18: Girl with a Gun

I turned to Gracie. The gun trembled ever so slightly in her grasp.

“Gracie?” I gasped. “What are you doing?”

“You are making a terrible mistake,” said the abbot, holding his hands out towards her. “Please. Give that to me.”

Gracie’s face twisted into an awkward smile. “Put the scroll back into the box.” Her voice was barely more than a whisper.

“Gracie, where did you get that gun?” My voice was shaking. What was Gracie playing at?

She didn’t answer but used both hands to hold her aim steady.

“You cannot read it,” said the abbot. “It will be of no use to you.”

“I don’t need to read it. It’s the diagrams I want. They show how it all fits together. And the key. Now we have everything we need.”

“But you don’t understand,” said the abbot, a note of desperation creeping into his voice. “Mankind isn’t ready for this...”

He never finished. A loud crack sounded and the abbot’s eyes opened wide. Behind his shoulder a bullet hole punctured the plaster. A small cloud of dust drifted in the sunlight.

“Give me the scroll,” said Gracie, the gun wobbling in her clasp.

The abbot hesitated. Then he put his hands behind his back and lifted his head to look her in the eye.

“No.”

“Now.” The pitch of her voice had risen slightly. “I won’t aim to miss next time.”

“How could you, Gracie?” I started. But then the gun was pointing at me.

“Danni, pick up the scroll.” Her voice was flat.

“You’d better do as she says,” said the abbot. “I think she means it.”

I picked up the box and scroll, tears burning my eyes.

Gracie’s gun was pointing at my chest. She held out her hand.

“Give me the key.”

I shook my head.

Her eyes narrowed slightly. “You don’t have a choice.”

I was shaking so badly I don’t think I could have moved even if I’d wanted to.

“Why are you doing this, Gracie? I thought you were my friend.”

A look of uncertainty flickered across her eyes. Her hands started to shake and she adjusted her grip, trying to keep the gun steady.

“Gracie. Why?” It felt as if I was in a daze. This couldn’t be happening.

Her bottom lip trembled.

“I- I- My father...” Gracie’s voice faltered. She kept glancing over at the abbot, but he didn’t move.

“Please, Gracie,” I mouthed. “I don’t want to die.”

“I’m sorry, Danni,” she said at last. “You have to come with me. They want to talk to you.”

I had no doubt in my mind who “they” were. “They” had to be MEXA.

“You used me,” I said, my voice quivering with rage and fear. “You used me to get to the scrolls. Kris was right to tell me not to trust anyone. And I should never have trusted you. I hate you!”

I spat the last words at her. Gracie took a step back. For a moment, she looked afraid.

“I have to do this,” she mumbled.

Then she narrowed her eyes.

“If you come after us, I’ll kill her,” she said, turning back to the abbot. Her voice was strained, almost as if she didn’t really mean it.

He blinked and shook his head.

She moved round behind me and the barrel of her gun jabbed into the small of my back.

“Nice and slowly now.” She opened the door and peered out into the corridor. “It’s clear.”

Gracie pushed me ahead of her. The silence pressed in on me from all sides. The place was deserted.

We reached the courtyard. Ahead of us, across its dusty emptiness, was the gate. A gate that led back out to the barren expanse of rock that formed this island. To the boat and whatever Gracie had planned for me.

But the courtyard wasn’t empty. There was a monk there, right in the middle, harnessing a donkey to a cart.

He hadn’t seen us. We watched from the shadows. The gun was hard against my spine.

“What now?” I whispered.

“We walk,” said Gracie. “As if everything is normal.” She jabbed the gun into my back and I flinched. Then she took the scroll box from me and tucked it under her arm. “And don’t you go trying anything. Understand?”

We started out across the courtyard. Gracie put her gun out of sight, but I knew where it was aimed. My legs felt weak. I don’t think I would have had the strength to run, even if I got the chance. Half of me still couldn’t believe what was happening.

I stared hard at the monk, willing him to look in my direction, willing him to read the fear in my eyes. But he never once looked round. It was as if we didn’t exist.

Gracie slid the bolts back on the gate and pushed me out of the monastery, out of the last sanctuary left. Any hope that we might pass some monks at work in the gardens soon faded. I stumbled on across the saltpans, the white crystals glaring at me.

We paused at the top of the cliff. Gracie held the gun in front of her.

“Go on,” she said. “You go down first.”

I stood my ground. She wouldn’t really shoot me – would she? She took another step towards me.

“I will if I have to.” The gun wobbled in her hand.

I turned and started to scramble down the cliff. The rocks scraped the skin off my palms and they stung with the salt of my sweat.

Behind me I heard Gracie clambering down, too. And then I heard her slip.

I looked back up the cliff.

Gracie was sitting down and a flurry of loose stone slid past me, skittering down to the rocks below. She was holding on with both hands to stop sliding any further – and she had dropped her gun. It was lying a short distance away. She had dropped the box as well and it had slid a little way from the path. Her eyes were wide, staring at me.

I didn’t stop to think. I started climbing upwards, as fast as I could. She didn’t move. She just clung there, watching me.

“Cow,” I hissed as I pushed past her, giving the gun a hefty kick as I climbed.

I heard it bouncing off the rocks below as it fell. Even so, I half expected to feel the bite of a bullet at any moment. I reached the top of the cliff and started to run. Behind me was silence.

I splashed through the saltpans. There was no cover here. I searched as I ran, for something, anything.

Then ahead of me was a gully, a fissure in the limestone, and I dropped down into it.

There was sand along its base, as if a stream had once run here, and small scrubby plants clung to its stony sides. I started to run along it, as fast as I could, dreading the sight of a figure appearing above.

Soon the gully widened and the sides weren’t so high. I slowed to a walk, my breath rasping in my throat. So far, no sign of Gracie. But she couldn’t be far behind.

As the gully ended and opened out, I crouched down behind a lump of jagged rock. Ahead were old stone walls and, amongst them, people. It looked like a group of tourists.

Maybe I could hide among them.

I took a deep breath and started forwards, half running, half walking over the scrub. Nobody seemed to notice. Most of them gathered round a woman who appeared to be their guide. A few others were wandering around some ancient ruins.

I glanced back over my shoulder – and almost fell as fear clenched its fist once more.

Gracie was standing on a low rise, not far from where I had emerged from the gully. She was holding her gun but wasn’t pointing it at me. Maybe I was out of range, or maybe she wasn’t that good a shot. Perhaps she wasn’t firing because of the tourists.

I started to run, stumbling over the stony ground. The tourists were my only hope – but they still hadn’t seen me.

I scrambled over a low wall and dropped down into a deep chamber on the other side. An elderly couple were staring at the stones and they looked up when I joined them. I smiled at them, but they just frowned. Not surprising really, I must have looked a state.

I took off my hat and wedged it down a crack between two rocks. Bright orange was just a bit conspicuous. I straightened my T-shirt and followed the tour on into the ruins where the guide was pointing to a series of stone slabs.

“And this is believed to have been an altar...” she was explaining, and my heart leapt as I realised she was speaking English.

I wormed my way between them.

There was a track on the far side of the ruins. I guessed that this was the way they had come and how they would leave.

I looked around, but Gracie had vanished.