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We push on at the same sluggish pace as before, both far too exhausted to go any faster. I start to worry about upholding my end of the deal. What if there are no boreholes up here, or I can’t open the locks?
I want to keep checking how much further we have to climb, but that would waste my dwindling energy reserves, so I proceed as I did before, hand, foot, foot, hand, not looking up.
I don’t realise I’ve come to the top of the cliff until I move my right hand forward and meet nothing but air. I wriggle my fingers, figuring I must have found a hole, searching for rock to either side. With a groan, I tilt my head back, and find myself staring at the floorboards of the Cuckoo’s Nest, which jut over the edge of the cliff.
“Inez?”
She pauses, looks up, and smiles weakly. “Open sesame.”
“But there’s nothing to open,” I tell her, looking for locks but not spotting any.
“Are you sure?” she asks.
“Nothing,” I say bitterly. “Just wood.” I reach up to rap the floorboards, but my knuckles pass through them, momentarily disappearing. I yank back my hand with a squeal.
“Don’t worry,” Inez says. “It’s an overlap, the same as in the Born.”
“Right,” I sigh. “It was that way in the Empire State Building. I was able to pass through ceilings and walls. But the cliff ends here. How can we go any further?”
Inez studies the underbelly of the palace. “It looks like it’s resting on top of the cliff,” she says. “The overlap could be structural. Everyone thinks the tree supports the Cuckoo’s Nest, but maybe it needed an extra prop, and a deviser worked a cliff from the Born into the mix.”
“Thanks for the architecture lesson,” I say sourly. “How does it help us?”
Inez shoots me a dirty look. “It’s simple, Archibald. If the cliff supports the building, there should be a cliff top as well as a cliff face.”
Shouldering her way past me, Inez stretches a hand out further than mine, pats around, then digs into a horizontal part of the cliff that neither of us can see.
“I get it,” I wheeze, moving my hand forward the way she did, hauling myself up and over the edge of the cliff.
I hang there for a moment. A field of green grass lies ahead of me, running to the far end of the Cuckoo’s nest, where it stops. It’s the same to my left and right. The building is perched on a square of green.
“That’s not right,” I frown. “The cliff runs further to the left and right on the face than it does here.”
“How many times do I have to tell you?” Inez grunts as she drags herself clear of the drop. “Space works differently in the Merge. It looks like the deviser ran four cliffs together. Down there we could see our cliff as it is in the Born. Up here we can see the point where the four interlink.”
“The space thing is going to make my head explode one day,” I grumble. Then I bring my legs up, crawl well away from the edge of the cliff, and stand.
“That was easy,” I say jokingly.
Inez stares at me incredulously, then laughs. I laugh too. We grab hold of one another and hug hard, weaving on our feet, laughing hysterically, a few happy tears slipping out as well.
We finally separate, laughter dying away, and wipe the tears from our cheeks.
“I want to crawl into a soft bed and sleep for a week,” I say.
“Me too,” Inez agrees.
She removes her hooks and groans as she straightens. I do the same, and we both try to rub the knots out of our spines. Kneading my sides with my knuckles, I look around. We’re on top of the cliff, but also inside a room in the Cuckoo’s Nest. It’s a small, bare room, supplies stacked on shelves.
“Tell me you see locks,” Inez mutters.
At first I don’t, but then, in the external wall, I spot a small yellow lock.
“There,” I say, pointing with a trembling hand.
Inez beams, but when I don’t move, she frowns. “Go on, do your thing.”
I shake my head. “That wall overhangs the edge of the cliff. If it’s a borehole like the one below, we’ll fall to the ground if we step through.”
Inez stares at the wall, then at the cliff edge. “You can reach the lock if you lean forward,” she says.
“So what?”
“Why position it there if it was a death trap?”
I frown. “Maybe it leads to another zone.”
She makes a growling noise. “Open it.”
“But it’s a waste of time,” I argue. “We should check the other rooms.”
“Just do it,” she snaps.
I shuffle back towards the cliff edge, muttering foul things beneath my breath. When I’m close to the edge, I consider putting my hooks on, so that I can grip the earth with my feet, but then Inez pops up behind me and grabs hold of the back of my trousers. I lean forward and stretch out my fingers to explore the lock. It’s like the one I accessed from the vine, and a borehole opens less than a minute later.
“Have you got a firm hold?” I ask.
“Firmer than you deserve,” Inez says icily.
I almost bite at her, but she’s only irritated because she’s drained. Holding my tongue, I poke my head through the borehole... then pull back with a yelp.
“What is it?” Inez shouts. “What’s wrong?”
I stare at her wordlessly. With a scowl, she pushes me aside and leans through the borehole, more confident on her feet than I am, not requiring assistance. She’s smiling when she withdraws. “Look again,” she says. “It’s nothing to be scared of.”
I glance at her dubiously, but poke my head through the borehole. Logic tells me I should be gazing out over Cornan, or into another zone, but instead I’m peering back into the small room. I can’t see the clifftop, or Inez, or even my lower body — the room seems bare. I give my left leg a shake, and watch dumbly as nothing moves where I can feel it moving. “This is crazy,” I whimper.
“No,” Inez corrects me. “This is the Merge.”
Her voice echoes through the borehole, as if drifting my way from a distance.
“I can’t see you,” I tell her.
“I know,” she says, “but I bet you can feel me.” She pinches my bum.
“Hey!” I shout. “How would you like it if I did that to you?”
“I’d punch you,” she laughs. “Now get a move on.”
“What do I do? Throw myself through?”
“Yes,” she says, and when I hesitate, she pushes me.
I yell as I topple forward and land awkwardly on the floor. I start to complain, but there’s nobody to complain to. Then, as I’m picking myself up, Inez comes flying through the borehole and crashes into me, knocking me down.
“Why didn’t you get out of the way?” Inez huffs, shoving me aside.
“Why didn’t you call before you crossed?” I retort.
We glare at one another. Then our glares turn to grins. The overlap’s behind us. The cliff has disappeared. We’re in the Cuckoo’s Nest. Against all the odds, we’ve made it, and in time for the vote.
Watch out, royals — here we come!