The Everlasting by Tim Lebbon Page B

was more than apparent.
    Seeing more
, she had said.
    â€œWe need to find something to open this,” Nina said.
    â€œHow long will it take? Someone could be here anytime.”
    â€œThen let’s hurry.”
    Scott searched the few shelves on the wall beneath the stairs, feeling by touch because the light barely reached that far. He returned to Nina with a screwdriver and claw hammer, though half the hammer’s handle had snapped off. “All I could find.”
    â€œIt’ll do.” Nina set to work. First she ran the screw-driver’s point around the outline in the wall, clearing powdery plaster from a sunken seal. She stepped back, breathing heavily, and it was then that Scott noticed she was panting.
    â€œWhat is it?”
    Nina shook her head, reaching out for the hammer.
    Scott stepped back. “What’s wrong?”
    â€œI can’t touch them,” she said. “Even being near them . . . it’s like I can taste the end of time.”
    â€œThat’s why I’m here?”
    She nodded.
    â€œWell . . . thanks for being honest.”
    â€œScott—”
    He moved beside Nina and pried the hammer’s claws beneath the edge of the seal. It was metal, rusted into the plaster, weak, and a few wrenches on the hammer saw a foot-long section of lining pop from the wall. It brought a spread of plaster with it, filling the air with dust and exposing a timber board behind the wall. He worked around the board, breaking the seal easily enough, scoring the surface of the wood, getting closer and closer to whatever lay behind. And it felt all wrong.
    He should not have been doing this. It was not his place.
    â€œSomething’s wrong,” he said. Nina was standing behind him now, and he could feel her eyes on the back of his neck. He turned. “Nina.”
    She was sweating, wringing her hands together as if to squeeze out fear. “They’re so close!” she said.
    â€œYou wrote them, Nina. Why can’t you touch them?”
    â€œJust the way things are. I don’t make the laws; I just follow them.”
    â€œDoes that include armed robbery?”
    â€œI mean the
real
laws,” she scoffed.
    â€œSo what happens when we find them? How do we carry them out?”
    â€œYou can. But it’s the clue that’s more important. Your grandfather would have left something, some hint. . . .”
    â€œMaybe not. Maybe he never wanted the book found at all.”
    Nina stared at him without answering.
    Scott went back to work, and soon the whole metal seal was ripped away. He set to work on the wood, breathing in air heavy with dust. He wanted to cough, but he was afraid that once he started he would not be able to stop.
    The board was jammed in tight. He pushed the screwdriver through between the top of the board and the wall, encountering gritty resistance that soon crumbled when he twisted the tool from side to side. He felt like Lord Caernarvon gaining his first look into Tutankhamen’s tomb, and he held his breath for a few seconds lest this buried place also carried a curse.
    It’s Nina who’s cursed
, he thought, but he wondered whether that was entirely true. Eternal life? Many would kill for that.
    Some already had.
    The wood popped out without warning, falling against his legs and scraping his knees. He stepped back and let it clatter to the floor.
    Nina moaned behind him. He turned to see what was wrong, and turned back when he saw that she was looking directly into the hole in the wall. It was totally dark in there, as though a huge space extended back beyond the new doorway.
    Scott stepped aside to allow light access, and he reached out and touched Nina’s arm, urging her aside as well. He realized that it was first time he had touched her.
    â€œI can’t see anything,” he said.
    â€œThey’re there. I can feel them.”
    â€œWhere?”
    â€œDeeper.”
    â€œWe’ll need a torch.”