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The elevator shook and shimmied as it rose. I gritted my teeth and tightened my grip on Erik’s arm. What a way to go. Survive the undead Armageddon only to die in an elevator. But we didn’t fall to our deaths. Instead, the elevator shuddered to a stop. Mr. Dwivedi pulled back the gate and led us out into an open room that resembled a combination café and library. “Before we begin our business,” he said, “we will pause for refreshment.” Dr. Dwivedi clapped his hand and called out. “Parvati?”
A moment later, a girl about my age swirled into the room. Her gorgeous gown wrapped and folded around her body in a single piece of shimmering, bright fabric. The sari’s soft-pink hues brought out the rosy undertones in her dusky skin. “This is my niece, Parvati.” Dr. Dwivedi gestured toward the girl then bent and whispered in her ear.
Parvati nodded and disappeared but returned moments later carrying a laden tea tray. She had prepared it so quickly, almost as if she’d been expecting visitors. Gold bangles glinted on her wrist as she arranged cups and pots. I had never really coveted jewelry—too impractical—but she wore the accessories in a way that stirred a strange longing in my heart. Most of the time, I didn’t dwell on the loss of luxury and conveniences. Waking up each day to find myself still alive was usually enough to satisfy me. But sometimes... sometimes I missed the comfort of soft, shiny, ridiculous things. I missed the lost world they signified.
Dr. Dwivedi motioned toward the low table, and Erik stepped forward. I mimicked his actions as he lowered himself to his knees and eased onto an overstuffed pillow. Only then, in the warm lighting of the café, did I notice more details about our host. Dwivedi wore a dark-green jacket hanging nearly to his knees. Elegant stitching adorned its banded collar, and mother-of-pearl buttons dotted the length of his coat’s placards. In fact, almost everything about Dr. Dwivedi and his home was more elegant than anything Bloom and I had stumbled across in all the years of our lone survival. High-dollar homes in the city had managed to retain an air of stylishness, but whenever Bloom and I stopped in to raid them, those abodes had felt like empty husks, leftover skins shed by a snake. This place, however, felt vital—alive and thriving.
Dr. Dwivedi poured from his teapot as another man entered the room. He slid a slim volume onto one of the abundant bookshelves lining the walls. Then he paused, one hand braced on his hip and the other stroking his bearded chin, as he pondered his next selection. Questions flooded me, so many I couldn’t decide where to start, but Erik must have sensed my unrest because his strong fingers clamped down on my knee. He didn’t let go until I stopped fidgeting.
Dr. Dwivedi blew into his teacup then sipped. Smacking his lips, he sighed, obviously satisfied with the brew in his cup. “Now that we have a proper setting for it, please tell me why you have come.”
Though Dr. Dwivedi had directed the question to me, Erik answered. “We hope you can help us find something that has gone missing.”
I scowled at Erik for speaking on my behalf, but he ignored me.
“Is this something that belongs to you, Cy?” Dwivedi asked.
“No.” Erik flushed. “No, this is Sera’s loss.”
“Then why do you not let her tell me about it?” Dr. Dwivedi’s gaze turned to me. “Tell me, Miss Blite. What have you misplaced?”
“It’s not so much of a what as a who.” Tentatively, I sipped my tea. Flavors of cardamom, cloves, anise, and cinnamon flooded my senses. Milky, hot, and spicy, the stuff in my cup resembled nothing of the teas Bloom and I had brewed in our vault.
Dr. Dwivedi chuckled. “What who?”
“My sister, who. Bloomington Blite. I call her Bloom.”
“You’ve misplaced your sister?” He blinked like a surprised owl.
“I didn’t misplace her.” Heat scalded my cheeks as shame, anger, and dread washed through me. “She’s just up and went missing.”
“And where was the last place you remember seeing her?” he asked, as though Bloom were a set of misplaced house keys.
“We fell asleep on the roof of the Savings and Loan—that’s where we live. It was the night before last. When I woke up, she was gone. I haven’t seen her since.”
The scientist’s brow folded into a field of deep wrinkles as he considered my story. “I suppose her behavior is unusual, then. She does not regularly disappear without first telling you of her intentions?”
I shook my head. “No, sir. Never.”
“At this juncture, I would be disinclined to believe there is any assistance that anyone here might offer you. We are not regularly in the business of rescuing lost souls, at least not the physical bodies containing them. I suspect, however, there is more to your story.”
“I think Moll Grimes has something to do with Bloom’s disappearance.” I took another careful sip from my cup. Beside me, Erik also seemed to be enjoying his tea. In between sips, he stared at it as though it contained the answers to all of life’s deepest mysteries.
“Moll Grimes?” Dr. Dwivedi’s nostrils flared. His mustache twitched as his full lips thinned into a hard line. “I should have suspected.”
After I explained about Bloom’s mechanical aptitude and how the attack on the generator at the river coincided with Bloom’s disappearance, Dr. Dwivedi urged us to finish our tea. Then he led us back to the elevator and directed the car to lower us deep into the bowels of his college, even below the basement level where Erik and I had first entered.
“We have made many improvements to this building,” Dr. Dwivedi said. “Most of which the city council would have never approved in the Time Before.” He must have noticed the worried expression on my face, because he patted my shoulder. “Oh, everything we have done is structurally sound. Do not worry for the safety of your lovely head. It is simply that the city would have required permits and inspectors, which would have elicited too many of the wrong kinds of questions.
“If the library, where we just were, is the heart of this college,” he continued, “then the place to which I now conduct you is the brain.”
The elevator settled with an audible thud, and Dr. Dwivedi opened the brass cage. He conducted us into a room furnished with row upon row of flat wooden worktables covered in glass jars, beakers, tubes, and other mechanical whatnots I couldn’t put names to. Colorful potions bubbled and steamed from some containers while others rested dormant in racks and shelves, looking somehow ominous in their stasis. Large wooden cases lined the perimeter of the room, stacked with books, scientific equipment, and other things utterly unfamiliar and foreign.
Like a ringmaster in a circus presenting a daring new act, Dr. Dwivedi bent at his waist and executed a wide, dramatic wave that encompassed the entire room. “Welcome to the laboratory.”