David Baldacci - The Keeper

She said, “Yes.”

After she left my digs I turned out my tuck. The cavernous wardrobe swallowed my meager possessions with plenty of room left over.

I jumped up on the bed, which I found quite comfy. Harry Two hopped up next to me and I scratched his ears. He rewarded me with a soft whimper of pleasure. I looked at the door, which had closed when Astrea departed. I jumped down, strode over to it and tried to tug it open. It wouldn’t budge.

I looked in disbelief at Harry Two.

“She’s locked us in. Well, how do you like that?” I was miffed beyond belief.

I stepped away from the door and sized it up. Then I backed up to get a running start. I glanced at Harry Two. “Don’t worry, I want out of here and we will be in a mo’.”

I started to charge forward and then stopped dead.

The door had swung silently open.

I want out of here. That’s what I’d said. And the door had just opened.

I cautiously peered around the corner into the darkened corridor. There was no sign of Astrea. I stepped out of the room, Harry Two right with me. I looked down at him. I guess he could tell I was anxious because he gave my hip a nudge with his snout as though to say Let’s budge along, shall we?

I looked to the right. I had been down that way. Thus, I turned left.

A door stood on the right side of the passage. I tried the handle, but it was locked. I stepped back, drew up my courage and said in the most polite voice I could muster, “Might I come in, please?”

The door swung open, revealing nothing but darkness.

I looked at Harry Two, who stared back up at me. Now he looked anxious.

“Okay, right,” I said confidently, though I was feeling not a jot of it actually. I stepped through the doorway. Harry Two followed. As soon as we did, the door shut behind us, and the room brightened.

There was only one object in the room. It was an enormous clock that rested on one huge wall. Attached to it underneath were twin chains with large metal balls affixed to them. The chains disappeared through holes cut in the floor. I crept forward and stared at the clockface. It was unlike any I had seen before. Wug timepieces were divided into the different sections of light and night. There were numbers and words on this one. I drew even closer.

“Century,” I read off. That word was under each number etched on the clockface at regular intervals. There was only one hand on the clock. It was now pointed at eight centuries. I had no idea what any of this meant. I stared down at the holes in the floor, into which the chains disappeared. I had no idea where they went. Well, I could learn nothing more here, it seemed.

The next door we reached was about ten feet down the hall.

I stepped in front of it and said, “Might we come in, please?”

“GO AWAY!” The scream was nearly ear-shattering.

I jumped back so far I hit the opposite wall and slumped down, dazed.

“Bloody Hel,” I muttered.

I staggered up and we hurried along to the next door.

It opened at my request, though I did cover my ears in anticipation of a negative response. We walked inside and I looked around as the room was illuminated by a source of light that remained invisible to me.

There was a small cradle in one corner. I rushed over to it, but it was empty. It was also covered with cobwebs. So was the entire room, which was filled with old, moldy furniture. While I stood there, I was slowly filled with deep despair, as though only sadness reigned in my heart. Then my despair grew fathoms deeper and I felt tears creep to my eyes. I looked down at Harry Two and I could tell he was having similar emotions. He had lain on the floor and covered his snout with his paws.

When I could stand it no more, I rushed from the room, with Harry Two closely following. When the door closed behind us, the awful feelings instantly vanished. I drew a small knife from my cloak pocket and cut a tiny notch in the wood directly above the door handle. I rushed back and marked in the same way the door that had screamed at me. Now I would know which to leave alone.

The next room shouted at me to GO AWAY! I marked it as well.

The door after that didn’t budge at first and I thought the room was going to scream at me. But no sound came. Except finally a tiny click as the door swung open.

I crept inside and looked around as the darkness was dispelled by a wash of light, again from an unknown source. On every single wall were hundreds of paintings. I moved forward so I could see them more clearly.

Groups of females had on long gowns with low-cut necklines revealing far more of themselves than I was used to seeing. Their hair was beautifully styled and layered and piled on top of their heads. The males wore dark cloaks with embroidered stitching and what looked to be gold leaf on their shoulders. Some held short sticks of wood and others had swords in holders on gilded belts encircling their waists. One male clutched a long leather lead attached to a canine that looked like a far larger version of Harry Two. The thing looked proud and noble staring off into the distance as it sat obediently beside its master. I looked down at Harry Two and found him staring at his counterpart cast in oils on canvas. He seemed awestruck.

My gaze kept roaming until it finally stopped and held on one female. She was taller than the others, her flaming red hair pooled luxuriously around her broad, muscled shoulders. I instantly recognized her. She was the one I met on my trip through the fiery portals into the past, which I had discovered at Stacks. I gazed back up at the painting. This female had saved my life and given me the Elemental before dying on the battlefield. Curious though I was about her, my gaze again began roaming to the other paintings, which held landscapes of broad, lovely countryside, towns with towering stone buildings and smoothly laid cobblestone streets. Sleps and carriages were pictured on the cobblestones and there was an air of prosperity and, well, peace.

As I moved around the room, though, the air of hope and prosperity faded. The paintings turned far darker and the lovely gowns, piled-up hair and stately carriages on fine cobblestones were no more. Replacing them were scenes of bloody battlefields, smoldering ruins and abject carnage. Along with this change in subjects, the bright colors of the earlier paintings had disappeared into the shadowy and depressing hues of blacks and grays, displaced only by the garish thrust of bloody red, as someone lay dying. Flames leapt from the stone towers, and everyone looked frightened and confused. In one small painting, there was a young female alone on a street, her face uplifted to the dark sky and her mouth open apparently in a scream as tears fell down her dirty cheeks. The sense of loss was awful.

We left this room and reached the next one. The door opened at my asking. Darkness again. I expected the lights to come on, but they didn’t. I did hear something. Something breathing.

The breaths were uneven, harsh, and sounded painful. I felt my own chest tighten as I listened to them. I looked wildly around for the source of the noise.

There was a large four-poster bed set in the deepest crevice of the room. As I drew closer, the room lightened a bit, allowing me to see more clearly.

My jaw dropped when I saw him.

He was the oldest male I had ever laid eyes on, even older than ancient Dis Fidus back in Wormwood. He had not a hair on his head. His beard was snow white and curled down his chest and then past it by a good two feet. His eyes were sunken, hollow and brushed liberally with red. His nose was long and horribly misshapen. His cheeks were flat. When he rose up a bit on his pillow, I could see his hands. They were wrinkled claws with large brown spots across them.