“Anyone spot any cradles?” I scan the clockface, then the four elements sculpted on the exterior edge.
The crown wheel advances notch by notch, trickling a slowtick, tick, tickthat echoes around the library.
Bastian crouches. “Maybe the cradles are the elements?”
“Or in the Quatrefoil loops, or petals, or whatever they’re called?” Alma stares at the gold outline that extends from one edge of the clock to the next.
“Alma may have a point. Perhaps we’re supposed to place our pieces in the leaves aligned with our element.” Adrien gestures to one of the triangles—either his or Slate’s, since there’s no bar through it.
The Air and Earth triangles are both slashed to indicate the separation between the ground and the sky. Mine should be upside-down, but all the triangles are pointing out, making thedihunerresemble a giant compass.
Alma squints at the element closest to her. “How can you tell whose element is whose? They all sort of look the same.”
Bastian points to mine and Gaëlle’s. “Two have bars through them. Earth and Air.”
“Okay . . . but how can you tell which one is which?”
“The one that’s upside-down is Earth. The other is Air.”
“And how do you know which one’s upside-down?”
“Oh.” Bastian rubs the back of his head. “I’m not sure. Adrien?”
Adrien touches the triangle that could potentially be his. When he’s not struck down by a freakish bolt of lightning, I lean forward and run my fingertips over the one that could theoretically be mine. The slashed triangle emits a pulse of neon green light that sends me stumbling back. My tailbone whacks the tiles.
“Cadence!” Slate yells, racing across the clock instead of around it.
I want to tell him not to tread on it, but by the time I shake off my surprise, he’s already kneeling beside me, flipping my hands over as though checking for burn marks. “I’m okay. I was just surprised and slipped.”
Slate’s dark eyes narrow. “So, the element didn’t send you hurtling back?”
“No.”
He’s still checking over my fingers.
“I promise.”
“It’s true, Slate. Look.” Adrien’s walked around to the opposite side of where he was standing when I fell, and his hand rests on the second plain triangle.
The shape glows crimson.
“How cool!” Alma claps her hands.
“Wow.” Bastian presses his glasses up the bridge of his nose.
A new noise, a grinding of sorts, sounds over the steady ticking.
“What is that?” I whisper. Or maybe I yell it. My blood pounds so loudly against my eardrums it’s hard for me to gauge the volume of my voice.
Although he doesn’t let go of my hands, Slate finally looks away from them and over his shoulder.
“Thatwould be the cradles,” Adrien whispers reverently.
I tear my hands from Slate’s and push myself up. Sure enough, in the middle of the leaf aligned with the fire element, a recess has appeared in the exact shape and size of the leaf he collected after he defeated theguivre.
I blink and stare, then blink some more. And then I lean over and press my fingertips to my shape. It ignites, sending my pulse into orbit. I tip my head back, find Slate looming over me, arms crossed, chin dipped into his neck, black eyes painted a vivid emerald-green and narrowed on the point of contact between my body and the clock.
“We need to call Gaëlle,” I whisper, my voice husky with wonder. “And Papa.”
