Sera could do this. She knew angles. She knew cause and effect. She understood the physical world so much better than she understood most things. Maybe tomorrow she would go back to thinking herself stupid, but not today.
Miles carried firearms. Guns required powder to create the explosions that launched the bullet. Which means they stored that powder somewhere.
Sera searched her memory for the storerooms located throughout Demon Row. Wraith had various supply houses set up for emergencies. The closest was the one just next to her building, but it was also too close to Cole’s flames. There was another a few streets over in the craftsmen district, but she’d have to take the long way around. Her sense of direction was not the greatest, but the pressure and gravity of the situation formed a crystal clear picture in her head of the direction they needed to go.
“This way,” she ordered, not releasing Kieran’s hand. Needing that grounding sense of security.
It took close to ten minutes to reach the storeroom a few blocks over. A single guard was posted at the entrance, likely following procedure for if Demon Row was ever under attack. She raised her weapon as they approached, but Kieran moved faster, the jagged remains of his sword held at the woman’s chin.
“We are not your enemy today,” Kieran said, motioning toward the commotion of the battle with Cole that could be heard even at this distance.
“Is there powder in there?” Sera asked.
The woman pursed her lips, like she intended to hold her ground, but Kieran drove the blade into her neck a little harder, a single dot of blood welling from one of the jagged points.
“Kindly answer the lady. Time is of the essence,” Kieran said in his politician’s voice, the tone equally flat and polite. Sera bit her lip.
The guard looked toward the sound of fighting, the thick column of black smoke rising into the sky, then back at them as if she was undecided about cooperating.
“I can help,” Sera said, earning a quick dart of the woman’s eyes. “I can stop Cole.”
The woman gave a single nod and Sera pushed through to enter the storeroom. She didn’t know what Kieran did or said after she left, but the woman was gone when she checked the door. The barrel of gunpowder was marked very clearly with skulls and flames.
“We’ll never lift this out of here,” Kieran observed.
“We don’t need all of it, just enough.” She started throwing things around, searching for something she could use to create an airtight container, preferably metal. She’d watched arrows catching on the flames. That fire was hot enough to lite anything that passed through it.
Kieran held up a bag. “Would this suffice?”
Sera shook her head, sparing a passing glance to confirm that it wasn’t what she needed. “We need to build pressure, something sturdy that can…” She found a forge mold near the ground, its shape designed to create some sort of larger circular item like a cannonball. She checked the heavy bolt clamps that screwed in place to seal it while the metal cooled. It was thick iron, the perfect vessel to hold the powder until the heat could build enough pressure to cause an explosion. Similar to firearms, with enough heat one could theoretically create the same process that fired bullets but on a larger scale.
“This will work.” Sera hefted the mold, rolling it until it was beneath the barrel of gunpowder. She located a funnel near the gunpowder and set it in the same hole blacksmith’s used to fill the mold with liquid metal. “Quick, fill it as much as you can.” She passed over a cooking ladle she’d unearthed with some kitchen supplies.
Kieran didn’t take the offered ladle, his eyes fixed on the mold. It was the first time Sera had truly stopped to look at him since leaving her apartment.
The warmer tones in his skin had completely drained of color. Long slow blinks. Noticeable effort in each hard rise and fall of his breathing.
“How much?” Kieran asked, still eyeing her choice of container. His voice wavered, nothing of the smooth cadence it usually held.
The iron.
The heat.
“Kieran, are you alright?” She forgot her plans and stepped closer. Dread crawled up her spine. How had she not noticed? He looked seconds from collapsing and now she’d just pushed an iron object directly next to him.
There was a calm certainty in his gaze, though it couldn’t hide the pain and fatigue. “As well as can be expected.”
“I’m so sorry. The mold is made of iron… but it’s the only thing in here that will work…”
He held up a hand, his arm falling to land gently against her, his fingertips brushing her cheek. He took a deep breath, like just lifting his arm had cost him dearly. “While I would rather not touch it directly, I can handle a headache. The nausea is rather unpleasant, but nothing debilitating.” He gave her a weak smile. “I’ll be fine.”
“Do you have any glacite or—”
“Sera.”
She stopped panicking to meet his stare.
“Let’s finish this. And then I can sleep for a few years. Preferably, in a snowdrift. But for now, we should focus on the task at hand. I have no hope of following your thought process, which is clearly superior in this area. You and only you, are capable of stopping him. Now. How much do I need to fill this?”
