It hit me then, memories from that time flooding my mind. Memories replayed much clearer in my god mind.
“It was at the temple where they make the servers,” I said in a rush. “Images just like these were on the walls there. I didn’t pay any attention to them at the time, because I was a little busy trying not to get turned into a mindless server. But they were definitely etched into some of the panelling.”
Cyrus froze for a moment, then he stepped back from Emmy. When she spun toward him, he smiled. “I just thought of something. Don’t move, I’ll be right back.”
He disappeared out of sight before anyone could get in another word.
We all stood there in silence for a click, no doubt wondering what the hell Cyrus had figured out. After another click, Coen reached into his pocket and pulled out the note. A timepiece appeared from somewhere as well. I’d never been that organised in my entire life—he’d probably be keeping track of things for me for the rest of our sun-cycles.
“We have twelve clicks until the arranged time,” he said. “Cyrus better move his ass.”
I went back to the wall, my mind trying to piece it together. “The symbols … some of them are repeated,” I mumbled to myself. “Not in any sort of recognisable pattern though.”
“We need a key,” Emmy whispered from nearby, taking me by surprise as I jolted.
“A key?” I asked.
“With codes like this, you need to know at least a few letters or words. You need a key to work from.”
“Do you think that’s what Cyrus is fetching?” I asked, turning fully toward her.
She shrugged. “You know I hate guessing. Especially since Cyrus takes me by surprise a lot—he never does what I expect him to do.”
A concept which would usually have bothered her, but she seemed pretty relaxed about it now.
“To kill some time, tell us what happened after you were taken by Pica.” Aros’s voice was husky. “We have pieced some of it together, but there’s still a lot I’d like to know.”
“Same,” Yael added drily.
Knowing our time was limited, I launched straight into the kidnapping, her crazy power-sucking room, and the blade of Crowe she had designed for me. The Abcurses’ eyes darkened when I spoke briefly of the blade, and then again when I talked of my time in the imprisonment realm.
Emmy clutched my arm. “Willa!” she gasped.
I shook my head. “I had no other choice. I was pretty confident I’d be able to return like last time. And in the process get Pica out of our lives and free Jakan.”
“It was a good plan,” Rome said, surprising me. “But if you ever do anything so risky again …” He trailed off and I almost wanted him to finish that sentence.
Punishment from the Abcurses was not really a bad thing.
“I’m sorry that I worried you, I wish there was another way, but I had to rid us of Pica once and for all. She never would have given me up. Never. She lost her child and it broke her mind. She was not going to lose another child, and that was what I represented to her.”
“As much as I hate her,” Emmy said sadly, “I’m hoping that she has found her child and some peace in the imprisonment realm.”
I hoped for that too, because I couldn’t imagine my own grief at a loss like that.
Coen glanced at the timepiece and his brow furrowed. “Eight clicks.”
Come on, Cyrus.
In a rush, I finished telling them everything. They were most fascinated to learn that the imprisonment realm was a reflection of the mortal glass, and then pissed off to learn how Crowe made his weapons to trap the gods’ souls there.
By the time I was done, Coen was staring quite resolutely at the timepiece, and I was nervously pacing, trying to figure out what I would do if we missed the deadline to open our channel. A small gasp was the only signal I had that Cyrus was back.
Emmy rushed toward him first, having sensed him or something. I hurried after her, blinking in the darkness as I realised that Cyrus held a squirming dweller in one hand—he had a firm grip on the female’s throat—and in the other hand was a thick tome. The leather-bound book had some age to it, the dark ochre cover cracked and peeling.
“Three and a half clicks,” Coen said shortly before Cyrus could speak.
“Who is that?” Emmy asked, reaching out to free the dweller from Cyrus.
