Rawlins
Greywall went to the receptionist’s desk, continuing his conversation, as she handed him two notes on Post-its, which he read, nodding, and then headed through the door into his office.
“Oh, yes, I know,” Greywall said. “And if it was up to me, you would’ve been tried, too.”
“Look. The study of arcane mechanicals is just inherently dangerous to the community,” Greywall replied. “It’s like teaching a class on how to build nuclear weapons, and hoping no one actually does.”
Greywall’s face remained impassive. He ran a hand across his shiny scalp. “Physics didn’t kill anyone at Newlyn, as far as I know.”
Rawlins glanced at his watch. More than a minute had passed…yet Greywall showed no sign of the ritual’s effect taking hold. Shit.
Rawlins continued the conversation, stalling for time and attempting to lay out his arguments in a logical manner.
But he was nervous and overly attentive to Greywall’s disposition, pausing every few seconds to try to read any shift that might indicate the obscuration was taking hold.
Greywall was irritated by these pauses, feeling that his time was being wasted.
Fifteen minutes passed, and it became apparent to Rawlins that he had failed.
He considered trying again—some desperate move would be required to touch the man’s skin.
But no…he was certain that the clay compound had made contact, which meant that there must have been a mistake or something defective with the ritual.
He was now merely lobbing pebbles against a brick wall in the hope it would come down.
He pressed on, more out of a social need to justify his appearance here, but he could feel the meeting winding down to its necessary conclusion.
As Rawlins wrapped up a point about the pro-social potential for arcane mechanical research, Greywall steepled his fingers and leaned forward.
“Interesting. You’ve given me a lot to think about as we consider Max’s case.
I thank you for your time.” He stood up, clearly signaling an end to their conversation, and Rawlins had no choice but to do the same.
But then Greywall paused, standing behind his desk, as if he had forgotten what he was doing.
Rawlins was puzzled, expecting to be escorted to the door, but then he saw on Greywall’s face an expression of blank openness.
His eyes, which had been pinched with skepticism a moment earlier, were wide and glassy. He did not speak.
It worked. Somehow the effect had taken hold on a significantly greater delay than he had intended. Perhaps a significant miscalculation? How could he be off by an order of magnitude?
Time dilation. The mechanism he had built into the ritual, which would (hopefully) prolong its impact, must also be having a meta-effect on the elements of the ritual itself: The delay he’d calculated had been dilated and significantly extended.
It was a painful oversight—one that Ellsbeth might have helped him anticipate, if they could have worked on it together.
But at the moment, it didn’t matter. His window of opportunity was narrow.
“Let’s sit back down and continue our conversation,” Rawlins said. Greywall did so immediately. His irascibility had evaporated.
Rawlins cut straight to the point. “Maxwell Keene deserves to be paroled.” Greywall nodded, offering no disagreement, and Rawlins went on.
“Paroling Maxwell Keene will help send the right message to the community. You will grant Maxwell Keene his parole, and it will be seen as a sign of your wisdom and lenience.”
Greywall gave a vague hmmm, taking this in. “You will grant parole to Maxwell Keene,” Rawlins said firmly, needing to leave no room for uncertainty. “Now tell me what you think about Keene’s case, in your own words.”
“Seems like Keene is a good candidate for parole,” Greywall said, sounding like an intelligent but slightly absentminded man putting the thought together at that moment, one word at a time, like railroad tracks being laid out.
“That’s right,” Rawlins said. “And I’m not influencing your decision on this. You’ve decided, on your own, to parole Maxwell Keene.”
“Yes, I think so,” Greywall said. He fell silent for a moment, then blinked rapidly as the effect of the ritual wore off.
“Are you all right?” Rawlins asked. “You look like you got a little lightheaded when you stood up.”
“I think I did,” Greywall murmured, the edge of certainty gone from his voice.
“Thank you for your time,” Rawlins said, and headed out the door.
As he strode back to the car, Rawlins felt the buzz of exhilaration, making his ears hot despite the chill in the air.
But it was not the clearheaded rush of triumph; even though his spell had worked, it was unclear if the period of susceptibility he had created was sufficient for his ideas to infiltrate.
And the time-dilation slow release was totally untested; it had impacted the delay mechanism, but that was a mistake, and he had no clue if it was influencing the primary obscuration.
Now he would have to wait a full week to learn the outcome of the parole hearing.
The more troubling question: Was it possible that Greywall might suspect him?
The man was innately suspicious of arcane mechanicals, and was aware that Rawlins had come here to influence his decision.
Could he put it together? The awkward handshake, the strange conversation, the (probable) gap in his memory.
Rawlins imagined arriving home to find the police searching his house, tossing his papers; for god’s sake, they wouldn’t even need to search, the written ritual and materials to do it were right out in the open in his study.
He was exploding with the need to talk to someone, to try to sort out whether his anxieties were legitimate fears or not.
But there was only one person he conceivably could talk to.
One person who would understand the arcane mechanicals involved, of course.
One person who might understand him, and his reasons for doing so.
But when he glanced at his phone, considering sending a text to ask if she could talk, he was reminded that she was already ignoring him.
And he realized that even if Ellsbeth had once been someone he could be honest with, she wasn’t anymore.
She was keeping things from him, which meant he had no choice but to keep things from her.
And it wasn’t only that he couldn’t trust her; he couldn’t trust himself when he was around her.
Desire clouded his decision making; he wouldn’t know where to draw the line.
If he told her anything, he’d have to tell her everything.
And that was not only unwise, it was impossible, and unfair to ask her to take that on.
This was his secret, and his burden to bear alone.