The cypher’s jaw clenched. “How far is the crawl?”
“About twenty cubits. It’s really not so bad.”
She grappled with this for a long moment. “I’ll go first. I want to be able to see the end.”
“Fine by me.”
They splashed through the shallow river that marked the crevice. Cathrynne eyed it with trepidation, then dropped down to shine her light through.
“I can see the other side,” she said with a touch of relief.
“You don’t have to go in,” Kal said again. “I promise the kaldurite is there.”
The cypher sat up on her haunches. “I believe you. But I still want to go. I need to . . .” She trailed off.
“Prove that you can?” Kal finished.
Cathrynne nodded.
“Believe me, I get it,” Kal said. “I’ve crawled into some seriously funky places for the same reason.” She smiled and Cathrynne smiled back. At that moment, Kal decided that she couldn’t abandon this woman in the tunnels. She just couldn’t do it.
“The Light-Bringer,” she said in a rush. “I’ve heard his word is unbreakable. Is that true?”
“It’s true. Integrity means everything to him.”
“So when he said I’d be free, he meant it?”
“He did, and you have my word, too.” She paused. “I’m so sorry about your friend, Kal. He didn’t deserve that.”
She thought Durian might appear and crack a joke, but he didn’t. A hot lump tightened her throat. “Thanks,” she managed. “You’d better go first. We only have an hour before the angel comes looking for us, remember?”
The crawl turned out to be easier than last time since neither of them was wearing a pack. Cathrynne slithered through the low tunnel faster than Kal could believe, then bent over with her hands on her knees, breath rasping. It opened into a vast cavern that their lamps couldn’t fully illuminate. Stalactites hung from the ceiling like icicles, matched by stalagmites that rose from the floor. In some places, they joined to form columns thick as old trees.
“Hey, you did it,” Kal said, patting her back.
“Hated every second, but . . . Minerva’s luck,” Cathrynne breathed, looking around in awe.
Hundreds of kaldurite stones in varying sizes were scattered across the cavern floor. Blues deepened to violet, reds flashed like glowing embers, all changing as the light of the electric torches moved across their facets.
Cathrynne crouched, watching the colors shift. She used her sleeve to pick up a stone. “Amazing, isn’t it?” she said. “Like a void in the ley. How is that even possible?”
While she was preoccupied examining the stone, Kal discreetly scooped handfuls into her trouser pockets. When they were full to bulging, she returned to Cathrynne.
“You know where it is now,” she said. “So let’s get back?—”
The stones on the cavern floor began to wobble and jitter, sending sparkles of light across the cavern walls. Cathrynne stiffened. They stood motionless, barely breathing. The tremors came again, stronger this time. Rhythmic quakes that sent dust sifting down from the ceiling. Then came a sound that turned Kal’s blood to ice: a dry scrape like a dozen knives being sharpened at once.
She extinguished her torch with a quick twist. Cathrynne followed suit a second later, plunging them into darkness.
A glow appeared at the crevice. Not the steady light of a torch but the flickering orange-blue of living flame. It brightened, throwing distorted shadows across the cave wall. The air grew forge-hot. Sweat erupted across Kal’s body. She pulled the Bluekiller from her belt. Subtract the bullet she’d fired at Levi and she had seven left.
“Get back!” Kal cried.
They scrambled out of the way as a gout of white flame shot from the crevice. That burnt-toast smell scorched her lungs and coated her tongue. Through wavering lines of heat, she saw that the narrow shaft they’d crawled through was now a full-fledged Sinn tunnel.
She grabbed Cathrynne’s hand, gripping the pistol in the other. They backed away as the head appeared, roughly the size of a mining tram, with a crown of six silver horns. Its gaze found them. The blue emperor opened its jaws, revealing teeth like ivory daggers.
The Sinn unleashed a deafening roar. It bulled into the cavern, moving with the speed and power of a fright train. They retreated to the rear wall, where another smooth-walled tunnel wound into darkness. Kal switched her lamp on, flashing the beam into the gloom.
