Eximere (The River Book 4) (15 page)

“Ah, it couldn’t be that easy, could it?” he said.

“It makes sense there’d be another locked door down here,”
Eliza said, retrieving her lockpicking tools from her pocket. “They wouldn’t
want the people running liquor to be able to get in here.” She knelt in front
of the door and began maneuvering the tools into the key slot below the handle.

“Is this a symbol?” Steven said, pointing to the oval.
“Hasn’t been on any of the other doors.” Neither Roy nor Eliza replied.

“This door,” Eliza said, still working the tools, “is the
protection you saw in the trance in the tunnel, Roy. There’s no way to know what’s
beyond it without walking through it.” Within a few moments it clicked, and she
turned the handle. The door opened.

“You’re going to have to show me how to do that,” Steven
said. “And tell me how you learned it.”

“Long story,” she said, “best told over drinks.”

“Rain check then,” Steven said, walking through the
threshold. Inside was another stairway leading down, and another light switch.
Steven reached for it, but Roy stopped him. “Let’s just use the flashlight for
now,” he suggested.

Steven led the group down. They were going a little slower
than the last stairwell, feeling for each step with less light.

“Wish there was a handrail,” Roy said. “And I don’t look
forward to coming back up all these stairs.”

“Given the ladder and these stairwells,” Eliza said, “we must
be at least fifty feet below the house.”

“I’d say a hundred,” Roy said. “Maybe more.”

The stairs continued down for several more minutes. It
finally ended at yet another locked door. This door had the same oval symbol
painted on it. “Any idea what this means?” Steven asked, shining his light on
the symbol. The gold paint reflected the light back into their eyes.

“No idea,” Eliza said, cracking open her tools again. After
several minutes she had unlocked the door.

Steven grabbed the handle. “Please not another stairwell,” he
said, pulling the door open.

It was not a stairwell. What they saw made each of their jaws
drop. No one took a step to pass through the door. Instead they stood frozen,
staring at the scene before them.

◊

“I’m not sure I believe what I’m seeing,” Steven said, his
eyes fixed on the images past the doorway.

“Me either,” said Roy.

“Come on,” Eliza said, stepping through the doorway. “Let’s
check it out.”

They passed through the door and stepped onto a brick path.
In the distance, about two hundred feet away, stood a large house. Between them
and the house was the path, meandering through a lawn, a fountain, and several
trees.

“What the fuck is this?” Steven said, looking up. There was
light coming from above, but he couldn’t see a ceiling – or a sky. Just
diffused light that gently illuminated the entire area. It seemed to be coming
from all directions above them; nothing cast a shadow.
This is a cave, a
large cave,
he thought, but he strained to see the walls of the cave and
couldn’t – the images in the distance just dissolved at a certain point. “You
think James did this?” he asked as they walked slowly along the path towards
the house.

“No idea,” replied Eliza.

“Am I going crazy?” Steven said. “That’s a fucking house?
Underground?”

“Apparently,” Eliza said. “That’s what it looks like.”

“Amazing, isn’t it?” Roy said, staring at the house. “All
this, under here?”

The house they were walking towards didn’t look dissimilar
from the real one on the surface, though it was smaller. In fact, the path they
were walking and the arrangement of the lawn reminded Steven of the layout
upstairs. Like the house upstairs, this one also had two stories, but it wasn’t
as grand or imposing. It mirrored its style but not its size.

As they got closer to the house, Steven could see that the
front facing windows were all open, and a slight breeze was causing the inside
curtains to flutter in and out of the window frames. The path they were on led
right up to the front door, which looked open. As they approached he realized
it wasn’t open, it just wasn’t there at all. There was no door. An open
doorframe led into the house. Above the door was a small sign that read
EXIMERE
.

“Strange name for such a beautiful place,” Eliza said.
“Wonder if it means anything.”

“I guess the front door to this house is really back there at
the base of the stairwell,” Roy said. “No point in more doors here. No weather
to worry about, no visitors, I’m guessing no animals. No need for a door.”

They walked into the house. At the far end of the room was an
archway that opened to the back yard, again with no door. Hallways led to more
rooms on the right and left, and a stairwell led up to the second floor. There
was a large fireplace with a small fire, and several couches and chairs
throughout the room. There were large vases filled to capacity with freshly cut
flowers. The walls were white and the room felt sunny and warm. A slight breeze
blew through the archways and the room. Steven felt that were it not for the
strangeness of the house and the situation they were in, it might be the most
peaceful place he’d ever been.

“Incredible,” Eliza said, looking around the room. “Simply
incredible.” Steven wasn’t sure if Eliza was referring to the house itself, or
the power that must have built it.

Roy walked towards the archway that led to the back yard.
“Look at this,” he said, beckoning the other two.

The archway opened to reveal a majestic back yard,
immaculately manicured. Further back in the yard was a giant banyan tree, its
branches as wide as the house, its roots descending from the branches here and
there. Steven could see water beyond it; there was a small pond on the other
side of the tree.

“Wow,” Steven said, surveying the view. “That might be the
most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

The branches of the banyan swayed lightly in the breeze. Its
massive canopy covered a large amount of ground, the lawn giving way to dirt at
the edges of it.

“There’s something out there,” Roy said, taking a step out of
the archway and walking down a few steps to the ground. “Come on.”

Eliza and Steven followed Roy as he walked through the back
yard past several rose bushes and hedges.

“What is it, Roy?” Eliza asked. “Is it the device?”

“No,” Roy said, “but it’s something important. Something we need
to see.”

As they got closer to the edge of the tree’s canopy, Steven
could see rectangular shapes in the ground. As he got closer, he realized their
size meant they must be graves. There were dozens of them.

Eliza gasped when she realized the same thing, raising her
hand to her mouth. Roy walked between a couple of them, making his way to one
in particular. Steven and Eliza followed him.

“Here,” he said. “This is who was trying to communicate with
us.”

“Who was it?” Eliza asked.

“It’s family, I know that,” Roy said. “We need to talk with
whoever it is.”

“How can it be family?” Steven asked. “And how do you know
that? There’s no headstone – none of these graves have headstones.”

“I just know,” Roy said. “And that’s not dirt, either,” he
said, pointing down towards the grave.

Steven knelt down next to the grave and pressed his hand into
the soil. It felt rubbery, depressing slightly under his palm, but returning to
its original shape when he raised his hand. “What is it?” he asked.

“Don’t know,” Roy said, “but it’s why we were barely able to
communicate with them during the séance. That substance is blocking their
ability to talk to us.”

Steven tried digging his fingers into the material, trying to
remove it. It stuck firm. “It’s not coming out,” he said.

“No, I expect not,” Roy said. “Whoever buried them wanted to
be sure they were shut down in the next life, too.”

“Have you ever seen this kind of thing before, either of
you?” Steven asked.

“No, I haven’t,” Eliza said. “It reminds me of those acrylic
paperweights, with spiders or bugs suspended inside.”

“Except in this case,” Roy said, “the body is a human, and
the plastic isn’t clear.”

“I wonder who they all are?” Steven said, rising from the
grave side and looking around. “There must be a hundred of them, maybe more.”
He walked to one nearby and pressed his hand in its soil, again feeling the
rubbery resistance. “The same crap here, too. They’ve all been trapped like
this.”

“I have a feeling,” Eliza said, “that James might have
created a few casualties while he was perfecting his device.”

“You mean these are gifteds?” Steven asked. “Buried in this
goop?”

“She’s right,” Roy said. “This is how James dealt with them
before he devised a less lethal way.”

“Fucking horrible!” Steven said. “Can you imagine being
encased in this shit? For eternity?”

“Maybe he thought placing them under this tree would give
them some level of peace,” Eliza said, looking up at the banyan’s branches.
“Look,” she said, pointing to a grave nearby. “That one’s open.”

They walked to the grave Eliza had identified. It was the
correct size, six feet deep, ready to receive a body. “I wonder who this was
prepared for?” Steven asked. “Someone James didn’t manage to trap?”

“Notice there’s no dirt nearby to fill it in,” Roy said.
“Another gifted, probably.”

“What do we do now?” Eliza asked. “We still haven’t found the
device. Perhaps it’s in the house somewhere.”

“I’m convinced the solution to our problem lies in that
grave,” Roy said, walking back to the first one that drew his attention.
“There’s someone in there who wants desperately to help us along. Someone I’ve
got a connection to. I don’t know who, but I do know we need to talk to him.
We’ve got to figure a way to get through this stuff, remove it.”

“Can we dig it out?” Eliza said.

“No,” Steven answered. “It’s not coming out, you can tell
from feeling it.”

“Do you have your book upstairs, Roy?” Eliza asked. “Perhaps
we could consult it.”

“Yes, it’s in my bedroom up there,” Roy said. “It’s worth a
shot.”

“I think we should get back,” Steven said, “before the others
become suspicious. We’ve been gone a while.”

“And we’ve got to get that hole in the janitorial closet
covered up somehow,” Roy said.

Steven turned to walk back to the house. As he did so, he
felt as though he was spinning. He felt light, as though his steps might lift
him off the ground.

“Anyone feel any different?” he asked.

“Yes,” Eliza said, “I do. Like I’ve been drinking.”

“It’s this place,” Roy said. “It’s affecting you.” They
walked up a few steps from the back yard and into the house. They glanced down
the hallways as they passed them.

“Or maybe it’s the device,” Steven said. “If it’s in this
house, and proximity increases its effect, we’re getting a massive dose being down
here next to it.”

“You may be right,” Roy said. “Come on, let’s go.”

“Wait a moment,” Eliza said, turning to go to the first room
down one of the hallways. “Look at this.”

Steven and Roy followed her as she walked into a large
library. The walls were lined with shelves and the center of the room contained
a sofa and easy chairs. Eliza studied the spines of the books at the closest
shelf.

“We should leave,” Steven said. “If our theory is correct,
we’re accelerating the draining by being here.”

“These aren’t normal books,” Eliza said, removing one from
the shelf. She opened it and read a little of it, then turned the open book
towards Steven and Roy, who were looking around the room.

“See?” she said, “handwriting. These books were handwritten.
They’re all like your book, Roy.”

“My father’s books?” Roy asked, scanning the room and walking
up to one of the bookcases. He removed a book and studied it. “Well I’ll be.
They are!”

“You realize what this is?” Eliza said, replacing the book on
the shelf and removing another. “It’s a library of the dead. These are the
books that belonged to the bodies out there under the tree. James kept them
here to make sure they didn’t make their way back into the hands of those
people’s children.”

Roy replaced his book and removed another. “You’re right,” he
said. “Each one is the writings of a different individual. This one has several
generations. They’re just like mine.”

“Can you imagine how much information is in this room?” Eliza
said, looking around. Steven noticed a tear forming in her eye. “How much was
stolen from them?”

“Guys, we need to be leaving,” Steven said. “We’ve got to
limit how much time we spend here if you don’t want to lose your abilities.”

“Prematurely,” Roy added, closing the book he had been
looking at and replacing it on the shelf. “The device will still impact us
upstairs, though I expect its power is diminished quite a bit by the protection
at ground level that keeps this place secret. But you’re right, we need to
leave.”