Chapter 70
Sal and Albert lead the way. Gryphon steadies me, and I start moving, my chest tight with unshed tears. Eero and Oscar might still be alive. Same with Lozen, Meryl, my gran, Aunt Florence, and Marie. I didn’t see any of them die. We may all meet again. I have to believe it.
We walk. And walk. And walk.
The tunnel stretches before us like a wound in the earth.
Wooden support beams line the walls at regular intervals, ancient timber groaning beneath their weight.
Our footsteps echo on rails that run along the ground, metal like the mining tracks in the history books, gleaming dully in the strange illumination.
Those odd lights continue their steady progression along the walls, coming to life just ahead of us and dying behind us, as if the tunnel itself is guiding us forward.
The air grows colder, carries new smells. Mossy, sharp.
The only sounds are the hollow thud of our footsteps and our labored breathing. The tunnel seems endless, stretching to infinity. Eventually time loses meaning. We could have been walking for hours or days.
And then, without warning, it ends.
The final lights flick on to reveal a door rising before us, a monolith of gleaming metal. No handle, no hinges, just a smooth silver-gray surface marked with strange symbols that seem to shift when I look at them directly. A red light pulses near its center like a dying heart.
“What’s on the other side?” Sal whispers.
None of us, not even Albert, has a guess.
At our approach, the door hisses open.
All our lives spent inside the Wall, and suddenly there’s an exit. Sal puts one hand on Albert’s shoulder and offers the other to me. I take it, grabbing Gryphon with my free hand. We enter the new world side by side.