The Dark Vault

by Victoria Schwab

  “You’re right,” he says hollowly. “We are. Which is why I’m giving you one last chance to tell me exactly what’s going on. And don’t bother lying. Right before you lie, you test out the words and your jaw shifts a fraction. You’ve been doing it a lot. So just don’t.”

  And that’s when I realize how tired I am, of lies and omissions and half-truths. I put Wes in danger, but he’s still here—and if he’s willing to brave this chaos with me, then he deserves to know what I know. And I’m about to speak, about to tell him that, tell him everything, when he brings his hand to the back of my neck, pulls me forward, and kisses me.

  The noise floods in. I don’t push back, don’t block it out, and for one moment, all I can think is that he tastes like summer rain.

  His lips linger on mine, urgent and warm.

  Lasting.

  And then he pulls away, breath ragged.

  His hand falls from my skin, and I understand.

  He’s not wearing his ring.

  He didn’t just kiss me.

  He read me.

  Wesley’s face is bright with pain, and I don’t know what he saw or what he felt, but whatever he read in me, it’s enough to make him turn and storm out.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  WESLEY SLAMS THE STAIRWELL door, and I turn and punch the wall, hard enough to dent the faded yellow paper, pain rolling up my hand. My reflection stares at me from the mirror on the opposite wall, and it looks…lost. It’s finally showing in my eyes. Da’s eyes. I hold my gaze and search for some of him in me, search for the part that knows how to lie and smile and live and be. And I don’t see any of it.

  What a mess. Truths are messy and lies are messy, and I don’t care what Da said, it’s impossible to cut a person into pielike pieces, neat and tidy.

  I shove off the wall, the anger coiling into something hard, stubborn, restless. I’ve got to find Owen. I turn for the Narrows door, pulling the key from around my neck and the list from my pocket. My stomach sinks when I unfold it. The scratch of letters has been near constant, but I didn’t expect the paper to be covered with names. My feet slow, and for a moment I think it’s too many, that I shouldn’t go alone. But then I think of Wesley, and speed up. I don’t need his help. I was a Keeper before he even knew what Keepers were. I slide off my ring and step into the Narrows.

  There is so much noise.

  Footsteps and crying and murmurs and pounding. Fear runs through me but doesn’t fade, so I hold on to it, use it to keep me sharp. The movement feels good, the pulse in my ears its own white noise, blotting out everything but instinct and habit and muscle memory as I cross through the Narrows in search of Owen.

  I can’t seem to cover more than a hall without trouble, and I dispatch two feisty teens. But by the time the door to the Returns room shuts, more names flash up to fill their spots. A bead of sweat runs down my neck. The metal of the knife is warm against my calf, but I leave it there. I don’t need it. I fight my way toward Owen’s alcove.

  And then Keeper-Killers begin to blossom across my list.

  Two more Histories.

  Two more fights.

  I brace myself against the Returns door, breathless, and look at the paper.

  Four more names.

  “Damn it.” I slam my fist against the door, still out of air. Fatigue is starting to creep in, the high of the hunt brought down by the fact that the list is matching me one for one, and sometimes two or three for one. It’s not possible to dent the list, let alone clear it. If it’s this bad here, what’s happening in the Archive?

  “Mackenzie?”

  I spin to find Owen. He wraps his arms around me, and there’s a moment of relief and quiet, but neither is thick enough to block out the hurt I saw in Wesley’s eyes, or the pain or guilt or anger at him, myself, everything.

  “It’s falling apart,” I say into his shoulder.

  “I know,” Owen answers, laying a kiss on my cheek, then one on my temple before resting his forehead there. “I know.”

  Quiet blossoms and fades, and I think of him holding Regina’s face, pressing his forehead to hers, the low static of his voice as he spoke to her. But what was she doing there? How did he find her? Did he even know what she was? Is that why they carved it out of his memory?

  But it doesn’t add up. The walls of the Coronado and the minds of the Histories were altered by different people, but in both cases the excavations were meticulous, and the time missing from the walls seems to nearly match the time missing from the people’s minds. But Angelli’s place was left unaltered, which means they missed a spot, or it didn’t need to be erased. So why would it be gone from Owen’s mind? On top of that, the other altered Histories had hours erased, a day or two at most. Why would Owen be missing months?

  It doesn’t make sense. Unless he’s lying.

  As soon as I think it, the horrible gut feeling that I’m right hits in a wave, like it’s been waiting. Building.

  “What’s the last thing you remember?” I ask.

  “I already told you…”

  I pull free. “No, you told me what you felt. That you didn’t want to leave Regina there. But what’s the last thing you saw? The very last moment of your life?”

  He hesitates.

  In the distance, someone cries.

  In the distance, someone screams.

  In the distance, feet are stomping and hands are pounding, and it is all getting closer.

  “I don’t remember….” he starts.

  “This is important.”

  “You don’t believe me?”

  “I want to.”

  “Then do,” he says softly.

  “Do you want to know the end of your story, Owen?” I say, the gut sense twisting inside me. “I’ll tell you what I’ve pieced together, and maybe it will jog your memory. Your sister was murdered. Your parents left, and you didn’t. Instead you moved into another apartment, and then Regina came back, only it wasn’t Regina, Owen. It was her History. You knew she wasn’t normal, didn’t you? But you couldn’t help her. So you jumped off the roof.”

  For one long moment, Owen just looks at me.

  And then he says in a calm, quiet voice, “I didn’t want to jump.”

  I feel ill. “So you do remember.”

  “I thought I could help Regina. I really did. But she kept slipping. I never wanted to jump, but they gave me no choice.”

  “Who?”

  “The Crew who came to take her back. And arrest me.”

  Crew? How would he know that word unless…

  “You were part of it. The Archive.”

  I want him to deny it, but he doesn’t.

  “She didn’t belong there,” he says.

  “Did you let her out?”

  “She belonged with me. She belonged home. And speaking of home,” he says, “I think you have something of mine.”

  My hand twitches toward the last piece of the story in my pocket. I catch myself, too late.

  “I’m not a monster, Mackenzie.” He takes a step toward me as he says it, hand drifting toward mine, but I step away. His eyes narrow, and his hand drops back to his side. “Tell me you wouldn’t have done it,” he says. “Tell me you wouldn’t have taken Ben home.”

  Behind my eyes I see Ben, moments after he woke, already slipping, and me, kneeling before him, telling him it would be okay, promising to take him home. But I wouldn’t have. I wouldn’t have gone this far. Because the moment he pushed me away, I saw the truth in the spreading black of his eyes. It wasn’t my brother. It wasn’t Ben.

  “No,” I say. “You’re wrong. I wouldn’t have gone that far.”

  I take another step back, toward a bend in the hall. Owen is blocking the way to the numbered doors, but if I can get to the Archive…

  “Mackenzie,” he says, reaching out again, “please don’t—”

  “What about those other people?” I ask, retreating. “Marcus and Eileen and Lionel? What happened to them?”

  “I didn’t have a choic
e,” he says, following. “I tried to keep Regina in the room, but she was upset—”

  “She was slipping,” I say.

  “I tried so hard to help her, but I couldn’t always be there. Those people saw her. They would have ruined everything.”

  “So you murdered them?”

  He smiles grimly. “What do you think the Archive would have done?”

  “Not this, Owen.”

  “Don’t be naive,” he snaps, anger flashing through his eyes like light.

  The bend in the hall is only a few steps behind me, and I break into a run as he says, “I wouldn’t go that way,” and I don’t grasp why until I round the corner and come face-to-face with a vicious-looking History. Beyond him there are a dozen more. Standing, staring, black-eyed.

  “I told them they had to wait,” he says as I retreat into his stretch of hall, “and I would let them out. But they must be losing patience. So am I.” He extends his hand. “The ending, please.”

  He says it softly, but I can see his stance shifting, the series of minute changes in his shoulders and knees and in his hands. I brace myself.

  “I don’t have it,” I lie.

  Owen lets out a low, disappointed sigh.

  And then the moment collapses. In a blink, he closes the gap between us, and I crouch, free the knife from my leg, and bring it up to his chest as his hand catches my wrist and slams it into the wall hard enough to crack the bones. He catches my free hand, and before I can get my boot up, he forces me against the wall, his body flush with mine. My ribs ache beneath his weight. The quiet pushes in, too heavy.

  “Miss Bishop,” he says, tightening his grip on my hands. “Keepers should know better than to carry weapons.” Something crunches inside my wrist, and I gasp as my grip gives way, the knife tumbling toward the floor. Owen lets go of me, and I lunge to the side, but he catches the falling knife with one hand and my arm with the other, and rolls me back into his arms, bringing the blade up beneath my chin. “I’d stay still, if I were you. I haven’t held my knife in sixty years. I might be a little rusty.”

  His free hand runs over my stomach and down the front of my jeans, sliding into the pocket. His fingers find the note and the metal square, and he sighs with relief as he pulls both free. He kisses the back of my hair, the knife still against my throat, and holds the two things up so I can see. “I was beginning to worry that the painting wasn’t there anymore. I didn’t expect to be gone so long.”

  “You hid the story.”

  “I did, but it’s not the story I was trying to hide.”

  The knife vanishes from my throat and he shoves me forward. I spin and find him putting away the note, and lining up the metal pieces in his palm. A ring, a bar, a square.

  “Want to see a magic trick?” he asks, gesturing to the pieces.

  He palms the square and holds up the ring and the bar. He slides the tapered point of the bar into the small hole drilled into the ring and twists the two pieces together. He produces the square and slides the notched edge of it along the groove in the bar.

  And then he holds it up for me to see, and my blood runs cold. It’s not as ornate as the one Roland gave me, but there’s no mistaking what it is.

  The ring, the bar, the square.

  The handle, the stem, the teeth.

  It’s a Crew key.

  “I’m not impressed,” I say, cradling my wrist. When I flex my fingers, pain sears through my hand. But my key hangs around my good wrist, and if I can find a Returns door…I scan the hall, but the nearest white chalk circle is several yards behind Owen.

  “You should be,” he says. “But if it’s credit you want, I’m happy to give it. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

  “I don’t believe that,” I say.

  “I couldn’t risk it myself. What if the Crew found me before I found the pieces? What if the pieces weren’t where they should be? No, this”—he holds up the key—“this was all you. You delivered the key that makes doors between worlds, the key that will help me tear the Archive down, one branch at a time.”

  Anger ripples through me. I wonder if I can break his neck before he stabs me. I chance a step forward. He doesn’t move.

  “I won’t let that happen, Owen.” I have to get the key back before he starts throwing open doors. And then, as if he can read me from here, the key vanishes into his pocket.

  “You don’t have to stand in my way,” he says.

  “Yes I do. That is exactly my job, Owen. To stop the Histories, however deranged they are, from getting out.”

  “I just wanted my sister back,” he says, still spinning his knife. “They made it worse than it had to be.”

  “It sounds like you made it pretty bad yourself.” I steal another step toward him.

  “You don’t know anything about it, little Keeper,” he growls. Good. He’s getting mad, and angry people make mistakes. “The Archive takes everything and gives nothing back. I just wanted one thing—”

  The sound of a scuffle echoes down the hall, a shout, a scream, and Owen’s attention wavers for an instant. I attack, shifting my weight forward. The toe of my boot catches the bottom of his knife midspin and sends it up into the ceilingless dark of the Narrows. My next kick knocks him backward as the knife falls and clatters to the floor several feet behind me. Owen hits the ground, too, and rolls over into a crouch, somehow straightening in time to dodge another blow. He catches my leg, pulls me forward, and brings his arm to my chest, slamming me to the floor. Pain burns across my injured ribs.

  “It’s too late,” he says as I try to force air back into my lungs. “I will tear the Archive down.”

  “The Archive didn’t kill Regina,” I gasp, rolling up onto my hands and knees. “Robert did.”

  His eyes darken. “I know. And I made him pay for that.”

  My stomach turns. I should have known.

  He got away. They let him get away. I let him get away. I was her big brother….

  Owen took everything I felt and mimicked it, twisted it, used it. Used me.

  I spring to my feet, lunging for him, but he’s too fast, and I barely touch him before his hand wraps around my throat and he slams me back into the door. I can’t breathe. My vision blurs as I claw at his arm. He doesn’t even flinch.

  “I didn’t want to do this,” he says.

  And then his free hand drifts to the leather cord around my wrist. My key. He pulls sharply, snapping the cord, and drives the key into the door behind me.

  He turns it, and there’s click before the door swings open behind me, showering us both in crisp white light. And then he leans in close enough to rest his cheek on mine as he whispers in my ear.

  “Do you know what happens to a living person in the Returns room?”

  I open my mouth, but no words come out.

  “Neither do I,” he says, just before he pushes me back, and through, and slams the door.

  TWENTY-NINE

  THE WEEK BEFORE YOU die, I can see it coming.

  I see the good-bye in your eyes. The too-long looks at everything, as if by staring you can make memories strong enough to last you through.

  But it’s not the same. And those lingering looks scare me.

  I am not ready.

  I am not ready.

  I am not ready.

  “I can’t do this without you, Da.”

  “You can. And you have to.”

  “What if I mess up?”

  “Oh, you will. You’ll mess up, you’ll make mistakes, you’ll break things. Some you’ll be able to piece together, and others you’ll lose. That’s all a given. But there’s only one thing you have to do for me.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Stay alive long enough to mess up again.”

  The moment the Returns door closes, there is no door, and the white is so bright and shadowless that it makes the room look like infinite space: no floor, no walls, no ceiling. Nothing but dizzying white. I know I have to focus, have to find the place where the do
or was and get out and find Owen—and I can do that, the rational Keeper part of me reasons, if I can just breathe and make my way to the wall.

  I take a step, and that’s when the white on every side explodes into color and sound and life.

  My life.

  Mom and Dad on the porch swing of our first house, her legs draped across his lap and his book propped against her legs, and then the new blue house with Mom too big to fit through the door, and Ben climbing the stairs like they were mountain rocks, and Ben drawing on walls and floors and anything but paper, and Ben turning the space under the bed into a tree house because he was scared of heights, and Lyndsey hiding there with him even though she barely fit, and Lyndsey on the roof and Da in the summer house teaching me to pick a lock, to take a punch, to lie, to read to be strong, and hospital chairs and too-bright smiles and fighting and lying and bleeding and breaking into pieces, and moving and boxes and Wesley and Owen, and it all pours out of me and onto every surface, taking something vital with it, something like blood or oxygen because my body and mind are shutting down more and more with every frame extracted from my head.

  And then the images begin to fold inward as the white recovers the room square by square by square, blotting out my life like screens being switched off. I sway on my feet. The white spreads, devouring, and I feel my legs buckle beneath me. The images blink out one by one by one, and my heartbeat skips.

  No.

  The air and the light are thinning.

  I squeeze my eyes shut and focus on the fact that gravity tells me I’m on the floor. Focus on the fact that I have to get up. I can hear the voices now. I can make out Mom’s voice chirping about the coffee shop; Dad’s telling me it will be an adventure; Wesley’s saying he’s not going anywhere; Ben’s asking me to come see; and Owen’s telling me it’s over.

  Owen. Anger flares strong enough to help me focus, even as the voices weaken. Eyes still shut, I beg my body to stand. It doesn’t, so I focus on crawling, on making my way to the wall I know exists somewhere in front of me. The room is becoming too quiet, and my mind is becoming too slow, but I keep crawling forward on my hands and knees—the pain in my wrist a reminder that I am still alive—until my fingers skim the base of the wall.