The Library of Shadows by Mikkel Birkegaard

Author:Mikkel Birkegaard
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Literary, Fiction - General, Action & Adventure, Denmark, Contemporary, General, Books and reading, Fantasy, Suspense, Bookstores, Thrillers, Crime & Thriller, Fiction, Copenhagen, Thriller
ISBN: 9780552775021
Publisher: Transworld Publishers
Published: 2009-06-04T07:00:00+00:00

21

'That was crazy!'

Katherina heard Pau's excited voice as if it were a radio that had suddenly been switched on, much too close. It sounded as if she were in the bookshop. Judging by the leather underneath her, she must be sitting in the armchair behind the counter, with her head tilted to one side.

Why was she sitting here? She felt so exhausted that she couldn't even open her eyes. What had happened?

She heard Iversen answer Pau in a somewhat more subdued tone, his voice extremely grave.

'Things could have gone terribly wrong,' he pointed out. 'And we still don't know how they're feeling. What about you? How's your arm?'

'It's okay,' replied Pau casually. 'It just tingles a bit, like it's asleep. But holy shit, it sure hurt when he zapped me. How'd he do that?'

'I don't know, Pau,' said Iversen wearily.

'If that's what activations are like, we should have more of them,' said Pau firmly.

'That was absolutely not normal,' Iversen emphasized. 'I've ... I've never seen anything like it.'

Katherina could hear a trace of nervousness in Iversen's voice. He was scared. Why? She tried to think back. They'd been downstairs in the basement. Jon had been there too. The activation.

She gave a start when she remembered.

'Is she awake?'

Katherina felt someone bending over her.

'No,' said Iversen very close. 'It was just a spasm.'

She wanted to shut them out for a little while longer. First she had to work out what had happened.

All four of them had been in the basement for Jon's activation. She herself had made all the preparations, with candles and everything. It was supposed to be pleasant, like adopting a new family member, but something had gone wrong.

At first everything proceeded according to plan. Iversen started reading, and Jon quickly fell into the rhythm, helped along by Katherina's efforts to focus his attention on the text. Pau had just sat there, gawking, with a silly smile on his face, as if he were waiting for a chance to tease the new boy in class.

After a couple of pages Iversen had glanced at her and nodded. She closed her eyes and concentrated on Jon's reading as she shut out everything else. Slowly she reinforced his attempts to accentuate the text he was reading, and she made sure his attention continued to be directed at the book. The images he created became more and more rich and detailed, until she held him back a bit. She sensed him trying to override this sudden obstacle, like a mass of water that had been dammed up.

Then Katherina opened her eyes. Iversen had stopped reading, and again he nodded to her. She closed her eyes again and removed the barrier to Jon's progress, as if she were uncorking a bottle. At the same time she enhanced what he was accentuating so the result was an explosive leap forward, filled with colours and a rapid flow of pictures. The activation was achieved, and she was surprised at the richness of detail and depth in Jon's interpretation of the text.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.