Sanctus

Chapter 103

Athanasius and Father Thomas entered the Roman section of the library and stood for a moment, searching the darkness and the deadened silence for any signs of occupation.

The Roman section was one of the largest of the older vaults and contained, amongst other treasures, all the apostolic documents that had been collated into the first Bible. Consequently the individual auras of light that accompanied them through the vast darkness had now dimmed to a burnished copper. The only other light in the chamber came from the thin filament of guide lamps embedded in the stone floor. Apart from that, the chamber appeared to be empty.

Athanasius glanced at Father Thomas, then turned and headed away down the first row of shelves. As he hurried down the dark passageway his breathing became more rapid, the desiccated air sucking moisture from his mouth until it was as dry as the scrolls in honeycombed stacks all around him. He reached the end of the passage and came to a junction where another corridor jutted away to the right and continued along the length of the wall, parallel to the central corridor. He stopped and looked back along the path he had just come down. At the end he could see the orangey circle of Father Thomas’s light, wavering like a distant candle in the darkness. He kept his eyes fixed on it and started slowly walking up the new corridor. He passed the edge of the bookcase and saw it reappear in the distance as Thomas matched his pace. By this method, Thomas had suggested as they’d plotted in the chapel earlier, they should be able to see anything in the passageway between them silhouetted against each other’s light. With luck it would speed up the search.

They continued their steady pace, each row of scrolls, parchments and carved tablets revealing itself then passing quickly into darkness as Thomas’s light blinked on and off like a distant lighthouse. With each rhythmic flash the glow dimmed a little more until Athanasius had to squint to make out the distant blob of light. The fading light also created the illusion that Thomas was getting further away, and gave Athanasius a mild feeling of panic. He hated the library at the best of times — and this was very far from being that. It was as this concern rose up, threatening to cloud his mind with irrational fear, that he rounded the edge of another bookcase and saw it — a ragged human form, silhouetted in Thomas’s distant light, about halfway down the row.

Athanasius stopped. Peered at it. Tried to discern whether or not it was moving. Thomas must have seen it also for his light remained steady at the far end of the row. Athanasius took a few shallow breaths to steady his nerves then stepped forward, moving silently, narrowing the gap between himself and the apparition. He saw Thomas’s orange blob of light wobble and start to grow as he did the same. Thomas reached the shadow first. ‘Brother Ponti,’ he exclaimed, loud enough for Athanasius to hear, ‘it’s you.’

Athanasius watched the stooped form of the blind caretaker appear out of the darkness a few feet in front of him, illuminated by the spill from Thomas’s light.

‘Who else,’ Ponti rasped in a voice dried by dust and darkness.

Even in the sudden warmth of the shared light everything about Ponti seemed white and bloodless, like the spiders and other pale creatures that somehow managed to live in the permanent darkness of the mountain.

‘I wasn’t sure,’ Thomas continued amiably. ‘I was just running a routine test and a query came up against your trace. The system didn’t seem to recognize you. Did you log in properly?’

‘Same way as always,’ Ponti said, holding up a thin hand in front of milky eyes.

Athanasius edged closer, saying nothing, carefully placing his footfalls so he made no sound. He watched the edge of his own light creep towards the spectral form of the caretaker until it passed over him and he was almost close enough to touch.

At that moment, back in the control room, the program Father Thomas had installed activated. Anyone looking at the main screen showing the floor plan may have noticed the three dots converging in the Roman vault, but they would not have noticed anything out of the ordinary about them. In fact Father Thomas’s program had just switched the identity of two of the dots, so the main security system was now tracking Athanasius as if he were Ponti — and vice versa.

In the vault Athanasius stood stock still and held his breath. He’d said nothing and made no noise, yet Ponti, sensing something, turned and stared straight through him with pale, sightless eyes. He raised his head like a rat sniffing the air and made to step forward when Father Thomas caught his arm.

‘Could you do me a favour,’ he asked, pulling him gently away down the tunnel of books. ‘If you’ll just step back through the entrance sensor I’m sure the system will re-acquire you and correct itself.’ Ponti continued to stare blindly at Athanasius as he was eased away, then turned and obediently shuffled off.

Athanasius felt relief flood through him as he watched them walking away, but it was short lived. He watched the warm orange bubble bob away down the narrow tunnel, with Thomas and Ponti at its centre, carrying the comforting sound of their voices with it until that too was smothered by the strange acoustics. The light got smaller until finally it slipped away on to the main corridor, leaving him suddenly alone in the silent darkness of the library.