There’s no light coming from Rez’s room. He must be asleep. I can’t believe he’s been saying all these things to Grace behind my back, it’s like he’s become a mouthpiece for Ariel. He’s trying to sabotage this. But why?
It’s deathly silent and it feels like I’m the last person left on earth as I stalk the labyrinth of corridors and stairs, thinking up ways I can break into the office. I’m tipsy and fizzing with adrenaline; I’ve gathered some Dutch courage and stopped worrying what happens if I get caught. Fuck it – what’s the worst they can do?
I know I have a tendency to become hyper-focused. I’m losing purchase, sliding into that ugly place where obsession has taken a front-row seat but, if I can hold it together just for tonight, that’s all the time I need.
I made a promise. I’m not leaving here without Martyn.
I slow down, look around, try to get a handle on my bearings. The office should be on the north side, facing Mount Jungfrau, which means there must be a passageway connecting it to the main room.
Creeping up the stairs, I enter the atrium. The last few candles to burn out push an orange glow around the room. It smells of wax and spices and something else, as I cross the wide-open space with its 360-degree wall of diamond-faceted glass, the snow falling silently past the windows.
Right will take me back downstairs. The stairs to the skylight are up ahead. I’m half expecting there to be a hidden door or a lever behind a bookcase. It’s far more obvious than that.
A short corridor leads me to a door set back in a recess and, as I feared, an electronic pad. It needs a key fob to access. Shit.
OK. Think. How can I get my hands on a pass?
Or try to break in?
Stupid idea.
I turn back, begin to move away, then freeze.
What the fuck was that?
Standing very still, my eyes rake over the room. Did I imagine it?
My pulse picks up, a thud thudding in the silence. I push off into the darkness, back the way I came, and then –
It’s not in my head.
A voice crying out. The same as last night – it’s happening again. I stand stock-still, listening, waiting, trying to work out where it’s coming from. I knew I wasn’t imagining it.
I feel a sudden tug of dread. My God, why didn’t it occur to me earlier? The candles, the sinister carvings, the ice sculptures, the chanting and – tonight – the winter solstice.
Something is crawling down my spine as I consider the possibility that they could all be connected, that there is some truth in the rumours. Ariel and her tribe of warriors are involved in the occult.
It could explain the suicides – did they kill themselves because they were traumatized by what they saw or what they were forced to do?
What if Martyn . . . No, I can’t bring myself to think that way.
And it doesn’t make sense. Why invite us here on one of the most important days in the pagan calendar? It would only draw attention. Unless – I swallow – that’s exactly why they lured us here. Oh God. What have they got planned for us?
There it is again. I spin around. It’s quieter than before, arriving in waves.
Again, and then again, in quick succession, ebbing lower. Only it’s not so much a cry for help as a moaning, something between pleasure and pain, and it’s coming from upstairs.
I follow the noise, heading for the observatory. It’s suddenly very dark in the stairwell. I hesitate and then carry on.
I’m about to turn on my phone’s flashlight, but think better of it. I don’t want to alert whoever’s up there.
The sounds are funnelling towards me, echoing up and around the narrow space, and it’s getting warmer and more difficult to breathe. I can see the glow of lights coming from above. A creeping sense of unease lodges in my stomach, the noises growing louder as I reach the final flight of stairs.
Hot, humid air drifts towards me like fog rising off dry ice. It feels like I’ve stepped into an experimental cocktail bar with the vapour and now the clanging and the dance music. The repetitive thud of trance beats echoes around me. This is not very Ariel is all I can think as I near the top of the stairwell, but then again, from what I’ve witnessed tonight, I know the Ariel we’ve seen so far is an act.
I arrive into a fog with candles everywhere – soft and flaming golden while the air is thick with heat. It’s wet on my skin, damp and cloying, and the windows are steamy with condensation. The ice pool has been transformed into a hot tub. I vaguely remember Tinx explaining there was a mechanism for that.
Through the mist of heat, I can just about make out an outline. The shape of two people splashing around in the pool in hazy soft focus. Groaning, sighing, the guttural noise of pleasure. It’s loud and angry, and unbearably familiar.
I still at the sound of his voice. And then I keep going, the overriding need to see them together propelling me forward.
Water is spilling onto the tiles, the music is boom-booming, and now I can see the profile of his back, the unmistakable broad shoulders. The familiar scars. His skin flushed pink with the heat and intense activity.
He sounds exactly the same as when he was inside me. When he was pounding out his frustrations.
I knew it; I knew Rez couldn’t resist her, not after she’d cast a spell on him. I feel so fucking angry and betrayed. I’m about to say something, but then I stop dead. Because it’s not her.
It’s not Ariel Rose whose shoulder he’s gripping. It’s not Ariel who he has bent over the side of the plunge pool, who he’s thrusting into from behind.
It’s not her.
My God. How could I have got it so wrong?