down to the ground. I had drawn circles around it and for every life that was consumed in the flames, my own life was lengthened.
‘Considering all the ecto I’ve sold to PE since last summer, I reckon it’s something along those lines that they have in mind,’ Mona continues. ‘They’ve connected all the people in your school into one big network. Next, all you need is to herd the victims into a room where the circles have already been drawn and leave it for the metal witch to chomp away at all the energy in the network.’
‘But what would they want with so much energy?’ Minoo asks tiredly.
‘Haven’t got a clue.’
‘They won’t get that far,’ Vanessa says. ‘How can we stop this?’
‘Easy-peasy,’ Mona chuckles. ‘The ruling metal witch must also wear an amulet. Rip that off him or her and you short-circuit the network. All the amulets become worthless.’
‘Who is it, Helena or Krister?’ Minoo says.
Mona smiles, a strange smile. Minoo feels uneasy. It is as if she has missed something, and as if Mona thinks she’s too stupid to get it.
‘Neither she, nor Krister, is a witch. Not a natural witch, that’s for sure.’
Minoo stares at Mona.
‘It must be one or both of those two,’ Vanessa says. ‘I know it must. Ida and I saw them.’
‘They definitely work with a witch,’ Mona says. ‘But posh Mr and Mrs Malmgren are not practising magic. Somebody else is.’
‘Do you know who?’ Minoo says.
‘No,’ Mona replies and suddenly looks serious. ‘I regret to say.’
‘It must be one of Helena’s favourites,’ Ida says. ‘When I sensed the magic in the centre, they were the only ones there. You know, Erik, Robin, Rickard, Julia, Felicia … Or maybe someone else was there. I can’t be certain.’
Rickard, Minoo thinks. Perhaps he’s not controlled. Perhaps he’s the controller.
‘Gustaf said that Rickard has had an amulet since last summer,’ she says.
‘But why should Rickard help Helena and Krister to take revenge?’ Anna-Karin says. ‘Did he know Elias?’
‘No, he didn’t,’ Linnéa says. ‘But then, Helena might have brainwashed him in some quite non-magical way.’
Minoo glances at the dolphin clock on the wall.
‘We’ve got to go,’ she says. ‘The party starts in a few hours. Is there anything else we need to know?’
Mona smiles her odd little smile again.
‘Need and want are two quite different things,’ she says.
She puffs on her cigarette, looking at Vanessa.
