Witch's Pyre (Worldwalker #3)(40)

The coven made their way through the foyer, through the side door, and down the long passageway connecting the villa to Hearing Hall. There were no locks on the doors and each group of the coven breezed through, so fast and silent with Lily’s strength in them that they neared invisibility. Lily knew the Workers were there, but she doubted even their multifaceted eyes could see her preternaturally swift coven under the cover of night.

The map was in Lily’s mind’s eye as she glanced around Hearing Hall. The oculus let in a beam of bright moonlight onto the marble floor, but the light was lost in the silver-black shadows among the pillars. The air was heavy, and the empty space was anxious for them to make a sound for it to amplify. The weight of silence was a ringing pressure inside Lily’s ears. She saw something move among the pillars, just off the edge of her vision. She snapped her head around to find it, but there was nothing there.

The other two groups joined hers shortly.

Look for the way down, Rowan said in mindspeak as he and Breakfast caught up to the rest of them.

The doors, Tristan replied, already moving to them. One goes to the villa, but what about the other two?

Caleb sped down one passageway, his connection to Lily getting thin as the crystals in the marble distorted his willstone’s vibration. He came back shaking his head.

It leads to another government building. It looked like offices, he said.

Tristan tried the third door, and it opened into emptiness. There are no stairs. How do they get down with no stairs?

You’d need wings, Breakfast said, joking.

Rowan leaned through the open door and let his magelight brighten, trying to judge the distance down. His light never reached the ground. Yes. You would, he said in all seriousness. Then he launched himself over the edge.

Lily felt her heart fly into her throat. She pushed her way through the others and knelt at the precipice to watch Rowan’s magelight descend into darkness. By the time he reached the bottom it was only a faint glimmer. Rowan’s feet, then knees, and then hands met the ground as he dispersed the energy up through his body in stages, ending with the thwacking sound of his palms slapping down. Lily’s skeleton jolted and her teeth clacked together along with Rowan’s.

I’m all right, he said. He stayed in a crouch for moment, checking his surroundings before straightening up. Two of you will have to make the jump carrying Juliet and Lily, but everyone else should be able to make it.

Lily was still shaking when she felt Tristan pick her up in his arms and jump. She clutched at his neck and held her breath as she dropped down into the smothering belly of the earth. Even as she fell, Lily could feel the deadening hum of quartz in the soil around her. It was like entering a tomb.

Her whole body rattled with the impact of their landing. Tristan did his best to shield Lily from it, but even fora witch-fueled mechanic it had been a long drop. Lily felt Rowan’s hands catching her and running over her lightly to scan for any damage.

I’m not injured, she told him privately in mindspeak. He removed his hands, but ignored the group order and stayed nearby as the coven began to move through the gloom.

They fanned out and let their magelight increase by degrees, but the space seemed to go on forever.

“It’s three, maybe four times the size of the Salem Stacks,” Juliet said. The sound of her voice made Lily jump, but then she realized there was no reason to continue in mindspeak. There were no Workers down here. Nothing living at all, except her coven.

“But the same layout,” Tristan added. “Look. Here are the rooms for the skin looms.”

They passed by a series of tall, skinny passageways. Breakfast pulled one of the looms out of the wall. It was three times his height, but it rolled out easily enough on casters that were set into tracks on the floor.

“Empty,” Breakfast said. “Guess they don’t have much use for wearhyde here.”

“Why would they?” Una said. “They can get fine Italian leather if they want. They can afford it, too.”

Lily nodded and started to move toward the hulking shapes occupying the main cavern. As she approached the first of many rows of womb combs, she could tell it was old. She put her hand on one of the stainless steel sides and imagined it full of ice lattices, each little cell housing a Woven embryo.

So many Woven, Lily thought. She brightened her magelight as much as she could without blinding herself, but she couldn’t find an end to the procession.

“I’ve never seen so many,” Rowan said, echoing Lily’s thought. “Not even in New York.”

“Is the New York Stack large?” Una asked.

“The largest of the Thirteen Cities,” he answered. “Growing tame Woven is their main industry. Most of the city is underground on what you know of as Long Island. But this is even bigger.”

“We should try to find the back wall. That’s where those stairs are on Ivan’s map,” Caleb said.

They started to work their way down the rows of womb combs, every step bringing them deeper into the disorienting vastness of the space. Support pillars sprouted out of the floor and started to divide up the main area into smaller sections, confounding their sense of direction. Soon it was difficult to tell which of the sections led left, right, or straight on to the back.

“We’ll split into our groups again,” Caleb said. “Everyone stay in contact through Lily.”

Her coven reached for her mind. Lily built a web of rapport that spun out as her coven dispersed in search of the back wall. The rows skewed on a diagonal as the size and shape of the womb combs changed.