Mikkel Birkegaard - The Library of Shadows

'Isn't that better?' he asked without lowering his voice so that his words echoed between the bare walls.

Jon turned off his torch and headed for the door at the end of the corridor. It had white panels and a brass handle. This door was also unlocked, and Jon slowly nudged it open until he could poke his head inside. What he found was yet another hallway, which apparently ran the full width of the front of the school. Up near the ceiling, at intervals of a few metres, were windows that allowed the light from the stars to shine in on the pale walls. A wide-mesh grating in front of the windowpanes cast shadows like a huge spider's web over the floor and walls.

Without opening the door any wider than necessary, Jon slipped into the hallway and motioned the others to follow. Pau closed the door behind them. A series of doors lined the wall they were huddled against, while at the end of the corridor they glimpsed a set of stairs, leading up into the building.

'You mean you still don't notice it?' asked Pau, sounding slightly annoyed.

Both Jon and Katherina said that they didn't notice a thing.

'It's strongest over there,' said Pau, pointing away from the stairs leading up.

Jon turned on the torch and aimed it in the direction Pau had indicated. At the end of the hall another stairway led down yet another level. They crept over to the stairs, with Jon going first, keeping the torch pointed at the floor. Right in front of the stairs was a strong, black iron gate, which stood open.

'I don't like this,' murmured Katherina as she grabbed hold of the gate. The bars were twisted wrought iron, at least two centimetres thick. 'It all seems too easy, don't you think?'

'Maybe they have nothing to hide,' Pau suggested. 'What sort of secrets would a school have, anyway?'

'You're the one who keeps noticing something strange,' Katherina pointed out angrily.

Jon shushed his two colleagues and shone the torchlight down the stairs in front of them.

'You're sure this is the way we should go?' he asked, turning to point the torch at Pau's face.

'Yeah, I'm sure,' replied Pau, holding up his hand to block out the beam of light. 'Can't you sense it? This is where the energy is coming from. Trust me.'

'You've certainly become awfully sensitive all of a sudden,' muttered Katherina.

Jon shone the light back on the stairs and began descending. After a couple of metres the stairs turned sharply round a corner. At the turn, Jon noticed a strange tingling of the hairs on the back of his neck, the same sensation he'd felt the first time he entered the library in the basement of Libri di Luca.

'Okay,' he admitted. 'I think we're on the right track. Now I can feel it too.'

Katherina confirmed that she also felt the energy.

'What did I tell you?' muttered Pau.

Cautiously Jon continued down the stairway. With each step he could feel the energy getting stronger, at the same time as the air got damper and stuffier. At the foot of the stairs was a corridor that led forward a couple of metres before it turned yet another corner. As far as Jon could tell, it ran along the back of the school.

The walls were more rustic in this part of the building, with big uneven patches and exposed granite.

They found two more doors when they turned the corner. The metal door on the right had a peephole of the type that might be expected in the door to a prison cell. The other door marked the end of the corridor and was made of heavy oak with black iron hinges and handle.

Jon peered into the hole in the metal door, but it was too dark to see anything. He pressed his ear against the door and listened hard. When he didn't hear anything, he pressed the metal handle down and opened it.

Inside was a small room, no more than two metres wide and about five metres long. The walls were covered with pale wooden panels. In the middle of the room two big leather chairs faced each other. They both had wide armrests, and over the back of each hung a metal helmet connected to a jumble of wires. With the beam of his torch, Jon followed the wires to where they gathered into one thick cable coming out of the wall. That same wall was dominated by a big window, which provided an adjacent room with a view of the chairs.

Jon found a light switch and turned it on. Fluorescent light flooded the room and all three of them stepped inside. As soon as Jon crossed the threshold, he sensed the energy disappear, as if someone had turned off a switch. Judging by the others' reaction, they had noticed the same thing.

'It must be shielded in some way,' Pau concluded.

'What is this place?' asked Katherina.

'The electric chair?' suggested Pau. 'All teachers must have an urge to use this sort of thing on their pupils once in a while.'

Jon leaned towards the glass pane and peered into the room next door. He glimpsed a series of red and green LEDs, and in the light from the cell he could see a table right on the other side of the window and a row of computers and printers along one wall. On the table stood a computer monitor surrounded by papers and half-empty coffee cups.

'Remer said they had the equipment to measure the powers,' said Jon. 'This must be where they do it.'

Katherina picked up a helmet. 'Very likely,' she said, looking with disgust at the helmet in her hands. 'The shield must prevent the measurements from being disturbed by the energy down here, wherever it's coming from.'

'Okay, Mr and Mrs Sherlock, shouldn't we find out where it's coming from?' said Pau, moving towards the door. 'This place is giving me the creeps.'

'Do you still think this is an innocent school building?' asked Katherina, but Pau didn't answer.

Out in the corridor they again felt the familiar tingling, and it got stronger as they headed for the oak door at the end of the hall. That door wasn't locked either, and it gave them free access to the room they had seen through the window in the cell room. In addition to the rows of computers, the printers and the table with the papers, there was another door leading further into the school.

Jon set his sports bag on the floor and went over to the table to have a look at the papers.

They were covered with graphs, sketches of parts of the brain and rows of numbers, some of them underlined or circled in pencil. At the top of each page was the name and age of the person being tested. Judging by these documents, the latest test subjects were aged ten to twelve. For some of the individuals, the numbers were a measurement of their actual strength, while for others the numbers represented an estimate of the person's expected potential.

'It looks like they can predict the strength of those who haven't even been activated yet,' said Jon.

'Could that be the criterion for admission to the school?' suggested Katherina, who had come over to the table and was looking over his shoulder. Pau stayed near the door, casting nervous glances down the corridor.

'Maybe, but it's hard to imagine how they could take the measurements without arousing suspicion from the parents,' said Jon.

Katherina shrugged. 'There's no limit to what parents will subject their beloved offspring to if it means giving Little Peter a head start.'

'God only knows whether the parents even find out the truth,' said Jon, thinking aloud. 'It's not certain they're Lectors themselves. But what about the children? When are they told? Are the parents informed, or are the kids forced to lie to their mother and father?' He shook his head. 'What would that do to a child?'

'It doesn't sound healthy,' Katherina chimed in. 'They must have more tests than this one to find suitable candidates. It's one thing to possess the powers, either activated or latent, but it's another matter whether the kids are mature enough to join the Shadow Organization.'