Chapter 6

Rho and I looked around the room. Walker had passed us by just before we were thrown into the past. If the same amount of time had passed as we had spent in the past, then it was reasonable to assume a full day or more had passed for Walker and the others.

“Use the key,” Rho said. “With it, the door should open to the same minute we came through.”

I nodded and held out the key to the door. There wasn’t a keyhole, but I pointed it at the metal plate just below the doorknob.

The knob rattled and then the door swung open. I had to jump back to keep from getting slammed into the adjacent wall.

The hallway looked empty.

Rho and I stepped out into the hallway and the door slammed shut behind us. To our left, further down the hallway, we spied Jade, Ruby, and my mom just turning a corner. It wasn’t much longer than when we first went into the Time room.

The door opened again and Walker came out. He looked at me and grew confused. “I thought I just saw...”

I knew he had seen me inside, but I couldn’t let him know what I knew. I simply frowned and crossed my arms. “Did you find what you were looking for?”

He smiled and nodded. “Yes. Yes, I did.” Then he showed me a pocket watch with a rampant lion on the cover. It looked brand new, but something told me this thing could have been over a hundred years old. He snatched the watch back and dropped it into a pouch on his waist. “I doubt we’ll need it here.” Then he looked down the hall and noted the girls’ progress. “Damn time dilation. I was hoping they would be back by now.”

“You told them to go ahead to get away from whatever spell effect stripped them of their clothes,” I said.

He stared after them and mumbled, “I suppose.” Then he started after them.

“To him, it’s only been a few minutes,” Rho said. “Though we don’t know what he went through in the time room.”

I nodded and followed him.

It didn’t take us very long to catch up to the women. We watched them disappear around the corner only about a second before we reached it. When he and I turned the corner, the women were dressed in their original outfits again.

Jade was a storm of anger. “I’m sick of this shit!”

“Calm down,” Walker said, “I’ve already collected the first item. Three more to go and we’re out of here.”

“We’re out of here?” Jade asked. “You say that like we’re not going to have to go back through all of this shit to leave!” Then she spun on me. “Unless you know another way out?”

I shook my head and looked at Walker. “She’s right. Everything we’ve gone through so far; we’ll have to go through again to get out.”

Walker smiled, held out his arm to my mother, who took it as if waiting all along to do so, and then said, “Go on thinking that way if you want.” Without another word, he strolled off with my mother as if nothing could go wrong.

It made me wish I had his confidence.

Ruby stepped up beside me and hooked her arm around mine. With a salacious grin, she said, “Don’t worry, Seth. I won’t let you get lost.” Then she led me down the hall after Walker and my mom. Jade watched us go with a look of revulsion on her face.

Being this close to Ruby put me on a kind of edge halfway between fear and yearning. I could only imagine the yearning was a lingering effect from the mattress spell that affected the two of us previously. Other than my instinctive ambivalence, I wasn’t entirely sure what to think about her. Yes, she came onto me like a love-sick schoolgirl with a severe itch she wanted me to scratch, but something told me that was just a mask. If I was going to get out of this situation with my mom alive and well, then I needed Ruby to show me what was under her mask. “So, where are you from, Ruby?” I asked quietly.

She smiled. “Why do you want to know?”

I shrugged. “Walker is driven. He’s too focused on his agenda to tell me anything. Jade only wants to kill me. You, however, are the only one who wants to get close, and I only get close with those I know.”

She leaned into me, pressing her breast into my arm. “Are you telling me, given the chance, you would ... get close ... to Walker?”

I smiled. “Not in that way. But I would like to know what drives him.”

She shook her head. “I couldn’t tell you that even if I knew. I was tasked with keeping you distracted should Jade fail to do so.”

“Distract me?” I asked, giving her a coy glance. “Now, what could I possibly find more interesting than what you have to offer?”

She smiled. “That’s just it, Seth. You don’t know what I am offering.”

“Oh, so you’re offering more than really good sex?”

She leaned over and whispered directly into my ear, “I offer phenomenal sex, and yes, I am offering more.” Then she used her tongue to draw my earlobe up and sucked on it.

It took a lot of self-control to keep myself from shaking with a combination of rage and revulsion. Fortunately for me, some part of me enjoyed her closeness enough to make me pitch a tent. I smiled. “Well, if it weren’t for Walker’s insistence that we keep moving, I would love to find out about that ‘more’ you’re offering.”

Her smile grew. “I can only tell you about that after the phenomenal sex.”

I play-pouted. “Aww! Not even a hint?”

“What are you two talking about?” Jade interrupted. She was following so close I could almost feel her breathing down my neck.

I pulled away from Ruby to look back at Jade. Ruby looked at her too. “Don’t worry, Hun. We were just discussing the sorts of things we’ll do once Walker has what he wants and we have the time to explore our lusts for one another.”

Jade looked from her to me and back again as if confused by something. Then she shook her head, without any sign of disgust, and pushed her way between us to catch up with Walker.

Ruby watched her with a small smile.

“Why tease her?” I asked, watching Jade as well.

Ruby looked at me and watched me as I watched Jade. “You’d get close with her?”

I shrugged. “A little pain can be invigorating,” I said. “And you have to admit, that outfit shows off her ass beautifully.”

Ruby looked again. “So, it does.”

Walker and Mom stopped at the next corner just as Jade caught up to them. All three stood there staring at the next hall. After all of the different obstacles we had run into already, it made me wonder what we would face this time.

Ruby and I reached the corner and I moved around the group to get a clear sight of the hallway.

The floor, walls, and ceiling were all broken up as if an earthquake had hit this area alone. The floor, however, had more than simple breaks in the stonework, there were deep fissures too.

I picked up a piece of broken stone and dropped it in one of the fissures. We listened as it hit the walls and tumbled down and down until we couldn’t hear it anymore. As far as I could tell, it never hit bottom. I looked at the others. “We have to find another way around. If one of us falls into one of these fissures...”

Walker shook his head. “The next room we want is at the other end of this hallway.”

I frowned. “You say that like you’ve been down here before. You walk through these halls like you’re at home here. Yet, all of these problems we’ve run into have taken you by surprise as much as the rest of us. What gives?”

“You have been poorly trained,” he said. “Most of the items here are permanent magic items, meaning...”

“Meaning,” I continued, “they don’t need to be recharged. But if this is the result of having the wrong items collected together, why would anyone arrange the vaults this way?”

“Each room has magical shielding. In some cases, individual items are kept in some sort of container that shields the magic within. They are used to shut away magical effects that are constant. Which is why many of these items should be destroyed rather than kept for study.”

“Are you suggesting the rooms themselves are losing their ability to hold back the magical effects of the different items?”

He nodded. “That would be my conclusion.” Then he waved at the fissures. “This is but one possibility of the ways the different magical items in the rooms of this hallway could interact. As for your suggestion to go around, there is no way around it. We have to cross this.” He looked up and around at the walls and ceiling of the hallway. Then he turned to Ruby. “We should use a force bridge.”

“A what?” I asked.

Walker held up his hand to silence me, but Ruby answered. “A force bridge is exactly what it sounds like, a bridge made up of magical force. It’s mostly transparent, which makes it an interesting construct.”

“Why not simply close the fissures?” I asked.

They both looked at me. “Give it a try,” Walker said.

That was not the response I was hoping for. I considered refusing, but Walker held my mother close and I couldn’t take the chance that he would threaten to, if not outright, throw her into one of the fissures.

I turned and faced the fissures. I had no real idea of how I would close them, even if I could. First, I needed to know how they were formed. Since most of the problems we had faced down here were due to surrounding magical effects, I decided to check for that first.

Magic infused every inch of the hallway. I couldn’t even determine the location of the source. I did know, however, that the magic was earth-based. I knew this type of magic was heavily used for shaping stones, creating statues, adjusting brick sizes, and other such transmutations to make buildings sturdier or statues more beautiful. The breaking of stone was also useful in mining, and the fissures were the result of the uncontrolled direction of such magic.

Knowing what I was up against, I focused on filling in the fissures. I didn’t care whether the stone surface was pretty, just that it was solid enough to walk on. With the method and desired result in mind, I closed my eyes and focused on making it happen.

For my first few breaths after starting, everything felt as if it was going the way I wanted. Then I felt resistance. Something was fighting back. I put more power into my spell and the resistance grew to match me. I pushed forward, determined to make this happen even if it cost me all of my energy. The resistance began to crumble, but then someone jerked me back, breaking my concentration.

I looked up to find Walker holding my shoulder. “Why did you stop me?”

He wasn’t looking at me, but when he did, I turned and looked out at the fissures.

The fissures had grown. They had consumed more of the floor, leaving less for us to walk on, should it come down to it.

I pulled free of his grip and moved up to the edge of the first fissure. “I felt something fighting my efforts. I thought I was about to win the struggle, but I was about to fall in, wasn’t I?”

Mom nodded. Walker continued to focus on the problem. Ruby looked at me as if she had almost lost her favorite toy, but Jade was the only one to say anything: “Too bad.”

Ruby and Mom each shot a dark glare at the shorter woman. Walker looked at Jade too. “Tell me, Jade. If Seth fell into the fissure, would you have a plan for getting us out of the vaults?”

She met his eyes but didn’t say anything.

“I didn’t think so,” he said, turning from her. “From now on, only speak when you have something constructive to add to the conversation.”

If looks could kill, Walker would have been reduced to smoldering ash.

“I believe the force bridge spell is still viable,” Walker said, “So long as we do not attempt to reverse the spell currently in effect.” Then he looked sideways at me.

Ruby nodded and everyone stepped back from the edge of the first fissure. She stood still for a moment, focusing, and then dropped into a crouch that made me think of a martial artist. She rose to her feet again as she moved her arms around her and mumbled something under her breath. She ended by raising both hands and whipping them out toward the hallway as if laying out a rather large sheet over a bed. When she touched the floor again, a shimmering, translucent path appeared along the middle of the hall for the entire length.

Walker stepped closer, staring out at the length of the bridge. “Perfection,” he said softly.

Ruby turned and smirked at me as if gaining Walker’s praise was the goal and I was wrong in trying to show off my power.

What were we, ten?

Walker turned to Ruby again. “Your creation, you go first.”

Ruby, still smiling, stepped up to the edge of the bridge and placed her foot on the transparent energy. Her heel tapped down as if she were walking on something hard. She put her weight on it and then stepped forward, standing on her magical construct, appearing to hover over the first fissure. She walked forward, confident that her spell would hold.

I looked at Walker. He watched her as she continued. I was pretty sure he wasn’t going to let anyone else cross until Ruby either made it all the way across or fell to her death. I wasn’t going to let her be a guinea pig and rushed out onto the bridge.

At first, it felt weird to stand on something I couldn’t see. More so since the fissure opened up into what appeared to be a bottomless pit. I looked up and spotted Ruby standing in the middle of the bridge and looking back at me. There was a sparkle in her eyes, a sort of glee that I rarely saw in Magi, and then she turned and continued, nearly dancing as she moved.

I followed her at a good pace, just short of breaking into a run. Some twenty paces out, I heard boots behind me and knew that Walker, my mom, and Jade were all following.

I reached what I thought was the halfway point when light appeared down deep within the fissure. I stopped and looked down, trying to determine the source.

The light or source quickly rose and flashed in my eyes.

I sat down on the bridge with my eyes closed for a few seconds. When I opened my eyes, I couldn’t see anything. “Someone please tell me that the lights are out.”

“Why can’t I see anything?” a female voice asked from behind me on the bridge.

“I would assume the light took out the magical lighting of the vaults,” Walker said, his voice unmistakable.

“What are you talking about?” Ruby said. “The lights aren’t out.”

I frowned. “What?”

“I said the lights aren’t out. It’s not dark in here.”

My stomach dropped from under me. “You mean we’re blind?”

“It may take a few minutes for you to regain your sight,” Ruby said.

“We can’t sit here and wait for our sight to return,” Walker said. “This bridge won’t last long.”

“Who can see?” I asked.

“I can,” Ruby said. “But then I had reached the end of the bridge when that flash of light happened.”

“I can see,” said a female voice.

“Mom?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said. “I never saw a flash of light.”

“Good,” Walker said. “You can lead me to the end of the bridge.”

“Okay,” she said. Then I heard footsteps heading my way.

“Wait!” Jade screamed. “What about me?”

“Stay where you are, Jade,” Walker said. “We’ll get you in time.”

I heard them moving again. As they drew up next to me, I heard my mom ask, “Shouldn’t I help Seth too?”

“No,” Walker said, “he’s not in any immediate danger. Get me to the end first, and then I’ll send you back for him.”

“I’ve seen entire lines of blind people led by a single-sighted person, Walker,” I said. “She could easily lead all three of us to the end of the bridge.”

I didn’t hear a reply other than the sounds of their footsteps as they left me.

Of course, Walker would assume that I would try to take advantage of his lack of sight under such conditions. He was more concerned with his agenda, which meant he had to survive above all. Even I was expendable as soon as I let him out of the vault. Rho was right: I had no guarantees that Walker would keep his word and simply leave us all unharmed when this was over.

And then, there was Jade. She wasn’t exactly my biggest fan, but something told me that if I helped her, her allegiance might shift in my favor. No, we wouldn’t be bosom buddies, but she might be less inclined to try to kill me, and I could live with that.

I turned in Jade’s general direction. “Jade.”

“What do you want?” she spat.

“We both want to reach the end of the bridge. We can help ourselves by finding the edges and following them toward Ruby.”

“No,” Ruby called out. “The bridge narrows as it ages. You could be following the edge with your hands and suddenly find it has retracted so far back you’re falling.”

“Then we need you, Mom, and Walker talking to us so we can follow your voices to the end of the bridge,” I said.

I heard movement behind me. “Why are you waiting for the idea?” Jade asked, obviously having already thought of that herself.

I got to my hands and knees and started moving toward the direction of Ruby’s voice. Jade moved up next to me, crawling along beside me, possibly hoping to knock me off the bridge. I bumped her back. She sped up, and I kept up with her.

“Hey, you two, you’re supposed to be making your way to my voice, not trying to knock each other off the bridge,” Ruby said.

“Why can’t we do both?” Jade said, but I could hear a wry smile in her words. Whether she was teasing or not, I wasn’t sure.

Jade bumped me once and I was ready for it. She bounced off me and then screamed.

I don’t know how I did it, but I reached out for her and snagged her wrist. From the way she pulled me, I could tell she was partially over the edge. I spread out prone to add more friction against Jade’s pull, but we were going to need help.

“Ruby!” I called. “Help. Jade’s about to fall.”

“Then let her go,” Walker called. “It’s her fault she didn’t wait as instructed.”

I felt the bridge retract under my foot. It was the other edge of the bridge. “Walker, I can feel the bridge retracting. We need help now, or you’ll never leave the damned vaults!”

“And neither will your mother,” he said. “Remember, whatever happens to me, happens to her as well.”

“I have a feeling that thanks to the charm spell you’ve hit her with, she won’t mind as long as she’s here with you,” I said. “Ball’s in your court.”

The bridge retracted more. I could feel the edge under my knee. Jade held onto my hand with both of hers. I couldn’t see the bridge or anything for that matter, but I didn’t need to be able to see to have a good idea of our situation.

I also recalled that the fissures didn’t completely take the entire hallway. “Ruby, how far is Jade from the level ground?”