“Your friends are much better when they’re tied up, yes? So much more
docile
.”
Abby and Jordan were awake, both of them struggling against the fasteners holding them down. Dan watched, miserable, as Cal collapsed the legs and wheels on the gurneys and propped them up vertically against the wall. His friends cried out, now facing him directly, both of them as tightly bound as mummies.
“Why don’t you just hypnotize them, too?” Dan muttered.
“What makes you think I haven’t?” Professor Reyes stood and walked over to Jordan, looking up him and down with plain disinterest. “Actually,
I
haven’t, but our friend the Sculptor did. Or is he Felix? Or is he the Sculptor?” She laughed—cackled—and Dan shot up out of the chair, only to feel that same horrible burning sear through his head.
“The nightmares . . . the voices . . . You really had no idea?” Professor Reyes
tsk-tsk
ed him playfully. “He had you down there in that operating theater all to himself. Armed with my knowledge, it was only natural for him to have a little fun. He isn’t very skilled, though. He couldn’t control you. But I can.”
“Leave them out of this,” Dan said, clutching the edge of the warden’s desk. The heat of the candles in the room was overbearing. Sweaty, faint, he dropped back down into the chair. “You said you wanted information, fine. I’ll give it to you.”
Professor Reyes nodded to Cal, who went obediently to the desk and picked up the spike and mallet. Then he retreated to Jordan’s side and Dan felt his skin prickle with fear.
“I bet you want the notes,” Dan said, trying to keep her attention away from Jordan. “I don’t know where they are.”
“But you read them,” she said, showing her teeth. It couldn’t be called a smile.
“Yes, I read them.”
“I so hoped you would. I bet you thought you were so clever, figuring out the coordinates, finding all the crumbs I laid out for you. The notes were there for you, and you being of his blood . . . I knew you would understand them better than I ever could. One piece was always missing. You see him, don’t you? In dreams, in real life . . . You see the warden. You can see what others cannot, Daniel. That was why it had to be
you
. I couldn’t very well dig up Maudire and question him myself, could I?” Her mouth twisted viciously as she said it. Caroline pulled on the necklace around her neck and it came free in her hand, then she leaned onto the desk and dangled it in front of Dan, letting it swing gently back and forth. He couldn’t help but look at it and feel a strange urge to never take his eyes away.
“Felix led you right to it. I led you right to it. The carnival, the photos . . . If I could just trigger the right memories, I knew you would give me the answer. Maudire was the one who told you about the password. So simple. So unbelievably simple. Why hadn’t I thought of that? You found it, didn’t you? You know the word that undoes all his programming, all his work. . . .” She picked up one hand from the desk and slammed it back down. Dan shot back in his seat, shaking.
“I don’t know what you mean. . . .” And it was true. She was right about Maudire suggesting there might be a fail-safe, but he never said what exactly that was. . . .
“Do it,” she growled, and Dan watched, paralyzed, as Cal lifted the spike and positioned it above Jordan’s eye.
“Hey!” Jordan flinched, then went perfectly still. “Don’t . . . Don’t do it. Dan will tell you the word! Of course he will! Won’t you, Dan? You will, won’t you?” Sweat poured down Jordan’s forehead. His voice had gone high, panicked.
Dan shook his head slowly; he didn’t know it. Why didn’t he know it?
Think . . . Think . . .
“Stop! I’ll tell you,” Dan said, but it was just to stall. He couldn’t focus, couldn’t think. He didn’t know what she wanted to hear. He tried to visualize the pamphlet and the notes but the harder he tried the more the words blurred together.
“Tell me what it is,” Caroline screamed, shrill, the red stone moving faster and faster in front of his eyes. It looked like a star, red, burning, cracking his skull right open until her words sounded like they were coming from inside his head. “Tell me the password, Daniel Crawford, tell me and I will have control over myself once more. I will be freed. The rest of you can rot, but
I
will be free.
Tell me
.”
Out of the corner of his eye he could see Cal pull back the mallet. He was going to strike.
“I know it!” Dan shouted. “Don’t-hurt-him-I-know-it!”
Abby was shrieking, flailing against her bonds.
Why didn’t he know? Why couldn’t he help them?
“Do you?”
Professor Reyes grinned at him from behind the swinging stone. “Maybe this is the wrong kind of encouragement. Maybe you’re more like
him
than I thought.” Her eyes drifted down to the table and the tray of instruments. “Pick up the scalpel, Daniel, and hold it to your neck.”
It was like his mind and his body were two separate entities. He couldn’t control his arm or the hand that reached out and closed around the knife.
“There’s a good boy.”
Dan watched the blade come closer and closer until the cool tip of it touched his neck. His mouth opened in a silent, helpless scream of dread.
“You don’t care about your friends—threatening them does nothing. You only care about yourself. . . . Just like he did.” She lowered her voice to a steady, emotionless whisper. “Now say the word that will set me free or you’ll have to start cutting.”
His eyes flew to Abby, then to Jordan. They watched him, unblinking, Abby whispering a stream of words he couldn’t make out. Tears gushed down her cheeks. Dan pictured the pamphlet again, but it was no use. There was nothing there.
“He didn’t write it down,” Dan babbled, tripping over his words. “He didn’t. . . . I know he didn’t. I would remember. He didn’t write it down, I swear! I swear he didn’t. Oh God, don’t make me do this. . . .”
It was just one word, one syllable that he heard and had to obey. The professor’s conditioning was too strong and Dan was powerless against it.
“Wake up, Daniel, and
cut
.”
He hardly felt it at first, the knife biting into his skin as he began to slowly, slowly drag it across his throat. Then he felt warm wetness against his fingertips and the room began to dip. He couldn’t blame Micah now, or Lara, or even Cal—he would have done anything Caroline said under that combination of drugs and hypnosis. He tried to fight it, but his mind was a blank, his limbs seemingly belonging to someone else.
“A little fear to jog your memory,” Caroline whispered savagely. “And if you can’t remember . . . Oh well.”
The blood was coming faster now but he couldn’t stop it, and he didn’t know how to answer her so he knew it would just pour out and out.
Then he heard something pierce through the blank canvas of his mind. It was a splash of color, of inspiration, and the instant he heard it he could think again. He was free.
“Sanctum!” Abby screamed it, and then screamed it again, louder and with more conviction. “Sanctum! The password is sanctum!”
Caroline reeled, blinking fast before settling her gaze on Dan. From the blankness of her expression came a sneer, her lips twisting as she advanced toward him. “That’s it! The password! And so simple, too! I almost feel like a fool. But that’s all I needed from you,” she said. “I don’t need you anymore. Now I can stamp out the last of that monster’s bloodline!”
He saw and heard the spike hit the floor. Cal had dropped it. The professor lunged across the desk, grabbing Dan around the throat and squeezing. Spots danced on Dan’s vision. He spun the scalpel in his hand and raised it high, using the last of his air and strength to plunge the scalpel down into the professor’s back.
She clawed at him, spinning and falling down onto the desk as she tried to reach the knife. The red stone fell out of her grasp, bouncing on the papers littering the warden’s desk. Dan snatched it up and vaulted over the table, ignoring the tremor in his hands and the blood covering them to rip at the bonds holding Abby down. Cal had already started undoing Jordan’s.
Breathing hard, Dan stole a glance at Cal, who was bent double, shaking his head as if he’d been punched in the jaw and couldn’t get his bearings.
“I’ll kill you!” Caroline was screaming, still scrabbling on the desk trying to pull the scalpel out of her back. Candles spilled onto the floor, rolling away, some going out and others spreading their flames to the files and books scattered on the floor. “I’ll kill you all!”
The flames spread to her robe and took, and it looked as if she couldn’t decide whether to deal with the knife or the fire licking up her sides.
Dan yanked at the last buckle, the one fastening Abby’s head to the gurney. She tumbled out of her bindings and into his grasp.
“We have to get out of here,” Jordan shouted, grabbing Dan by the sleeve of his coat and pulling. “Now!”
Jordan led them to the door, Dan and Abby fast on his heels, but it was blocked. Cal stood in the way, his handsome face drawn and weary. Whatever spark had been in his eyes when Dan first met him was gone now. Dan didn’t want to fight him, but he wasn’t going to stop now, not when the flames were already spreading, eating up the office and turning the room into a furnace.
“Go,” Cal said, shoving Jordan through the door. “Get out of here, go!”
The others filed through, but Dan skidded to a halt just outside. “You can come with us,” he said breathlessly, turning to Cal. Behind him, the fire roared, the dusty old books and papers acting like kindling, igniting instantly. It wouldn’t be long before the flames reached the door.
“No,” Cal said with a sad smile. “She can’t get out. She has to go down with his place. Take your friends and get out of here. Let me do one damn decent thing.” He turned away then, and over his shoulder murmured, “And tell your girlfriend thanks for me.”
“Dan! Let’s go!” Abby jerked him backward by his collar, forcing him to follow her and the others down the corridor.
He remembered the way so well, like he had just been down in the depths of Brookline yesterday. The smell of char and smoke filled the air, and he could still feel the heat of the fire as they rushed down the hall and away from the office. When they were almost to the lobby of the old asylum, Dan looked back to see the flames pouring out of the warden’s office and down the corridor.
They reached the outer door and found it locked. Jordan didn’t bother with the handle, ramming his shoulder against the metal and wood until it gave, spilling them out into the cooler air of the abandoned dormitory.
“Out the back,” Jordan said, already running. Dan could hear the faint crackle of fire spreading across the asylum behind them. “We don’t want to be seen coming out of here.”
As they rounded the corner and ran for the back entrance to Brookline, Dan spotted the red latch handle of a fire alarm. Cold evening air rushed in around him as Abby and Jordan broke through the outer doors and Dan pulled the fire alarm. The bells sounded at once, deafening as they filled the echoing hall.
Outside it was twilight, purple-and-orange dusk sitting just above the tops of the trees. Dan took a few steps out the door and turned, trying to catch his breath as he heard a distant, guttural rumbling.
There was an earsplitting crack and the whole of Brookline sagged. The foundation was disintegrating. Brookline was going to fall.
Chapter 34
T
he flames spread faster than Dan expected, and by the time he, Abby, and Jordan rounded the side of the building and approached the front, a crowd had already gathered.
“The cops took our phones,” Jordan muttered bleakly. “I hope someone calls 911 and gets Cal out of there.”
Dan and Abby stood looking at him in stunned silence.
“What?” he mumbled. “Cal was probably an okay guy before the brainwashing. Who knows, maybe the boat shoes weren’t even his idea.”
Abby clapped him lightly on the shoulder. “I hope they can get him out.”
A fire engine screeched onto the lawn, sending the onlookers running in every direction. Dan tried to fix his rumpled coat and clothing, nervous that they looked like they had just escaped Brookline’s destruction. The last thing he wanted was to explain what had happened inside.
“Dan! Your neck!” Abby appeared in front of him, pulling a handful of wet wipes from her pocket. She tore one open with her teeth and pressed it firmly to the cut on his throat. It hurt more then than it ever had before. “Luckily I don’t think it’s very deep.”
“Yeah,” he said with a dark laugh. “Luckily.”
Firefighters poured out of the truck, swiftly organizing and finding the nearest hydrant along the quad path. Dan recognized a few of the prospective students in the group milling on the lawn.
He felt Abby’s fingers entwine comfortably with his, and he turned to her, exhausted but still managing a tiny smile. She helped him put a fresh wet wipe on his cut and he pressed it hard to stop the bleeding.
“How did you figure it out?” he asked softly. “The password . . . I mean, I know we both read that thing in his notes, but that was pretty amazing what you did back there.”
“It just stuck out to me,” she said with a modest shrug. “It didn’t fit with the rest of his mumbo jumbo so I thought it had to be important. To be honest it was mostly a guess. I would’ve just started screaming random words if that one didn’t work.”
“I’m glad we hid those stupid notes,” he muttered.
“Should we go get them?” she asked.
“Later. Cal wanted me to thank you,” Dan added. He watched the firefighters shouting to one another, though the fire was visible on the first floor now, the windows glowing like a jack-o’-lantern’s eyes. “Maybe he’ll get to thank you in person.”
“God, I hope so. He shouldn’t have stayed in there.” Abby gave his hand one last press. “I’m going to check on Jordan. You going to be okay?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I’m just . . . eager to get out of here and go home.”
As Abby turned and wandered toward Jordan, Dan wondered what he would tell Paul and Sandy about his neck.
Or maybe it’s time to tell them the truth about everything.