Necropolis

the sheet of paper under a light. There was a picture of Scarlett next to the text. She had been photographed holding a hockey stick with two more girls, one on each side. A team photo. The boy examined her carefully. She was quite good-looking, he thought. Asian, he would have said. Almost certainly the same age as him.
    "When did this arrive?" he asked.
    "Half an hour ago," came the reply.
    The boy's name was Matthew Freeman. He was the first of the Gatekeepers and, without quite knowing how, he had become their unelected leader. Four months ago, he had faced the Old Ones in the Nazca Desert and had tried to close the barrier, the huge gate, that for centuries had kept them at bay. He had failed. The King of the Old Ones had cut him down where he stood, leaving him for dead. The last thing he had seen was the armies of the Old Ones, spreading out and disappearing into the night.
    It had taken him six weeks to recover from his injuries, and since then he had been resting, trying to work out what to do next. He was staying in a Peruvian farmhouse, a hacienda just outside the town of Nazca itself. Richard Cole, the journalist who had traveled with him from England, was still with him.
    Richard was his closest friend. It was he who had just come into the room.
    "It's got to be her," Matt said.
    Richard nodded. "She was in St. Meredith's. She must have gone through the same door that you went through. God knows what happened to her. She was missing for eighteen hours."
    "Her name is Scarlett."
    "Scar." Richard nodded again.
    Matt thought for a moment, still clutching the article. He had spent the past four months searching for Scarlett in the only way that he could — through his dreams. Night after night he had visited the strange dreamworld that had become so familiar to him. It had helped him in the past. He was certain that she had to be there somewhere. Perhaps it would lead him to her, helping him again.
    And now, quite unexpectedly, she had turned up in the real world. There could be no doubt that this was her, the fifth of the Five. And she was in England, in London! A student at an expensive private school.

    "We have to go to her," Matt said. "We must leave at once."
    "I'm checking out tickets now."
    Matt turned the photograph round in the light, tilting it toward himself. "Scar," he muttered. "Now we know where she is."
    "That's right," Richard said. He looked grave. "But the Old Ones will know it too."
    SIX
    Matt's Diary [1]
    I never asked for any of this. I never wanted to be part of it. And even now, I don't understand exactly what is happening or why it had to be me.
    I hoped that writing this diary might help. It was Richard's idea, to put it all down on paper. But it hasn't worked out the way I hoped. The more I think about my life, the more I write about it, the more confused it all becomes.
    Sometimes I try to go back to where it all began, but I'm not sure anymore where that was. Was it the day my parents died? Or did it start in Ipswich, the evening I decided to break into a warehouse with my best friend…who was actually anything but? Maybe the decision had already been made the day I was born. Matthew Freeman, you will not go to school like other kids. You won't play football and take your A-levels and have a career. You are here for another reason. You can argue if you like, but that's just the way it's got to be.
    I think a lot about my parents even though sometimes it's hard to see their faces, and their voices have long since faded out. My dad was a doctor, a GP with a practice round the corner from the house. I can just about remember a man with a beard and gold-rimmed glasses. He was very political. We were recycling stuff long before it was fashionable, and he used to get annoyed about the National Health Service — too many managers, too much red tape. At the same time, he used to laugh a lot. He read to me at night…Roald Dahl…
    The Twits was one of his favorites. And there was a comedy show on TV that he never missed. It was on Sunday night, but I've forgotten its name.
    My mum was a lot smaller than him. She was always on a diet, although I don't think she really needed to lose weight. I suppose it didn't help that she was a great cook. She used to make her own bread and cakes, and around September she'd set up a production line for Christmas puddings, which she'd sell off for charity. Sometimes she talked about going back to work, but she liked to be there when I got back from