Ink, Iron, and Glass (Ink, Iron, and Glass #1)(85)
“Look, you’re still alive,” Elsa said brightly, accepting the lab book back from Porzia.
“Alive and bored,” she said, taking the fourth rebreather off Leo’s hands. “Oof, this contraption weighs a ton. You call this quality engineering?”
Leo replied, “I swear, you could find something to complain about in paradise.”
“The oxygen balance is going to be high at first, so shallow breaths,” Faraz warned. “We don’t want anyone hyperventilating and passing out down there.”
Elsa adjusted the oxygen tank’s strap across her shoulders, held the facemask over her nose and mouth, and took an experimental breath. Everything seemed to be in working order, so she tied the facemask in place. She exchanged a nod with Faraz, who detached Skandar from his shoulder and—with some difficulty—convinced the beast to wait for them in the courtyard. Then the humans took the stairs down again.
“So what now?” Leo said, looking around the cavern. His voice came through the facemask, muffled but still audible.
Porzia said, “We investigate until we find another clue, like we did above.”
The cavern floor had the smooth but uneven feel of water-eroded rock. With the help of stalactites, the string of gaslights around the perimeter cast strange patterns of light and shadow on the ceiling. The unevenness of the stone and insufficiency of the lighting made it difficult to say if there was only one cavern, or if there were passages leading away to a network of caves.
Elsa walked forward, trying to get a better feel for the space, and a wave of nausea flowed through her. Her face flushed hot and her stomach clenched. She checked her air supply but found nothing amiss. So what was that feeling? Another kind of trap scribed into the world? She turned to warn the others and saw something exceedingly strange.
Her three companions were still there in the room, but they were moving so fast their features blurred and she could barely tell one from another. Then one of them sped toward her, resolving into Leo as he approached. He held one arm back, connected to the blurs that were Porzia and Faraz, and threw his other arm toward her, still moving faster than a person should.
She reached out—he was gesturing at her impatiently—and took his hand. He yanked roughly on her arm, and she winced. As he drew her closer, though, the nausea washed over her again, and everyone slowed down to normal speed.
“What—” Elsa said, baffled.
“Temporal pockets,” Porzia explained. “You were stuck in there for ten minutes—we weren’t sure how to get you out safely.”
Elsa blinked. “Felt like seconds. Good thing I stopped walking when I did.”
“If we’re not careful, we could spend centuries down here and not even know it. Montaigne does seem to love nested security measures, doesn’t he?” Porzia set her hands on her hips and glared at nothing in particular.
Leo adjusted his facemask. “There must be a way through to wherever the book is. Montaigne got out, after all.”
An idea occurred to Elsa. “Leo, do you have your pocket watch on you?”
“Of course,” Leo said, taking his out. “Name me a mechanist who leaves home without a pocket watch.”
Elsa declined to point out that she, obviously, did not own one; otherwise she wouldn’t have asked. Instead, she explained, “Hold it out in front of you at arm’s length. If the second hand slows down, we know not to walk in that direction.”
Leo did as she instructed. The progress was slow, but after a few minutes they had mapped out the pattern of temporal dilation in the cavern. The bubbles of slow-time were everywhere around them, with only one invisible passageway large enough to admit a person.
“I suppose it’s this way, by process of elimination,” Leo said. “Watch your knees and elbows, everyone.”
He inched forward, sweeping the pocket watch left and right to detect the curves of the passageway. Elsa and the others followed single file, carefully watching where Leo stepped and matching his route exactly.
At the front of the line, Leo stopped suddenly, and Elsa nearly crashed into him. They were close to one wall of the cavern, but other than that, nothing seemed odd about the spot.
“What is it? Another temporal bubble?”
“No,” Leo said, lowering his pocket watch. “I think we’ve arrived at our final destination.”
He stepped aside to give her a clear view. Set into the stone wall were four large, faceted wheels, each facet carved with a different number, zero through nine. A combination lock. Beside the wheels was a single lever, presumably to be pulled once the proper combination was entered.
“Four digits,” Porzia observed. “Possibly a year, but which one?”
Elsa reached out and thumbed the first wheel, setting it to the number one. Then, figuring that Montaigne wasn’t much of a historian, she set the second digit to eight. She withdrew her hand, considering what to do next.
Leo ran a hand through his hair, frustrated. “Even assuming the code is a date from this century, we still have ninety-one possible combinations. We don’t have enough oxygen left to try them all.”
“Hold on.” Elsa thought hard, trying to imagine this from Montaigne’s perspective. Even after everything that had happened with Jumi, Veldana was still his greatest accomplishment—the victory that Jumi had wrenched from his grasp. Could he really be so egotistical?