Free How to Live Forever by Colin Thompson Page B

his head slipping forward and his eyes closing and it took all his effort to shake himself awake.
    â€˜But I can’t climb any more stairs,’ said Peter. ‘My legs keep trying to fold up.’
    â€˜We’ll sit here for a while,’ said Festival, ‘but promise me you won’t go to sleep.’
    The bottom panels of the door that Festival had tied open shattered and Throatgall, dragging his torn leg, came to the bottom of the stairs and looked up at them. Festival gripped the broken chair leg she had brought with her and stood up, but like the creatures from the floor below, Throatgall was unwilling to come up after them. He reached out towards the bottom step but, before he touched it, pulled back and sat down.
    â€˜Come back to Throatgall,’ he whined. ‘I won’t hurt you, I promise.’
    â€˜You were going to eat us,’ said Festival. ‘You tried to bite Peter’s hand off.’
    â€˜Sorry, I didn’t mean to,’ said Throatgall. ‘It was just a reflex action.’
    â€˜And you killed your own mother.’
    â€˜I know, I know,’ the creature whimpered, ‘but I didn’t enjoy it. I won’t do it again.’
    â€˜You drank her blood,’ said Festival.
    â€˜I had to,’ said Throatgall. ‘It’s a family tradition. I drank my father’s too, when I killed him, but I didn’t enjoy it.’
    â€˜You’re disgusting,’ said Festival.
    â€˜I’m lonely. No more left, just me,’ said Throatgall. ‘Come down here, please.’
    â€˜Come on,’ said Peter, pulling himself to his feet. ‘At least we know which way to go.’
    And they climbed up to the twelfth level.
    â€˜I’ll be waiting when you come back,’ shouted Throatgall. ‘I’ll sharpen my teeth so I’m ready for you, my angels. Little cups of blood, little spoons of skin. Lovely finger, so tender like baby veal.’
    As the two children came out on the twelfth level, a steel trapdoor fell shut over the stairs, cutting off their way back. This level seemed deserted. Peter walked over to the nearest book and slumped down against it.
    â€˜I’ll just wait here,’ he said, ‘while you look for, um, something …’
    Festival knelt down beside him but it was obvious that trying to wake him up was a waste of time. If she did, he would only fall asleep again. The dark stains on his bandage were getting bigger. She slapped his face to wake him up, but she couldn’t make herself do it hard enough to have any effect. So she just sat down beside him with her arm round his shoulder. She didn’t want to leave him, but she knew that to save him, she had to find help.
    It was dark on this level. The sun had to struggle to reach under the thirteenth gallery above them and throw any light there. All the colour had faded from everything. The gold embossing was almost gone from the books. The lettering on the spines had nearly faded. And most of the books were simply books, not houses with doors, or windows, or any signs of life. The leather bindings were collapsing away, revealing crumbling pages and armies of insects eating the paper and the glue. Here and there an occasional book did have rooms inside, but they were deserted and crumbling too.
    Festival gathered up pieces of the crumbling book backs and laid them over Peter to hide him. Then she walked cautiously round the entire gallery without seeing anyone. All the stairs back down wereclosed off in the same way with heavy plates of steel and no handles to lift them by. At least it meant that Throatgall couldn’t come up after them. There was no way he would be able to lift one of the doors. But the way down wasn’t the problem.
    There was no way up. All the other levels had at least four sets of stairs leading to the level above, but this one had none. There were gaps overhead where the steps had once been, but the stairs themselves