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By Root 387 0

days after that, someone came to offer me a job. She said that I wasn’t crazy. I was depressed, but I wasn’t crazy. And I was depressed for a good reason. She knew what had happened to my sister. What I had seen was real. I had an ability that made me rare and very special, and did I want to do something worthwhile with it? Did I want to make a difference? A week later, I was released from the hospital. I was taken to an office in Whitehall, where a different person explained the rules to me. I would be the first of a newly re-formed and highly specialized squad. Technically, I would be a police officer. I would be trained as such. I would be, to the outside world, a police constable. That’s what I had to tell everyone I was. In reality, I would be the commanding officer of a new police squad.”

Stephen squeezed the steering wheel so hard, his fingers went white. This was as close as I’d ever seen him come to an emotion.

“That’s how they used to recruit, you see,” he said. “They’d look through psychiatric records for high achievers who told a similar story—those who had had brushes with death at a young age and then reported seeing people who weren’t there. We were drawn from mental hospitals. I’m the last of that breed. Boo and Callum were tagged at A&E after their accidents. They were both talking about these mysterious people they’d seen . . . Both had been in accidents. Both were athletes. Both were street smart, if not academic. Both were from London and knew their way around. They were identified, and I was sent to recruit them. I’m the last of the mad ones.”

“You don’t sound crazy to me,” I said.

Stephen nodded and looked out the window at Regis House, then back at the clock.

“Three fifty-five,” he said. “Callum’s in by now. It’s time to go.”

Regis House was a building that should clearly have been locked at four in the morning, but the doors were open when we tried them. The lights in the lobby were on, and there was a security desk that looked like it was normally manned. The guard was ominously absent, the chair pushed back almost to the wall. We saw a half-empty mug of tea on the desk and a computer opened to the BBC news site. Stephen leaned over and looked at the screen.

“Last updated a half hour ago,” he said.

I noticed a piece of paper on the desk, the following scrawled on it: “Take the lift down a level. Stairs are at the far end of the hall. Look for the black door.”

Neither one of us discussed the fate of the guard. There was no point. We took the elevator, then the stairs down into the physical plant of the building—the room with the heaters and pipes and all the heavy stuff needed to run a place of that size. In the far corner of the room, there was a black door. It had a few safety and warning stickers on it, but nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing to suggest where it might lead. Stephen removed his reflective jacket and dropped it to the floor, then carefully tried the handle. The door opened. I felt a rush of cold air come through the crack.

“One question,” I said. “Did you tell me all that because you think I’m going to die?”

“No,” he said. “It’s because you’re doing something brave, and I felt I should too.”

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I said.

Before I could hesitate another second, I put my hand on top of his and pulled the door open wider.

34

THE SPIRAL EMERGENCY STAIRS, MADE AROUND 1890, hadn’t been improved since then. A string of yellow work lights wound down and down and down, with no bottom in sight. Somehow, this twisting, descending string of bare bulbs made it worse. They didn’t produce that much light—just enough to show the old tile work, dirty and often missing in patches, and the rough and worn condition of the steps.

I stood there on the top step, my toes hanging over the edge, not ready to move. I could already feel the cold seeping in around my neck, freezing my hands on the old handrail. The air had a hard, mineral smell. The only warmth came from Stephen, who was right at my back.

Without my conscious effort, one of my feet moved, and suddenly I was going