“Yes. The Cube and the arc can see through time. I can show you your father as he was. You can see where he went—and where he is now.”
“He really is alive?” The idea rocked Gavin harder than the tritone paradox. The vague memory of his father’s voice sang softly in his head.
He longed to hear that voice again, learn where his own voice had come from.
Learn why his father had left.
“Did he go away because of me?” Gavin whispered. “Was it because I wasn’t as good at music as he was? Was I a bad son?”
“Gavin!” Alice cried. “Stop him!”
“We can look,” Dr. Clef mouthed. “We can seek. We can find. It is easy, Gavin. You will discover, uncover, ascertain.”
Ice slid down Gavin’s spine. “No. You’re lying! It’s a lie!”
Gavin fired, and the entire world slowed for him. The cog spun lazily through the air, teeth catching light and splitting it into a trillion particles that scattered like drops of syrup. Dr. Clef, with inhuman reflexes, snapped the clip connecting the paradox generator to the Impossible Cube. A blue rose of a spark bloomed and just as quickly flickered into death. The cog continued its long, slow spin. The paradox generator fell silent as all its energy drained into the Cube. Dr. Clef’s facial muscles stretched toward a smile. The cog whirled, heating the air an infinitesimal amount as it passed, and smashed into the paradox generator.
Utter silence fell over the entire chamber. Then a terrible, discordant sound boomed through the room. Time snapped back to its normal pace. The light within the arc flickered and spun like the eye of a hurricane. A terrible red light poured into the turbine room. Within the eye of the arc, Gavin saw gently flowing water, blue and calm, as if he were looking up from the bottom of a pool or river. His mind leaped from connection to connection, and he realized he was looking at a hole that punched through a dozen dimensions and opened into the past, into a number of time periods in the past, and he could see where the river had once flowed through this spot.
At that moment, a force very much like gravity pulled him toward the arc. He resisted and turned to flee, but it grew stronger with every passing second. It was like running through water. Two of Alice’s little automatons were sucked squeaking toward the arc. They struggled against the force that pulled at them, but their propellers had been damaged by the Impossible Cube and in the end they were dragged through the arc. The automatons sheered and shredded and vanished with a human-sounding scream. On the other side, the water bubbled and boiled like a cauldron, though it stayed on the other side. The Impossible Cube sat perfectly still on the table.
Dr. Clef managed to wrap his arms around one of the table legs and hold on. Gavin, now on hands and knees, made it back to Alice, who was still lying on the ground. She had braced her feet against an outcrop of brick on the floor and had caught hold of Feng’s wrist with her iron-bound hand. The spider’s eyes glowed green. How were they going to get out? Gavin felt himself being dragged backward. Alice’s hair was drawn forward over her face. Fear for himself and for Alice and Feng made Gavin’s heart beat against his spine. The force abruptly strengthened, and it lifted Feng bodily from the ground. Wind roared through the turbine room.
“Hang on, Feng!” Alice cried. “Don’t let go!”
And then Gavin lost his grip on the floor and tumbled backward toward the arc.
Susan Phipps felt the strange pull even on the staircase, and she nearly lost her balance. So did Glenda, who only saved herself by clutching at the handrail.
“What the bloody hell?” Glenda said.
“It’s that clockworker,” Phipps replied. “If I read those notes we found on the train correctly, he’s planning to do something with time. Michaels and Ennock must be
Her fury grew. It felt like she had been chasing Alice Michaels and Gavin Ennock for most of her life. She couldn’t remember when she’d last had a good night’s sleep or actually enjoyed a meal or simply sat and rested. Michaels and Ennock had become her entire world, and when had that happened?
A sudden urge overcame her, an overwhelming desire to simply turn and walk away. No one would know except Glenda, and she would keep her mouth shut if ordered. It would be so easy.
Then an image of her father standing on the front steps with the carpet bags at his feet sprang into her mind. Justice and fairness, always. They had gotten her where she was now. It was impossible to give them up just because it was inconvenient. She firmed her jaw and continued more carefully down the stairs, ready to do what was right.
And if her current path was wrong? Even… unjust? She paused for a long moment, caught between balanced concepts.
“Lieutenant?” Glenda asked behind her.
Phipps abruptly straightened her back. “I’m fine,” she said sharply. “Let’s keep going.”
At the bottom, she found the door already open, and beyond lay an enormous room filled with giant metal snail shells, strange machinery, and the very people she’d been chasing all this time. A metal arc glowed an evil red and seemed to be sucking everything greedily into itself, gaining power with every passing moment. Even as she watched, two of Alice’s little automatons were sucked into it and destroyed. The other automatons, including that stupid cat Click, managed to limp around to the back of one of the turbines and cling there as Alice braced herself against a line of bricks on the floor. The force reached outward and pulled at Phipps even more strongly.
“What’s happening?” Glenda said.
“Run up and grab that rope from the top of the stairwell.” Phipps drew a multiple coil dispersal pistol that she had snatched from the Cossack armory and twisted the charging unit. It whined with eager power. “We’re going to end this.”
Alice saw Gavin go by. Without thinking, she flung out her right hand and actually managed to catch his arm. Her shoulders burned. She was holding two men now, with her feet braced against the brick outcrop as wind tore past her face and hair. Her eyes met Gavin’s. Oh God—her grip was slipping, and it felt like her arms were coming
