CHAPTER TWENTY
“You really should reconsider,” Keshav says, bobbing nervously next to me.
He’d followed Valentin and me out of Everest’s tent and into the archives, where I’m sweeping pieces of my loot into a bag.
It’s a morgue in here. With magic shutting down across the fair, the shelves are all stationary, haphazardly stacked atop one another.
Some books have fallen out, and Keshav has been doing his best to put things back together, but he’s too distracted by me to do a thorough job.
Cillian yells at us from the highest shelf, making us very aware of his displeasure at the state of his home.
“They’ve ignored him for too long, Keshav,” I say, at last satisfied with my stash. Something in here should do the trick.
He wrings his hands. “I know, but surely there’s another way to get their attention.”
“Haven’t you tried every other avenue?” Valentin asks, toeing around stray books. “Sounds like this is the last resort.”
I half expected her to try to talk me out of the frightfully bad idea I’ve committed to, but she rallied behind me before I even shared all the details. My heart warms at the open trust she’s given me, then withers from the pressure. Am I thinking of everyone else here, or just Everest?
“Do you want me to come with you?” she asks.
“I’d like someone to keep an eye on Everest,” I say firmly. And I don’t know how safe this is going to be.
Valentin doesn’t look too concerned. She gives me a hug, which I cling onto for far longer than is necessary. “He’ll be okay, Ryka.”
He’d better be.
We part outside the archives and I march into the dead night, my full bag delicately balanced between my arms to ensure that nothing falls out. Keshav catches up in seconds, but he isn’t given a chance to pose another measured argument that will do nothing to stop me.
“Why am I hearing from Quill that you’re trying to destroy the carousel!” a piercing voice cries.
Geneva-the-child materializes in front of me, bringing me to a reluctant halt.
“I know he told you.” I jerk my chin at Keshav. “You can stop covering for him.”
Geneva makes the same clawing motion with her hands that she does when she wishes she could shake me like a rag doll, except right now, she looks like a kid begging for extra candy. It does not have the same effect, but laughing would mean my sure death. “You have lost your mind.”
“I’m trying to help you!” I say. “Now please move, or I will walk through you.”
“Officially!” Geneva cries. “Officially lost your mind. Do you even know what will happen if you succeed in this foolhardy plan? The dimensions will collapse, time-space as we know it will cease to exist–”
“You’re so dramatic,” I say, and in a move that draws a sharp gasp from both of us, I walk right through her.
“Insolent!” she screeches, all while Keshav tries to curb her temper.
I keep walking, straight down the path to the carousel.
Around us, ghosts peek their heads out of their tents, drawn to the sound of disorder.
They’re normally such busybodies, but this bedlam has the nosiest of ghosts choosing to remain on the periphery.
Things have gotten too scary, too serious for our status quo.
It needs to end.
From the corner of my eye, I see Beam and Ender sweep in.
“I would keep your advice to yourself,” I warn them.
Beam squints at me. “I came to help. Ender, too.”
I start. “Ender?”
“Well, I said I’d supervise,” he says, nervously adjusting his glasses. “Beam was very set on helping.”
“I’d prefer if you both stay out of the way, actually,” I tell them. “You could go check in on the axeman.”
“Calliope has him under control,” says Ender, ever the voice of reason.
I fold my arms. “I don’t know how any of this will go, and it’s not safe for you there.”
“You don’t get to have it both ways,” Geneva mutters, joining us. “And if you do pull this off, we’re all toast. No, not toast. Rubble. Smoke. Intangible.”
“We are already intangible,” Ender reminds her.
Beam gives him a well-earned nudge to the stomach. “Not to each other.”
We’re rapidly growing closer to the carousel, which looks more like an omen of the apocalypse.
The horses have all gone dark, their beautiful emerald and turquoise coats now a slate grey.
The threads of time are entirely black, rotten, and barely moving.
I wonder how this is impacting the continuum, my mind’s eye flashing a series of images, each more devastating than the last. Time portals opening up in the middle of crowded streets, black holes collapsing galaxies, the universe shrinking to a single, inexpandable point.
I take a steadying breath, then turn to face them. “I know this is dangerous, but since I’m not listening to any of you, I’ll respect your decision when it comes to where you choose to be during this.”
None of them budge. I arch a brow at Geneva, who says, “It’s my duty to remind you of how the friction between your two remaining brain cells is like slipping on a banana peel. If those are my dying words, then so be it.”
“Your dying words were ‘will I still be able to smell pancakes’,” Keshav reminds her softly.
Geneva wrinkles her nose. She really was a cute kid. “What a waste of dying words when I could have asked about that so much earlier. I’d like to have my dying words replaced.”
“I didn’t know we could do that,” Beam says. “What were my–”
“Let’s continue this afterwards?” I ask, pulling out the first curio from my bag: a pretty little snow globe that I lifted from a nursery in S?o Paulo.
It’s actually a rain globe, containing a diorama of a rainforest that erupts in a flurry of silver and blue droplets when shaken.
I give it a flick now, watching the specks rise and fall. In this light, it looks like ash.
“You don’t know if there will be an afterwards,” Geneva says, but I’m walking towards the carousel, bottling out the ghosts’ bickering.
The carousel hisses at my approach, static attacking my skin as I make a round, searching for what I felt earlier.
A soft point in the barrier, an area of weakness.
It’s like a wounded animal, its master injured in a grievous, lethal attack.
Well, that analogy doesn’t help at all with what comes next.
There’s a spot a few steps away where the electricity simmers down.
I reach out a finger and, sure enough, there’s no immediate shock.
This is where I can break this thing apart.
I hold the rain globe out like a rock and aim it at the center.
Good size, like a baseball. Too bad I was no use at sports.
“Are you certain you won’t reconsider?” Geneva asks, panicked.
I have turned the plan over and over in my head, and ultimately, only one solution has shown any kind of promise. It’s time to go for the jugular.
“See you on the other side.” I draw my elbow back, prepare to throw.
“Ryka, wait–” Ender calls, but I drown him out.
Just as I’m about to launch this rain globe like a grenade, a warm hand catches my arm.
The contact is accompanied by a zing of energy huffing from the carousel, like the fair itself is caught off guard.
I yelp, dropping the globe onto the overgrown grass.
Black, sleek boots that I’ve never seen before stand next to it.
My eyes trail up a dark suit, each of the three buttons fastened over a white shirt, to find a brown man with a stern face and sharply cropped hair looking down his nose at me.
His face contorts into something between a grimace and a scowl.
I know who the stranger is in seconds. Well, not precisely, but I recognize the power rippling off him.
The time god says, “You know, for a timekeeper, you really should have more patience.”