The Liar's Key (The Red Queen's War #2)(60)

“How?” Any further questions die upon my lips. The woman’s left eye has a pearly cast to it. She raises a pale finger to her lips as if to shush me. When she lowers her hand the slightest of smiles lies behind it.

“I’m ready,” says Alica. “Are the people in place? The soldiers assembled?”

There’s nobody here but me and her silent sister, and neither of us answer.

She raises her voice. “I said—”

“Optics indicate the stasis zone fully occupied.”

Surprise nearly tears me from the dream. There’s a ghost standing before my grandmother. It wasn’t there a moment ago. A pale, see-through, honest-to-God ghost. A damned odd-looking ghost it has to be said—its face like a Greek marble, statued perfection that couldn’t ever be mistaken for life.

Alica bows her head. “Begin the event.”

“I have explained that stasis is not possible. Extensive repairs would be required before the generators could provide a sufficient pulse of energy. Generators seven and three are functioning at thirty percent, the remainder at less than ten percent. A failed stasis will result in a quickening. All that might be achieved is a bubble of quick-time, and at a peak ratio of thirty to one.”

“And I have acknowledged this. You will run the reactors beyond failsafe.”

“You do not understand the consequences of such action. The generators will fail catastrophically. Estimates place the devastation radius at—”

“Even so, you will do it.” Alica keeps her gaze on the pulsing lights.

The ghost shows no expression, its tone unwavering. It seems even less human than Captain John at the keep door, and the palace guard practise hard at looking impassive.

“I am afraid User that as a Guest you do not have such authority. This algorithm will—”

“My sister has seen beyond you, Root. She has seen past the years, though the sight of it burned her eye. You are a dance of numbers, without soul. Cleverness without wit. You will do what I say.”

“User you may not—”

“Security override Alpha-six-gamma-phi-twelve-omega.”

“Compliance. Energy pulse in three minutes. Quick-time core ratio of thirty-two to one predicted.”

We wait while the ghost counts away the seconds. Summoned by some unseen signal, Contaph descends the stairs leading a mix of palace guards, common soldiers, knights, and even a lord or two. Many of them carry the filth and stink of battle with them. Hard men, warriors born.

“Fifteen.”

The chamber is packed and more men push down the stairs. Alica vaults the steel ring and stands on the other side looking out, the blue star just behind her head, making a silhouette of it.

“Clear the stairs!” Alica shouts, urgency in her tone now. “Clear the path to the gates.”

“Fourteen.”

The shout is echoed up the stairway and beyond.

“It’s already done, princess,” Contaph says. “As you instructed.”

“Eleven.”

“Contaph, you others there. Join me.”

“Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven.”

Men pack in close. I join them, hunched beneath the star itself.

“Six.”

A faint whine can be heard rising through the clatter of arms and shuffling of feet.

“Five.”

There’s something in the air. A brittle buzzing that puts my teeth on edge even though I’m not really there.

“Four.” I risk a glance at the Silent Sister, finding her through a momentary gap. She’s watching me from her corner into which nobody wished to push.

“Three.”

“You know me don’t you?” I don’t want to talk to her. I feel like that small boy again, just turned five and presented to the Red Queen for the first time. I remember the dry touch of her, that moment when the Silent Sister first laid her hand on mine and I fell into some hot dark place.

“Two.”

She isn’t going to answer. She only smiles.

“One.”

“Yes,” she says.

“Zero.”

The blue star expands, its cold fire engulfs us and passes on through the walls of the chamber. And that’s it. Nothing has changed. We all stand frozen, waiting, waiting for whatever magic was supposed to save the castle.

“Quickly now.” Alica vaults back across the wall. It’s not something I could do in full armour. Her strength is prodigious.

The men immediately before me are swift to follow her and I scramble after them, the contact with the steel a strange greasy thing as dream-flesh seeks purchase on the real. We’ve hurried along the cleared passage through the tight-packed warriors, and are nearly at the stairs before I realize that only the men closest to the ring have made any effort to follow us, and even they’ve been damned slow about it. Alica isn’t waiting, though, and so I hasten after her.

At the top of the stairs I realize something is wrong. The soldiers here stand like statues, not even following us with their eyes. Has the Builder-magic frozen them? There’s no time to consider the matter—Alica clanks along at a flat run, aiming for the great door.

I’m amazed to see the door standing wide open, as if we weren’t at war. Glancing back, I see men from the chamber stretched out behind us, the ones farthest back moving as if they were running through thick mud. It takes a moment but I think I understand. The star’s light has sped us up. Those of us closest to it have gained the greatest speed. Quick-time, it said? Has the Builders’ engine made our seconds pass faster? Our hearts beat swifter than hummingbird wings?