The Key (93 page)

Linnéa’s eyes fill with tears when she says this. She remembers the last words she thought to him the night he died.
At least you tried
.

Yes, Viktor tried. And now, all is over for him.

‘I’m going with Felix to the cemetery later on,’ Minoo says quietly.

Linnéa almost gives her a hug, even though neither of them is the hugging type.

Minoo’s mobile rings. She almost rips it out, and Linnéa just catches sight of Gustaf’s name on the display before Minoo gets up, answers and walks into the house.

Linnéa senses Vanessa’s energy coming closer and gets up too.

Vanessa strolls towards her across the grass and Linnéa’s heart beats in double time. As it did in the beginning, when she was secretly in love.

‘There you are,’ Vanessa says.

‘Here I am,’ Linnéa says.

Vanessa pulls her hand through her hair.

‘I was thinking of going home,’ she says.

Linnéa makes up her mind.

‘Would it be all right for me to come, too?’ she says. ‘I’m homeless after all.’

‘Sure,’ Vanessa says and smiles.

Viktor’s gravestone is a rectangle of black marble with an elegantly chiselled pattern around the inscription.

Minoo’s and Felix’s shadows fall across it.

VIKTOR EHRENSKIÖLD. BORN ANDERSSON

The grief that overwhelms her is so deep that she wonders if it is Felix’s or her own. And then she wonders if it matters.

‘Clara wanted it just to say “Andersson”,’ Felix tells her. ‘But I don’t think Viktor would’ve wanted that. This was part of his life as well.’

‘I think you’re right,’ Minoo says.

These are the first words they’ve exchanged since they arrived. They have been sitting together in the grass, quietly listening to the wind playing in the crowns of the lime trees. Hearing the odd cry of a child from the rectory, where a new family has moved in. And lots of drunken yelling from Olsson’s Hill.

‘If you still had your old powers, I would have asked you to use them on me,’ Felix says.

‘Would you have wanted to lose your memories of him?’

‘No, on the contrary. I would have liked to show you what Viktor meant to me.’

He touches the gravestone lightly.

‘You, Clara and I were probably the only people who knew what he was truly like,’ Felix continues, glancing at her. ‘I was jealous of you. Not only because you had those incredible powers, but also because I was convinced there was something between you and Viktor.’

That explains the way Felix looked at me at first, Minoo thinks.

‘When I arrived here, I hadn’t seen him for more than a year,’ he continues. ‘I hoped … Never mind what I hoped. As soon as I met him, I realised that he was in love with someone. I saw the two of you together and there seemed to be something special between you. On your first day in the manor house, he took your hand when we saw the sun going dark.’

‘There never was anything between us. Not like that.’

‘I know’, Felix says. ‘You weren’t exactly Viktor’s type.’

The way he says it makes her feel mildly offended, but he doesn’t seem to realise that she might mind.

‘I wasn’t either, of course,’ he adds, trying to smile. ‘He liked me well enough. But he never loved me.’

The pain Minoo feels now is definitely Felix’s. Grief. Unrequited love for someone who is gone for ever.

‘Was there ever anything between you?’ Minoo asks.

‘Do you have any idea how many times Sigrid tried to find that out?’

Minoo feels her ears going hotter. She doesn’t want to be like Sigrid. Ever.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘It’s OK,’ Felix says. ‘Yes, there was something. A couple of times. But he ended it. He didn’t think it was fair on me since I had feelings for him. I couldn’t exactly hide it, you know. I hated that he was so fucking considerate.’

Another wave of grief hits her.

‘I can’t believe he’s gone.’ Misery distorts Felix’s face.

He turns a little away from her and they sit like that for a while. He takes a deep breath and seems to pull himself together. The grief inside Minoo dies down a little.

‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘It seems I’ll never be able to control my powers. But I’m trying to learn to accept that.’

She hopes that will make it easier for him.

‘At least it’s some comfort that Walter is dead,’ Felix says. ‘There’s some justice after all.’

Minoo can’t see what she did as an act of justice, but doesn’t want to discuss it with Felix just now.

‘You have no idea how I worshipped Walter,’ Felix continues. ‘At school, I was nothing but a great big disappointment. Even though all the tests showed that I was very talented, I could never perform. And then
the chairman
asked me to help him save the world.’

He wipes the tears from his cheeks.

‘He was really nice to me sometimes, but only when no one was watching. So when he made a fool of me in public, it made me feel even more of a loser. The worst part of the humiliation was that I looked up to him. Walter was everything I dreamt of becoming. Or, so I thought. Now I know that he was a monster.’

‘Yes, he was,’ she agrees.

Felix gets up and Minoo goes to stand next to him. Somebody is playing music on Olsson’s Hill. A heavy bass beat echoes across the town. She doesn’t recognise the tune.

‘I keep trying to persuade Clara to come to the grave,’ Felix says. ‘But she refuses. I hope she’ll be able to move on one day.’

Minoo hopes so, too, but isn’t sure what she believes.

‘Have you moved on?’ she asks him.

‘I suppose one never does, not completely. But I have met someone … Maybe you saw him at Adriana’s? Guy called Sanke.’

Minoo remembers the name. Nejla’s boyfriend’s big brother. She guesses he must be the older of the two guys in the garden. The one with purple hair.

‘And it’s great to have something to aim for now,’ Felix continues. ‘I really believe we can accomplish great things with Adriana. And we could use someone with your strength.’

‘Me? I haven’t even got the slightest power.’

‘You were offered all the power in the world,’ Felix says. ‘And you rejected it. I would never have been able to resist.’

He fixes his dark eyes on Minoo.

‘I don’t believe you realise how strong you are, Minoo. It’s time you did, because the world will need you.’

Vanessa sits on the floor in the sitting room and looks at Melvin’s soft toy, a penguin that’s lying between her and Melvin. It has lost an eye since she last saw it.

She reaches out with her finger and tickles the penguin’s tummy.

‘But he must remember a little about me?’ She fights to keep her voice steady.

‘No, he really doesn’t remember you at all,’ Melvin says.

Vanessa still can’t get over how well he speaks now, and how much he has grown. She has tried to pick up hints of magic energy from him, but not sensed anything so far.

Mum cries, seated on the new sofa behind Vanessa. She wonders how many times Melvin has had to watch Mum cry while she’s been away.

‘Maybe Pingu remembers when we used to sing “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”?’ Vanessa suggests.

Melvin looks inquisitively at her, then purses his lips and shakes his head.

Vanessa gave him the penguin for his second birthday. Melvin treated her as a stranger then as well. She had been staying with Wille and his mother and had been away for quite a long time. When she moved back home, she had promised herself never to do this to her little brother again. And now she has been away for even longer.

‘Mum, why are you crying?’ Melvin asks.

‘I’m crying because I’m so happy,’ Mum says. ‘I’m happy because Nessa is with us again.’

Melvin doesn’t comment. But he hugs the penguin closer. Then he turns to point at Linnéa, who is in the kitchen talking to her father on the phone.

‘Why is she here?’ he asks.

Vanessa wishes there was a simple answer to his question. ‘She’s my friend,’ she says.

Linnéa ends the call, puts the phone down and stares out through the window.

‘Mum, I want to watch the rest of
The Little Mermaid
now,’ Melvin says.

‘Of course you can,’ Mum says. ‘Are you all right with watching on your own if we go to sit in the kitchen?’

‘Yes, if you don’t talk too loudly,’ Melvin says. ‘It’s annoying.’

Vanessa aches with longing to pick him up and hug him, but instead she just gets up from the floor while Mum puts the film on for him. Melvin curls up on the sofa together with his penguin and loses himself in the story immediately.

Vanessa goes to sit next to Linnéa at the kitchen table. They look at each other as the little mermaid’s underwater friends start singing at the bottom of the sea.

‘You must give him time,’ Mum says as she sits down on Vanessa’s other side. ‘And don’t disappear again.’

She smiles, but tears still trickle down her cheeks.

‘Sorry,’ she says, drying her eyes. ‘I’ve actually stopped crying. It’s more like I’m leaking.’

Vanessa scans the kitchen. New wallpaper. Mum had thought it was as well to do that at the same time as the sitting room had a complete overhaul after Olivia’s attack.

There are more pictures of Vanessa on the fridge than ever. Frasse’s bowls have gone. When she opened the front door, she missed his coming to greet her. The kindly, daft Alsatian they had rescued from a home for stray dogs. He had tried to defend Mum. Vanessa will never forget the stench of scorched meat.

‘How is Björn?’ Mum asks.

‘He … was pleased that I called,’ Linnéa replies. Vanessa notes the effort she is making not to withdraw.

He was sober today
.
Always something
, Linnéa thinks, looking at Vanessa.

‘You know, getting my head round all your stories is so hard.’ Mum shakes her head. ‘I know you think I’m a bit New Agey, Nessa. But this is hard to believe, even for me.’

‘I understand that,’ Vanessa tells her.

‘We had a hard time believing it too, in the beginning, even though we were in the middle of it,’ Linnéa says.

‘I thought I was hallucinating when Olivia was here,’ Mum says. ‘But I suppose I wasn’t.’

‘No, you weren’t,’ Vanessa says.

Mum nods and pops her head round the sitting-room door to make sure that Melvin can’t hear them.

‘What are we to do with him?’ she asks.

‘Are you sure you haven’t noticed anything?’ Vanessa says. ‘If you really think about it?’

‘No, nothing. Except, he has started to sleep-walk, but you did the same when you were little and—’

Mum’s phone starts ringing and Vanessa is grateful for the distraction. Usually, this is the point at which Mum tells the anecdote about how little Vanessa squatted and peed on the rug in the hall.

Mum only listens for a minute before clicking to end the call.

‘Another journalist,’ she says. ‘What are you going to tell them?’

‘Nothing just now,’ Vanessa says. ‘But we must tell them something. Later.’

‘That Council you spoke about. They won’t be best pleased when you go public.’

‘True,’ Linnéa says. ‘But they don’t like us anyway.’

Mum shakes her head again. ‘How did you
cope
with all the terrible things you experienced?’

She looks at Vanessa. They hear Melvin laugh.

‘I don’t know,’ Vanessa says. ‘We simply had to.’

She checks the time. They’re going to meet the others in the park and Linnéa has suggested that they walk there. Vanessa is expectant. And nervous.

‘We’d better go now,’ she says.

Mum looks at her and lightly touches the scar above her eyebrow.

‘I will be back.’ Vanessa gets up and gives her a hug. ‘Solemn promise. I’ll take the longest shower in the world and then sleep for a week. At least.’

She kisses her Mum’s head and wanders off to the sitting room.

‘Bye bye, Melvin,’ she says.

And stays in the doorway, as if nailed to the floor.

Melvin has got down on the floor and is dancing to the jolly music.

Behind him, his penguin is leaping about on the sofa, as if dancing with him. His wings bounce in a crazy rhythm against the bulky little penguin body.

* * *

Minoo sits on her bed with the
Book of Patterns
in her hands. It is empty now. One blank page after another. The guardians will never again talk to anyone through its pages.

They will never talk to her.

A sense of loneliness lurks somewhere inside her.

She had become used to having them within her reach, just beyond her consciousness. It made her feel safe. Just as she will miss the power, so she will miss that safety. Both helped her to feel strong. But perhaps she has another kind of strength. Felix thinks so.

The door to her room opens and Mum pops her head in. She doesn’t speak, only smiles. Just now, that is enough. Minoo knows that they have a great deal to talk about. But it can wait.

The doorbell rings and Minoo wonders if it’s yet another journalist. But when the front door is opened, she hears Gustaf’s voice. She gets up. Running footsteps on the stairs. Another second or two, then he comes in.

Minoo hardly has time to see him before he has taken her in his arms.

She doesn’t know how long they stand like that.

She hears the beating of Gustaf’s heart: fast at first, then slower. She looks up at him and their eyes meet.

He knows most of what has happened already. They have talked on the phone. And she has told him that she loves him. He has said he loves her and that he has missed her. He has said it over and over again.

Now he bends to kiss her and she realises how much she has feared that something between them would have changed while she was away. That he would have grown fed up with waiting. Or perhaps that something about her had been ruined by the guardians.

But everything feels all right.

They sit down on the bed and he puts his arm around her shoulders.

She has told him everything. Almost.

‘I know that you want to know about Rebecka.’

He nods but doesn’t say anything.

‘She is no longer in the Borderland,’ Minoo begins. ‘She has passed on. But I had time to speak to her before …’ She sobs, then tells herself to be strong for Gustaf’s sake. ‘She knows that it wasn’t you who killed her. And I told her about us. She asked me to tell you … that she loves you. And that she wants you to be happy.’