“Oh my god,” Elgar hisses, tensing up, his knuckles going white around the cuffs of his cardigan as he stares up around us. His right hand keeps twitching toward his hip, like he wants to pull his knife, and he keeps moving it back to his cuff to keep from making a bigger scene by brandishing a weapon in a crowd. “Oh my god. What does that mean?”
“It means,” Pip says grimly, “that the leak is getting worse. We should—”
A deep, rattling boom fills the hall. It originates from somewhere above us, and is followed by an earth-shaking crash and crunch. The population of the lower levels screams, high and discordant, as one. The floor tilts under me, and I clutch at the card table, sending the little paper squares scattering, to keep on my feet. Ahbni goes down hard, but Pip and Elgar manage to clutch at chairs and remain upright. Kintyre and Bevel look as placid as if they’re standing on a streetcar.
The shaking lasts perhaps twenty seconds in total. The lights flicker again, and the room fills with the rattle and crash of furniture overturning; the high, terrified noises of the people; the sickening thud of bodies hitting cement. The air fills immediately with cement dust, chalky and stifling and impossible to breathe. I bury my chin and mouth in my sleeve, reaching for my wife, who is reaching back, clutching me as the world around us tremors. The four card players dive under the table for shelter against the raining dust and pebbles.
And then, as suddenly as it began, the shaking stops. The room is quiet, each person there waiting, waiting to see. . . . The walls groan. One corner of the room buckles slightly, the tiles of the ceiling cracking under a shift in pressure and weight. It holds. Thank the Writer, it holds.
People start coughing. Standing. Calling for friends, and medical attention, and help. Kintyre and Bevel each stand on chairs, scanning the crowd, searching, searching . . . but no, of course he’s not here. The Viceroy would never endanger himself thus.
Green light flares, once, through the new cracks in the ceiling. Oh, no. Upstairs. All those people who had no time to flee, no warning. Who must have been crushed by . . . by whatever has happened above us. Writer, we need to get out, get up, get to where I can see what’s happening, where I can assess our options.
“What was that?” Elgar asks, voice shaking.
“You wanted a trap?” Pip answers. She huffs in frustration, punching her own thighs. She is wobbling again, eyes glassy, clearly in pain from whatever magics were just used to accomplish the cave-in. “We’re in a trap. And it looks like the bastard just sprang it on us. Look at the escalators, the elevators, the emergency stairs. All cut off. There’s rubble everywhere. Fuck.”
“Save one. That path is clear,” Bevel says, pointing back the way we came, to the escalators. “We should scout it first, though, before we send people up it.”
“Agreed,” I say.
Pip is having trouble finding her balance, and as much as I wish I could be the one to support—or even completely carry—her, my greater strength is needed for Elgar. He is wincing with every step, holding his shoulders and neck tight, and I feel a vicious stab of pleasure to realize that his injuries have been aggravated. Good, let the blind fool suffer. I am not feeling charitable toward him at the moment.
“Right,” Kintyre says, hopping down from his chair. “It looks like the most secure and easily defensible area is there.” He points at the ballroom. “Mr. Reed, take the womenfolk and head inside. Forsyth, Bevel, and I need someone who knows this realm to scout for escape routes with us.”
“The womenfolk?” Ahbni repeats, aghast.
“Time and a place, Ahbni,” Pip says between gritted teeth. “I’d rather Forsyth was with Elgar and I went with Kin and Bev, though.”
Bevel shakes his head. “Protect the Writer. I believe you capable.”
Pip, clearly annoyed that he’s trying to pander to her vanity, snorts and turns to gather up Elgar as well as the four card players still cowering under the table. Whatever backlash she experienced while the upper stories were brought down upon us seems to have left a mark. I do not know how severe it was, what with her being cut off from my view by the dust, but she is mincing, holding her ribs tenderly, grimacing with each step. The green in her eyes lingers, a glowing rim around her iris. I do not know how much more Pip’s body can take before the magical runoff does her a permanent injury, and that terrifies me.
Ahbni and Pip leave first, Elgar and the little pack of card players close on their heels. In the distance, I can see that the doors of the ballroom have been blown off their hinges, the whole wall singed and seared, the metal in them warped and half-melted, dusted with virulently green ash. Between us and them, lining the walls, the doors to all the other small panel rooms have been flung back, left hanging open like gawping mouths, giving the room a gap-toothed grimace. In the center of the open space, the gaming tables are overturned, the chairs thrown to the side, bags and satchels abandoned, food and drink spreading across the concrete.
The people are still, though, startled and hunching down, waiting to see what might happen next.
I see a few bodies amid the tables and rubble, too, and hope that they are not dead. Though, better dead than injured and abandoned to their pain. I wish to go to them, to help, to see. But the safety of my family is paramount, and perhaps once I’ve got them ensconced in a safe place, Bevel, Kintyre, and I can come back to see what can
