They found a quiet corner in Starbucks on the Pentonville Road. Emily ordered herself a large cappuccino with an extra shot of espresso. Nick followed suit, added two choc-chip muffins, and was pleased when she allowed him to pay.
‘How do you know Victor?’ he asked, after they’d eaten half their muffins and were blowing in their cups because the coffee was still boiling hot.
‘He was a friend of Jack’s.’ She smiled pensively. ‘Of course Victor says he is a friend of Jack’s and what’s a little bit of drowning between friends.’
Even before he realised what he was doing, Nick had put his hand over Emily’s. She didn’t pull it away; on the contrary she linked her fingers with his.
‘Victor helped me a lot. He adopted me as his little sister.’
‘He’s fantastic,’ Nick said fervently. He didn’t get any more words out; he had the feeling that he was about to float away any second. To cover his embarrassment, he sipped at his coffee, which had finally reached a drinkable temperature.
‘We’ll be in trouble with Kate,’ he declared. ‘We’re stuffing ourselves with muffins and she’s making pizza.’
‘I can handle muffins and pizza,’ Emily said. ‘And so can Victor, by the way. Don’t worry. But we should make our way back soon anyway. Firstly, this isn’t a very salubrious area at this time of night, and secondly I want to Google the telephone number of my victim.’
Outside, Emily took Nick’s hand as if it was the most natural thing in the world. The area wasn’t at all suited to a romantic stroll, but as far as Nick was concerned it could have lasted the whole night long.
* * *
There was hardly any pizza left when they returned to Victor’s flat.
Kate raised her arms in apology. ‘Victor. He says a genius needs food. Lots of food. There’s half a pizza left. I could make you some pasta if you like.’
They declined, took the leftover pizza and opened a can of peanuts. The sofa with the roses and ships was suddenly the nicest place in the world. Nick opened the laptop and typed the number Emily dictated to him into the search engine.
‘No hits. Unfortunately.’
‘That’s what I expected,’ said Emily. ‘It’s probably a private number. Too bad he didn’t say his name, just “Hello”.’
The word ‘private’ struck a chord in Nick – there was something he had to tell Emily. Now.
Hopefully the smile on her face wouldn’t evaporate immediately. ‘I need to confess something to you. I’ve been reading your posts on deviantART for a few months. And your poems. They’re brilliant, and so are your drawings.’
She caught her breath. ‘How do you know that it’s my account?’
‘Someone let on once. Please don’t get mad. You don’t need to be embarrassed.’
She looked away. ‘It’s a pity.’
‘Why is it a pity?’
‘Because I would have liked to show you those things myself. Some time or other.’ She leaned her head on his shoulder and yawned. Nick, who was inwardly leaping with relief, only then noticed that Victor was standing in the doorway.
‘It’s group hug time round the campfire,’ he said. ‘So I thought I’d see how you’re going. But it’s hugging time here too, hmm?’ He plumped himself down on the sofa opposite.
Emily reported on her orders. ‘I threatened a total stranger. Who knows what he’s thinking now. He probably has no idea what I was talking about.’
‘What did you have to say, exactly? Do you remember?’
Emily passed the note to Victor.
‘It is not over. You will never find any peace. He has not forgotten. He has not forgiven. You will not get away with it.’ Victor was almost vibrating with excitement. ‘Far out! Okay, let me summarise: A certain He is very angry with the person you talked to, Emily. I’d bet he’d like to see him take a trip in Charon’s boat or arrange for Atropos to snip away at his life thread.’
Emily was clearly confused, but Victor continued. ‘Unfortunately this telephone number probably doesn’t belong to my garage-owner, otherwise we could have sent him a friendly warning.’ Victor checked for tea in the teapot, but didn’t find any, and his moustache drooped. ‘If you ask me,’ he went on, ‘Erebos has only one goal: to take revenge. On Ortolan, our songbird.’
‘Yeah, but . . . graffitied garages and dubious phone calls? Somehow that’s not my idea of revenge,’ Nick put in.
‘I would be very surprised if that’s where it ends,’ Victor said. ‘I think I remember you telling me something about a gun in a cigar box.’
Nick felt himself going cold, and hot, and then cold again. ‘You mean Erebos wants us to shoot someone?’
‘It’s very possible. If I’m not mistaken, the game is in the process of forming an elite troop for special operations.’ Victor smiled, but it wasn’t a happy smile. ‘It would be good to know who all the members of the Inner Circle are.’
The Inner Circle spun in Nick’s head for the next half hour like a burning wheel. An elite troop. A revenge squad. But what were its orders?
After Victor had returned to the game, Nick and Emily went into the kitchen to boil water for a fresh pot of tea. ‘You’ll be going straight back in, won’t you?’ he asked. ‘Now your orders have been carried out?’
‘Tomorrow is soon enough. I want to be there for the Arena fight; perhaps I can come to some conclusions. Too bad that we don’t know who’s behind the player names.’
She poured boiling water on Victor’s precious tea leaves. ‘By the way, there’s someone in the game who looks like you.’
‘I know. It bugged me the whole time, but what can I do?’
Emily smiled. ‘The sight of him cheers me up every time.’
Back in the sofa room Nick told Emily about Sarius.
‘He was cool, you know? Amazingly quick with his sword and a fantastic runner. After Level 5, I left them all for dead.’
‘Why did you get kicked out?’
‘Because of Mr Watson and his thermos.’ Nick told her about his orders and how he’d nearly carried them out. ‘It was a close thing; I was seriously tempted.’
Emily shivered as though she was freezing. ‘The game defends itself very well against its opponents. Do you think that’s how the business with Aisha and Eric started too?’
Nick looked at her sideways, but couldn’t spot anything other than genuine interest.
‘It’s quite possible. Probable, even.’
‘We have to watch out, Nick. Especially you. Colin made an odd remark recently. “Time to bring Nick down,” – that was just after you had that fight outside the canteen. Don’t underestimate it.’
Yes, Nick thought. Colin has a big mouth.
He poured tea into Victor’s cup and took it to him at the computer. Squamato was chatting with Beroxar about the advantages of axes in comparison with swords.
Beroxar. Nick grabbed a pen and a piece of paper. Beroxar was in the Inner Circle before he was ousted by BloodWork, he wrote. Victor gave him the thumbs up.
Evening turned into night. Emily unpacked her backpack and wrapped herself in her sleeping bag. They talked about people from school, and tried to come to some agreement about which student was behind which game character. But mostly they had differing opinions.
Shortly after midnight Victor staggered in. ‘That’s enough for today. I’m worn out. Has anyone got anything to eat?’
Emily took a block of nut chocolate out of her pack and Victor broke half off for himself with an apologetic look. ‘Something’s up,’ he said, chewing. ‘Non-stop gnomes, everyone’s rabbiting on about a great battle and how the proving time is approaching.’
‘I think there’ll be a fierce battle tomorrow for the places in the Inner Circle,’ Nick said. ‘I would have attempted it at the last Arena if I hadn’t been chucked out. The messenger said he would be able to tell me the weakest fighter in the Inner Circle. He probably would have done it if I’d . . . carried out his orders.’
Victor nodded wit
h his mouth full and lifted a finger. ‘Very true. He would have given you tips in order to have you there. The question is: why would he want you? The answer: because you would have proved you were prepared to walk over dead bodies for Erebos. Or go to prison.’
Nick and Emily exchanged a look. Someone had almost walked over Jamie’s dead body. Would that person’s name be on the golden shield tomorrow?
‘Of course walking over a teacher’s dead body is no big deal,’ Victor muttered and snaffled the rest of the chocolate. ‘In my day I felt like doing that quite a few times without needing a messenger to encourage me.’
At some stage Victor retreated to his bedroom. At some stage Speedy stopped playing, and camped out on a giant airbed in the computer room with Kate. At some stage Nick and Emily pushed two of the sofas together so there was a big area to lie on and the arms shielded them from the rest of the world.
‘Good night,’ Emily whispered, and pressed an incredibly soft, gentle kiss on his mouth. Her fingers tousled his nape. ‘Good night, raven.’
Then she leaned her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. Nick felt her hair tickling his neck and heard her breathing become deeper. He wanted everything to stay like this, exactly like this. He wanted to keep lying here forever. He wanted to stop the world.
CHAPTER 28
Toast with jam and tea. Victor brought them breakfast in bed the next morning. ‘Something to fortify you before the big battle.’
Emily thanked him, yawning, while Nick tried to figure out whether it was his numb arm or the sight of Victor’s Snoopy dressing gown that was immobilising him.
Nick watched the Arena fight as if in a trance. He kept changing his vantage point, flitting between Emily, Victor and Speedy, who were each housed with their respective species. It was still quite empty in the humans’ area – although LordNick and Hemera were waiting together in the same anteroom. Emily winked at Nick meaningfully.
The barbarians by contrast were quite a large crowd; Quox seemed to be the weakest among them. He was still a One, but given Speedy’s abilities Nick wasn’t too worried about him.
The same was true of Victor and Squamato. Even if the lizard man entered the Arena as a Three, he would presumably leave it with a few extra levels.
Big Goggle-Eyes arrived. Now that he knew his origins, Nick found the master of ceremonies even more sinister. An emissary from the underworld.
It was the arrival of the Inner Circle, though, that Nick was awaiting most eagerly; he held his breath as the golden platform was carried in.
BloodWork was still there, and seemed more gigantic than ever. Also Wyrdana, the dark she-elf, whom Nick knew from the last Arena fight. Another barbarian by the name of Harkul, a werewolf named Telkorick – and Drizzel. Drizzel had made it into the Inner Circle! Stunned, yet not entirely surprised, Nick stared at the red symbol dangling on a chain around his neck.
Before things began, the master of ceremonies strode into the centre of the Arena.
‘Take a look at the warriors of the Inner Circle. You still have the opportunity to take their places if you prove yourselves and wish finally to be initiated into the deepest mysteries of Erebos. Some will triumph today; others will eat dirt. Let the fights begin.’
Nick hadn’t remembered it being so quick. One after the other, the fighters chose their opponents. Soon it was Quox’s turn; he was challenged by another barbarian who was also a One. Speedy worked quickly and precisely, and defeated his opponent almost effortlessly.
Hemera defeated a werewolf, but was wounded; Emily was suffering visibly from the noise emanating from her headphones.
Squamato had to wait a long time and fought exceedingly hard – he’d challenged an overly strong opponent and only just won his fight.
However much Nick tried, he couldn’t read anything into the events – the fights, Goggle-Eyes’s words, the faces in the crowd. Neither did he discover any other unusual figures from the painting. The Arena fight was a run-of-the-mill bloodbath, nothing more or less. It wasn’t going to provide Nick with any further insights.
Late in the afternoon, after all the fights had been decided, Nick and Emily packed their bags and set off towards home. Hemera had got to Level 6, Victor to 7, Speedy had improved by three levels and was already a Four – without even having carried out any orders yet.
‘We’re stuck,’ Victor declared as he accompanied Emily and Nick to the door. ‘True, we’re doing well in the game, but we still don’t understand the bigger picture. If I had more time I’d try to make it into the Inner Circle. But I fear that this final battle everyone’s talking about won’t be long in coming. We’re running out of time.’
While they were standing in the Tube travelling home, Nick didn’t take his eyes off Emily. ‘How will it be, from tomorrow?’ he asked. ‘Can we . . . so, will we see each other when we’re at school? Will we have lunch together? Or will we keep acting as if we don’t have anything to do with each other?’
Emily took his hand. ‘The latter, I’m afraid. But just until it’s all finished. Just for camouflage, okay?’
‘All right. Will you text me with what’s going on? I think our phones are safe as long as we make sure that no-one else gets their hands on them.’
‘Yes, I will. And we’ll meet at Victor’s again on Wednesday afternoon.’
Even though they’d discussed it, and even though Nick was expecting it, Emily’s pointed show of indifference hurt. Particularly since Emily was acting unusually cheerful with other people – Colin, Alex, Dan, Aisha, and even Helen. She flung herself at Colin and spent recesses together with Aisha. Nick nearly died from longing. Once he saw how Eric went up to Emily and she walked off after two sentences, leaving him standing there. He wasn’t any better off either – at least that was something.
In the free period after Maths Brynne interrupted his gloomy thoughts. ‘Can I speak to you for a second?’ He saw her pale expectant face and sighed inwardly.
‘Okay.’
‘I’ve stopped,’ she whispered.
That actually was a surprise. ‘Why?’
‘Because it’s . . . evil. I think. And . . . it’s haunting me, day and night.’ She looked away. ‘You’re not part of it any more either, are you?’
He hated talking to Brynne about it. ‘What difference does that make?’
‘A huge one. Both of us could go to Mr Watson and tell him about our experiences. I know he’d be keen. We could form a counter-movement.’
Oh no. Brynne and Nick against the world; that was not going to happen. ‘Go find someone else, there are plenty of other ex-gamers.’ Out of the corner of his eye he saw Dan, who was slowing down more and more, the closer he got. They were attracting attention. ‘What do you want to say to Mr Watson?’ Nick whispered. ‘He’s known for ages that Erebos is responsible for the incidents at school. He needs the names of people who’ve been up to something. If you’ve got them, go to him. But please leave me out of it, whatever you do.’
Brynne looked forlorn. ‘I can’t stand it any more.’
‘Can’t stand what? You’re out, end of story.’
Dan was discreetly standing not three steps away from them, apparently absorbed in the ballet notice board. Nick had to get away, he didn’t want to become even more of a target. The less notice he attracted, the better it was for their little reconnaissance team.
Brynne wasn’t going to accept his refusal just like that. ‘Is Nicky a coward?’ she said, so loudly that Dan must have heard. Not to mention a few other students at the end of the corridor.
‘Get stuffed,’ he said, and walked off.
‘Fine!’ she called after him. ‘Then I’ll do it by myself. I’ll manage! I’ll take you all on!’
Even though he didn’t want to, Nick turned and walked back to her. ‘Quiet! Do you want to get yourself into trouble?’
She laughed. It was a horrible laugh, as though she was crazy, or about to become so. ‘Trouble? Nicky, you have no idea. Totally no idea. It ca
n’t get worse, no way.’
For the rest of the day Nick had the feeling he was walking round with his head ducked, constantly waiting for disaster to strike. But nothing happened. In fact it was quieter than usual. Exhaustion lay over the school like a grey veil.
Mr Watson arrived at English class with news. ‘Jamie’s condition has improved to the point where the doctors are going to wake him up within the next few days. They don’t know what state he will be in when he’s conscious again, so you should still leave it a while before you visit.’
For a short time this news lifted the mood of the class. Nick himself remained strangely unmoved. The unspoken words ‘brain damage’ were too much of a barb in his flesh for him to feel happy.
They wake Jamie up and his speech is slurred. Doesn’t recognise me. Can’t talk. Never cracks another joke.
Nick rubbed his face with both his hands until it felt hot. That wasn’t going to happen. Full stop.
In the afternoon he sat at home and stared non-stop at his phone. Victor had said he would text; Emily too. Why hadn’t he heard from anyone? Too bad that they weren’t meeting this afternoon. It was an eternity till Wednesday.
Tuesday was as grey and joyless as Monday. Nick couldn’t rid himself of the feeling that time had stopped; it simply stuck together and crumbled into pieces. That changed abruptly when a text arrived on his phone shortly before twelve.
SOS! Need ur advice. Come as quickly as u can. Victor.
As far as Nick was concerned that was the end of school for the day. Quickly, that meant as soon as possible. He would leave before lunch. Should he let Emily know? He located her in the schoolyard, where she was texting on her phone. She was alone for once. Nick risked a lightning-fast exchange of information.
‘Get a text from Victor too?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you know what’s happened?’
‘No.’
‘I’m going over there. Right now.’