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  “‘The books of histories are hiding deep in a Colorado canyon, in a home consistent with their nature, where they will remain until the day they are meant to be found by those destined to bring love into the world.’”

  “Here?” Andrew said.

  “You’re getting ahead of me.” He picked up his pace, eager to tell them the whole truth. “The books vanished, all of them. One year later, my son Christopher was killed, as you know. It crushed me. I spent months trying to convince my wife, Andrea, to conceive—”

  “Another child for the books,” one of them said.

  “No, the books were gone. I simply wanted another child. She did conceive, and Samuel was born into the world. But the pregnancy was difficult, and my wife died giving birth. This you also know.”

  David slipped into his seat and leaned back.

  “What you don’t know is the depth of my depression at her death. I took a sabbatical and set out to find the books. I was desperate to bring my wife back, you see. My sorrow clouded my judgment. For a full year I methodically searched every canyon in the Colorado mountains. But I’d written them into hiding until the day they were meant to be found, and I gradually became convinced that I had done so wisely.”

  “So then you didn’t find them. You want the children to find them.”

  “Patience, Nathan. One night I had a dream. An epiphany that introduced me to God in a way that haunts me still. I was thoroughly convinced that I should raise my son, Samuel, in total innocence, so that if he were to have the books, he would use them only for good. This, I determined, was the reason God had allowed the events in my life.”

  “I thought—”

  “I found the books the next day. Which only confirmed my vision. The books were meant to be found, and meant to be found by me. To be used, not by me, but by Samuel. Or perhaps more than one Samuel.”

  Understanding dawned on the overseers’ faces.

  “I found them here, in this monastery hidden from the world. All 1,443 of them. I found 666 of them in the dungeons below, which I promptly sealed. And I found 777 of them in the library above—though I don’t believe there is any difference between the books above and those below except in their symbolic placement. You see, the books had found themselves in a place consistent with their nature, exactly as Christopher had written. My friends, we are sitting on more raw power than has been known by any mortal man in all of history.”

  “They . . . you’re saying that the books are here now?”Andrew demanded. “Where?”

  David drilled them with a stare. He rose to his feet, crossed the room, and pushed the wall. It gave way under his weight. Slowly a large bookcase rotated into view. Hundreds of books lined the shelves.

  Leather-bound books.

  David extracted one and brought it to them. He sat down and placed it on the table.

  They leaned in as one. Ancient black leather, roughly an inch thick. No title.

  “The rest are in the dungeons. To the best of my knowledge they are the source of the worms in the dungeons. It’s not the disease on Billy’s skin that worries me most, it’s the deception brought on by the worms.”

  “But nothing you, or we, or any adult writes in these books will occur,” Nathan said. “Unless they have the belief of a child.”

  “That is my belief.”

  “But if the children, these thirty-seven that we’ve raised, were to write in the books, their words would actually change history?”

  “To a point. As I understand it, the books can’t force a person’s will any more than God can force a person’s will. But they can do almost everything else.”

  Andrew leaped out of his chair, sending it skidding across the stone floor behind him. “The books in the dungeons—Billy’s writing in them?”

  David lifted a hand. “Please, Andrew, sit.”

  He did, but slowly, fearfully.

  “The answer is yes. I don’t think the children are aware of the books’ power, but they are writing a story.”

  It was too much information in too short a time, but David was confident that if he guided them methodically through the meat of his choice, they would come around to seeing the wisdom of it.

  “They are writing a story about a town called Paradise.”

  “Not the town in the valley below us?”Mark said.

  “Yes, that Paradise.”

  “Is . . .What’s happening?”

  “The town is coming apart at the seams,” David said. “Apart from one man who had a heart attack, I don’t think there’s been any death, but there is certainly a mess brewing in Paradise.”

  A cacophony of protest filled the room. He let it run until a single question rose above the rest. “How do we know this?”

  “I have my ways. Trust me, Paradise is falling under Billy’s pen.”

  “You said he doesn’t know the power of his words,” Raul said.

  “No, but he knows plenty about the town. He can see what’s happening in his characters’ minds. Although he can’t force their wills, this bunch is influenced easily enough.”

  David decided against telling them about Marsuvees Black at the moment. The fate of their old colleague, though interesting,wouldn’t help them understand the overall picture.

  “It must be stopped!” Andrew cried. “This has gone too far!”

  “And how would you propose we stop it, Andrew?”

  “Pull the children out of the dungeons! Burn the books!”

  “And risk interfering with the path the books have put us on? We are here because of the books; I believe only they will show us the way out. Project Showdown isn’t a benign experiment to test the effects of children raised in isolation. It’s about life pitted against death. It’s about good in conflict with evil on a grand scale. I launched this project knowing full well that one day we would be seated at this table facing this very dilemma. But I’m convinced that it will lead to good, to love entering the world, otherwise the books would never have been found.”

  He opened the book in front of him and raised his index finger. “But just to be safe, I had Samuel write another entry into Christopher’s book, after we found it in the monastery library. Naturally he was too young to know what or why he was writing.”

  David read. “‘As of this date, any word written in this book or any similar book so described’—I’ll spare you the tedious description—‘that is written by any person not currently residing in the monastery, and/or that does not lead to the discovery of love will be powerless. This rule is irrevocable.’ It goes on to describe in detail this summary. I also had Samuel write the names of every student.”

  They didn’t know how to respond.

  “I knew from my tests with Christopher that making something irrevocable seems to bind the books. So you see, I have taken every precaution. The books are now limited to only those who were in the monastery on the date that this rule was written. And their power is limited to the discovery of love.”

  He shut the cover. Samuel had written another entry on that day, but it would only confuse them at this point. God help him if Samuel’s final entry ever came into play.

  “And if you require other assurances, I will only say that I have other safeguards.”

  David said this with far more conviction than he felt, and he prayed that his conviction would prove him right. But anything could happen, regardless of Christopher’s or Samuel’s entries. For all he knew, those destined to bring love to the world, presumably those in this monastery, wouldn’t do so for another fifty years, and then only after destroying only God knew what.

  “We are on dangerous ground,” Andrew said. The others nodded.

  “Without question,” David said. “But we can no more pretend that the books don’t exist than we can pretend evil doesn’t exist. We entered dangerous territory the day Adam and Eve ate the apple.”

  “But even they had a choice,”Andrew said. “You’re saying that the whole town is following these evil impulses from Billy? That
he simply writes and they listen and follow him, correct?”

  “Pretty much, yes.”

  “Are they nothing but sheep?”

  “No more than Eve was a sheep in the garden of good and evil. Do you think that if God had put a Jane or a Betsy in the garden, she would have made a different choice? Given the hearts of the people in Paradise and the powerful nature of Billy’s writing, the fall from what grace they had is practically wholesale.”

  For a while no one spoke. The idea of a story wreaking so much havoc daunted them.

  “We’ve assisted the children up to this point. I don’t see why we can’t nudge them now,” Daniel said.

  “On the contrary, we must let the children find their own way now, because it’s what they’ve chosen. What is the greatest virtue?”

  “Love.”

  “Yes. Love. From the beginning we’ve agreed that we must give the children the freedom to choose their own way. Should that change now that the stakes appear to be higher? Love can only be found in freedom of choice. And for choice to exist, there must be an alternative to choose. Something as compelling as love. Something that is evil, yes?”

  “Yes,” Raul said.

  “We must allow our students the opportunity to love the truth in the face of alternatives. We’ve effectively put Paradise in the hands of the children, as intended by whatever force allowed me to find the books in the first place. Nothing we do can reverse that.”

  Andrew leaned forward again. “But to let them stay in the dungeons—”

  “Let me tell you something, Andrew. The world lives in a dungeon. It’s dark and cold and full of the worst, but it’s where the world lives. Most well-meaning books do little to illuminate the way. What we’re doing here requires a view of the dungeon. Do you understand? It’s the only way to bring hope to that dungeon.”

  “And in the meantime whatever Billy and the others write will continue to bring destruction.”

  “To a point, yes.”

  “I still don’t think—”

  David slammed his palms on the table. “Then stop thinking, Andrew, at least for a moment! You’ve believed in me this far; you must believe that I’ve applied enough reason to Project Showdown to cover a week’s worth of argument. You must believe me when I say that if we interfere with the children, we may pay a price far more devastating than Billy’s writings.”

  He drew a deep breath. “We must trust in God. Which in this case means trusting in the books that surely he has given us. To betray the books is nothing less than a betrayal of the creative power that God has entrusted us which in turn is a betrayal of the children! We must trust the books to deliver us love in the end.”

  David couldn’t remember being so forceful, but it was the only way he knew to bring them quickly up to speed with a matter that he’d lived with for twelve years.

  Andrew broke the silence. “Can the damage be corrected by another student’s writing? Samuel and Christine and some of the others could write.”

  David took a deep breath. “Samuel is writing,” he said. “He’s been writing for four days now.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  PARADISE

  Saturday afternoon

  THE CANYON was deep and long, but the marble moved slowly enough for Johnny to keep up. He could see that the canyon ended ahead, maybe a hundred yards off. When he’d walked half of it, the red marble veered to the left and disappeared behind a towering gray boulder.

  Johnny stopped. The sun was high, but the sheer rock rose so high that even now long gloomy shadows filled the canyon. He walked to the boulder and made his way around the stone.

  Here, the canyon wall gaped to reveal another, smaller canyon. Johnny stopped and squinted, trying to make sense of the shadows moving across the granite face.

  No marble.

  The smaller canyon was wedge-shaped, like a teepee. It ended in a wall that rose roughly fifty feet. Nothing but rock.

  He walked toward the wall. His mind was evenly divided, one half insisting that he had no business being here, the other calling him forward. He realized he was holding his breath. He exhaled.

  He was ten feet from the cliff when something caught his eye. An irregularity on the surface. A straight, vertical line. Like someone had cut into the stone with a saw.

  He ran his hand along the crack.

  But it wasn’t just a crack. It was the edge of a door. He saw the latch a foot lower. Johnny jerked his hand back. He stood frozen for three loud heartbeats, then turned and ran toward the safety of the boulder.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  THE MONASTERY

  Saturday afternoon

  SAMUEL HURRIED down the hall, eager to tell his father this plan that filled his mind in the hours since the debate.

  He’d been writing in one of the blank books for four days now, carefully and with tempered purpose, but the time for caution had passed. Frankly, he couldn’t wait to begin writing again, but this time with a new purpose.

  He discovered on the first day that his writing connected with the characters of Paradise in a unique way. This storytelling experience was more enthralling than any he’d experienced. When he wrote into Paradise, he felt like he was really there, with the characters, speaking into their minds and hearing their thoughts. Thus he could extrapolate Billy’s actions by reading the minds of the characters that Billy was influencing.

  He also learned from these people what was happening in Paradise, at least to the extent that they actually knew what was happening. He could see the town in his imagination almost as clearly as if he were there.

  He also experienced unique limitations. Unlike in his other stories, he couldn’t force the characters to follow his every whim. He could play a game of wits with them, interjecting thoughts and suggestions, but in the end the characters did what they chose to do.

  Samuel had written hundreds, maybe thousands of suggestions into the minds of Paradise’s residents, and although each time he felt at least some influence on them, nearly every character he wrote into chose Billy’s way. It made him wonder how Billy was able to influence the people so effectively.

  Samuel couldn’t write more than one character at a time, so he focused on the most responsive character he found—Johnny. There was something unique about the boy, and Samuel was sure it had something to do with the fact that Johnny had seen Black for who he was when he first walked into town.

  Oddly enough, Samuel couldn’t enter the mind of Marsuvees Black, the monk who betrayed them all. In a way that Samuel couldn’t yet understand, Billy and Black were working together. As an active and willing accomplice, the monk’s power was stunning. Samuel couldn’t tell where Black ended and where Billy’s writing began.

  Either way, nothing happening in Paradise was a figment of the citizens’ imaginations. It was all real. All except the sludge that Black had persuaded them was hallucinogenic, which, although real enough, was nothing more than starchy water. Billy’s writing, not a hallucinogenic sludge, had deceived the people of Paradise. Black had merely distracted them long enough for Billy to sink his claws deep into their minds.

  But now Samuel had a plan that he was quite sure would take Billy and company by storm. And for that plan to succeed, he needed his own accomplice.

  Johnny.

  He knocked on his father’s office door. After a second attempt returned no response, he walked in. Vacant. But he could hear muffled voices from the conference room next door.

  Samuel crossed to the door, knocked, and waited.

  “Come.”

  He walked into a meeting of the overseers, who all wore dazed expressions.

  David rose from the table. “Hello, Samuel.”

  Samuel hurried to him, eager. At the last second, he second-guessed his intention to hug his father and instead took David’s arm.

  “Hello, Father.”

  An awkward moment passed.

  David glanced at the teachers. “Excuse me.” He stepped away with Samuel. “Wha
t is it? You have something?”

  “I have a plan.”

  David patted his hand and lowered his voice. “Nothing to them about Marsuvees yet.”

  Samuel nodded. “Okay.”

  Turning back to the table, David reassumed his usual volume. “My son has something he wants to share with us.” David looked at him. “Go ahead, Samuel.”

  “Then they know about the writing?” Samuel asked.

  “They know,” his father said.

  “And you know that I’ve been writing for several days now.”

  “Yes, they know everything.”

  Except about Marsuvees Black.

  He let go of David’s arm. “Among many things I’ve learned about how the books work is this fact: though I can’t make people do things, I can do whatever I want with objects and animals—anything that doesn’t have the capacity for moral choice, I would say. Billy’s done some very interesting things . . .”

  He decided now wasn’t the time for details.

  “If I were to write, ‘The red marble on Johnny’s dresser rises into the air and floats,’ for example, then that’s precisely what happens. But if I write, ‘Johnny grabs the marble,’ Johnny only has that thought. The decision to grab or not to grab is his. Has my father explained this?”

  “Some, but go on,” David said. “Hearing it from you is different.”

  Samuel addressed his father. “The bottom line is, I can’t make ordinary people do things, but I doubt the rule applies to unordinary people.”

  “Unordinary, meaning what?”

  “Fictional characters.”

  A light filled his father’s eyes.

  “I’m quite sure that I could write a character into existence, and it would have no will of its own.”

  “Turning an idea into reality,” his father said.

  “No different than turning an idea of a marble floating into reality when you think about it.”

  “That could work?” Andrew asked.

  “You haven’t tried it?” his father asked.