Sword and Pen (The Great Library #5)(39)

“Recovering,” Morgan replied. “But it makes this thing we’re about to do . . . harder. And possibly more dangerous for you. You understand this?”

“Yes,” he said, and shrugged. “Dangerous not to do it. The navies outside of the harbor are determined to sail in.”

“Then we have to raise the defenses.”

“Now,” he agreed. “Immediately. There is no time to prepare. Can you do it?”

“I have to get the Anubis statue here first to inspect the mechanism—”

“There is no time. We must trust the mechanism will work.” He pointed at the harbor. At the rippling water. “You can bind me directly to it, can’t you?”

“Thomas. No. And we don’t even know if it’s in working order after all this time! If I bind you to that and it doesn’t work . . . I’m not certain I can sever that connection so easily. You could experience . . . terrible things. I don’t know how this will affect you; it hasn’t even been attempted since the time of Heron, as far as I know.”

“Heron built these defenses,” Thomas said. “If he managed it, then it can be done. Shall we proceed?”

“Give me a moment.” Morgan looked worried, and Khalila didn’t like it. At all. She started to say so, but Thomas looked at her and shook his head.

“No, Khalila, you won’t talk me out of this, as eloquent as you are. Save your energy.”

“What about the Lighthouse? I thought you’d want to be there,” Khalila said. “You were installing the Ray of Apollo, weren’t you?”

“The Artifex Magnus fully understands the mechanism. There’s no need for me to meddle in her efforts. If you could send her word that we are about to attempt to raise the harbor defenses . . . ?”

“Yes. Of course.” She didn’t know exactly what Morgan and Thomas were planning, but to her it sounded ominously risky. So, exactly what we usually do, she told herself, and felt a little better for it. They’d been in many dire situations and come through. Surely this would be another exciting story to tell their friends afterward.

Surely.

But if Glain had been so badly wounded, Morgan must have worked a miracle to save her. A very dangerous and difficult miracle. Did she have enough left to do . . . this?

“I have a question,” Khalila said. Both of them looked to her now. “Whatever it is you are attempting to do . . . Morgan, if you fail or collapse, does that sever the link between Thomas and these defenses?”

“I think so.”

“But . . . you’re not sure?”

“What we’re doing hasn’t been attempted in thousands of years,” Morgan said. “It may not work at all. It may work for a moment. Or it may work too well. I just don’t know until we do it.”

“Thomas? Are you certain you want to—”

“Yes,” he said. “We must. Right now.”

They walked to the end of the docks. The harbor itself was starting to come to life, with workers arriving at stores and restaurants, bars and brothels. A city carrying on, despite the threats. As people did. And now it’s our responsibility to make them safe in doing so. Now, as never before, that struck Khalila hard. Power was a nebulous, light thing until it lay heavy in the hand. Once it did, only the weak and corrupt found it easy to wield.

She turned to Thomas, hugged him impulsively, and said, “In bocca al lupo, Thomas.” The mouth of the wolf. Always.

“Crepi il lupo,” he replied. He would, as always, face the wolf and defeat it. It was the call and response for the miracle and terror of the Translation Chamber, but it worked equally well here. He was going into danger, and going alone.

She couldn’t help him.



* * *



—

The preparations seemed simple enough. They all three sat down on the edge of the dock, feet dangling several feet above the water that lapped at the pier’s concrete supports, and Morgan took several deep, slow breaths. Then she held up both hands palms up. For the first time, Khalila noticed her friend was wearing a ring, a large amber one inset with the seal of the Great Library. A flawed amber, with a spot of something dark inside. And was it moving? No. A trick of her eyes, or the light.

But Morgan wasn’t much prone to jewelry, and the sight of that ring unsettled Khalila for reasons she couldn’t begin to name.

“What do I do if you appear in distress?” Khalila asked. She meant it for Thomas, but it applied equally to Morgan. The two of them exchanged glances, and then Morgan shrugged.

“Leave it,” Thomas said. “We won’t get a second chance. The Great Library needs this to work.”

Morgan disagreed, though only slightly. “Wait for half an hour,” she said. “If by that time nothing has happened, then we’ve failed. Try to bring us out of it.”

“How?”

“A sudden shock should do. Cold water, for instance.” Morgan looked down at the lapping ocean water. “It should break my concentration and sever Thomas’s link.”

“I’m not pushing you into the sea!”

“Well, it would probably work.”

“Do you even know how to swim?”

“Of course,” Morgan said. Thomas, tellingly, said nothing.