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July 11th
“I got the ’stone to her,” Eldren said as he sunk into one of the chairs opposite Orso’s desk.
Orso gave him a look of sympathy. “It’s all we can do for now. The rest is up to Phaedra.”
“There has to be something more we can do.”
Orso grunted. “There is plenty left to do. But right now, with this, we have to trust her.”
“If anyone can do it, it’s her.” Eldren didn’t want to voice the doubts that statement left him riddled with. He couldn’t accept the possibility that Phae would fail, even if he was terrified it was all for nothing.
“Trust is a powerful tool. At some point, we’re going to have to trust she can pull this off.”
“It’s so unfair,” Eldren said.
“The world isn’t fair. But we’re doing everything we can to right it.”
Eldren leaned his forearms on his knees, head down. “What do we do next? Please don’t say, ‘wait and see,’” he said, stifling the dark laughter that threatened to bubble over.
Orso stroked his beard. “There are those angels underground we need to check up on. Make sure they’re in running order.” He shuffled a few things around on his desk. “I can pull some strings. Get you on the engineering team if you want.”
Eldren’s head snapped up. “Wait, how did you—”
“Merethyl told me. I know it’s not exciting,” Orso told Eldren as he fidgeted. “But it’ll keep you busy until I need you again.”
Eldren wanted something active to do, not passive. But having nothing to occupy him was a nightmare. “I can do that.”
“Good. Before you head off, I want you go to find Abraham and give him this.” Orso passed a piece of paper over. “It’s a work order.”
Eldren took the paper. “Thanks, Old Man.” Eldren stood up and left, heading off for Abraham’s office. He didn’t really want to help restore the Angels, but what choice did he have? There wasn’t anything else to do at that moment, and he didn’t want to wander Temple’s halls just then.
Eldren found Abraham in his office. “Orso said to give this to you,” he said, passing over the piece of paper.
“Ah, yes, Orso and I talked about this. Since there wasn’t much to do right now, we could have you on the work team.” Abraham gave Eldren a sympathetic smile. “It’s only temporary until the next order comes through.”
“It feels like busywork.”
“That’s because it is. But Orso felt, and I agreed, that keeping you busy would help keep you out of trouble.”
“I’m not a kid,” Eldren said.
“No, you’re not. But we also don’t want you worrying yourself to death while waiting for the next step.”
It made sense. Eldren didn’t want it to make sense, but it did. “I get it.”
“The teams are underground. They’ve been working night and day, they’re almost done. Not much left, from what I hear.”
Eldren stood. “Thanks,” he said before walking out. Eldren made his way through Temple and deep underground. He didn’t need a set of directions because there were signs along the way, helping guide other workers. He made it to the cavern and found a worker who looked to be in charge.
The man listened to Eldren. “We could use help oiling the joints, if you don’t mind. We want to make sure they function like they’re supposed to.” He gestured to someone behind Eldren, and Eldren found himself accepting rags and oil cans.
There were more engineers than he expected, though with the number of mechanical objects in Harbor, it made sense. Eldren went to the nearest Angel and went to work where directed, making sure everything he could reach would be ready to use. He took his time, losing himself in the work so he didn’t worry about what he couldn’t fix at that moment. It surprised him when the crew broke for lunch that he had been successful.
Soon after, lunch was done, and it was back to work. This time he went up some of the scaffolding to work on higher joints he couldn’t reach, throwing himself into the work in the hopes he could forget his problems a while longer. It wasn’t what he wanted to do, but it was familiar. Orso and Abraham had been right to suggest this.
***
He was cleaning up at the end of his day when there was an explosion. It rocked the cavern, sending dirt and rocks raining down from above. People scattered for the exits, yelling, and Eldren followed, knowing it was Aurelius. He would know those explosions anywhere.
Chaos was everywhere. People were running and fleeing. Eldren felt his face blanch as he looked for someone to tell him what had happened. Thoughts of Aurelius rose in him as he ran, looking for someone in charge.
Up above ground, he found a team putting out a fire in a room and got shooed away from the door. “What’s going on?” Eldren asked the people waiting outside.
“Someone set off a small explosive in the room where the prophecy machine was being kept,” Abraham said from behind him. “There were similar explosions underground, though much bigger.”
“Anyone see who did it?” Eldren asked.
Abraham shook his head no. “Lavorna was the last one to use this room, but he saw nothing.”
Eldren’s pulse thudded in his throat. “I need to talk to you and Orso.”
***
“I’m telling you there’s something up with Lavorna,” Eldren said, repeating the things he had witnessed.
“It’s suspicious, but not enough to confront a High Council member with,” Orso said.
“You don’t believe me.”
“No, we do,” Abraham said. “Lavorna has always been a problem, and his appointment to High Council made it worse. But we can’t go around making baseless accusations without something to back it up.”
“What about the prophecy machine?” Eldren asked.
“I had relegated it to storage until either Sub Council or High Council decided to fix it. I put in another request to repair it just recently, though they denied it.”
“What’s blocking you?”
“High Council,” Abraham and Orso said at the same time.
“That’s just lovely,” Eldren said, exhaling sharply.
Orso and Abraham exchanged glances. “That’s why I want you to repair it without getting caught,” Orso said.
Eldren sat up. “What? Why?”
“Because we need the machine. I found out where they’re going to move it, and I’d like you to make the repairs while most everyone else is sleeping and generate two prophecies.”
“Temple never sleeps.”
“High Council does,” Abraham pointed out. “And I think I can arrange for guards we can trust.”
***
Eldren snuck into the room where they had stashed the prophecy machine, a gear bag slung over one shoulder. The guard was gone, but Abraham had assured him that the one they posted was on their side.
Eldren let himself into the room and got to work. The machine was a wreck on the outside, but that was just the casing. As long as the damage on the inside wasn’t extensive, he could fix it in no time and get the two prophecies Orso needed.
Some gears had gotten pushed out of place and others bent out of shape, and Eldren replaced them with a gentle touch. There were other repairs to make, but they were much easier to handle than the radio on Simone’s ’ship. Finished with that, he put the panel back on and flicked the switch. The lights came to life, flashing from white to red and then to green.
This was it. He keyed in the sequence for the first prophecy, and the dashboard lit up to spit the paper out. Keying in the second, he had only fetched the piece of paper when sounds came from the door.
“You’re not the guard I posted,” said a familiar voice.
“He was sick. I was ordered to replace him.”
Eldren looked around the room for a hiding spot. At the back was a doorway into what he suspected were the tunnels and he dashed to it as the guard tried to prevent the person on the other side from coming in. Eldren was closing the door behind him when the other one opened.
“Stop!” Lavorna yelled as Eldren shut and locked the door. Taking a lantern, he dashed away to hide, gripping it so tight his hand was numb, as he didn’t know if Lavorna was going to send people after him.
A light bobbed up ahead, and Eldren shuttered his lantern to hide. “It’s just me,” said another familiar voice.
Eldren unshuttered his lantern and held it up to see Merethyl. “What are you doing here?” he said.
“I was waiting nearby. I was hoping to find you in the tunnel,” she said. “Did you get the prophecy machine working?”
“I got the two prophecies.”
“What do they say?” she asked.
“The first one was just a reworked version of the old one,” he said. “But it was the same question.”
“What about the second? The one about what to do right now?” Merethyl stared at him, eyes wide and glassy.
“I didn’t have time to read it,” he said. “Hold on, it’s in my pocket.” He reached in and fished out two papers. “This is the new one,” he said, handing it over to Merethyl. “This is the one we’re more interested in,” he said, looking at it in the lantern light. A frown crossed his face.
“What does it say?”
“Rescue the Goddess and her compatriots,” he said. “That’s less than helpful.”
“I don’t know, it confirms the ’stone has accepted Phaedra. But where do we rescue her? And who are the rest?”
Eldren’s mouth pressed into a thin line. “That’s what I want to figure out as well.”
