Chapter 9: Behind the Door

Kofi was waiting inside the London chapter house.

He stood near the staircase in a dark coat, looking as if he had not slept properly in days. Dr. Obi watched him from her office doorway, her arms folded.

Zara stopped when she saw him.

“Kofi...”

His eyes moved to the mark on her wrist.

“So—it has started,” he said.

Adisa stepped closer to Zara. “What has started?”

Kofi ignored him and looked directly at Zara.

“You need to leave London.”

Zara folded her arms. “I am not leaving because you appear without warning and tell me to run.”

“Taiwo knows what you are.”

The name changed the room.

Dr. Obi closed her office door behind them. “Everyone inside. Now.”

They moved into the office.

Kofi remained near the door. Adisa stood beside Zara, while Dr. Obi positioned herself behind her desk.

Kofi looked at Adisa.

“And Taiwo knows what you are too.”

Zara stepped closer to Kofi. “How do you know about Taiwo?”

“He was my family’s Covenant mentor,” Kofi replied. “He told me about the old Ori records when I was fifteen.”

Zara stared at him. “You knew what my blank result meant?”

Kofi’s silence answered before he did.

“You knew...” she said.

“I knew it was not nothing.”

“And you said nothing!”

“I thought silence would protect you.”

Zara’s voice hardened. “Silence protected you.”

Kofi lowered his eyes.

Adisa moved forward. “What does Taiwo want with her?”

Before Kofi could answer, every window in the hall shattered!

Glass flew inward.

Dr. Obi dropped behind her desk. “Down!”

Three dark spirits entered through the broken windows.

Kofi raised both hands.

Fire filled the room!

The spirits walked through it.

“They are not here to kill us,” Zara said.

Dr. Obi reached for a blade beneath her desk. “How do you know?”

One spirit turned toward Zara.

“They want me alive.”

It reached for her.

Zara caught its hand.

A vision struck her!

A chamber beneath the Lagos Covenant hall.

A stone door covered in names.

Elder Taiwo standing before it.

Behind the door, thousands of voices cried at once.

Zara released the spirit.

It burned into ash.

The other spirits fled through the broken windows.

For several seconds... no one moved.

A clerk from the front office stared at Zara from beneath a table.

“What was that...?” he whispered.

Dr. Obi pointed toward the exit. “Everyone who is not part of this conversation—leave.”

The clerk ran.

Kofi stepped away from the broken window. “What did you see?”

Zara looked at Adisa.

“The register is not only a register.”

Adisa’s face went still.

Dr. Obi tightened her grip on the blade. “Then what is it?”

Zara answered quietly.

“It is a lock.”