Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls - Jane Lindskold [81]
With sudden insight, I realize that Eleanora had been wrong when she believed that Dylan’s growing addiction to the interchange had been mainly a result of the drug overdose she had been giving him. Certainly, that had played its part, but the real addiction had been to speech—to communication that would let him bridge the gap that he had created. He could refuse to write, but when given the chance to speak, the temptation was too great.
Wondering, I study the thing. Opening the hall door, I set Betwixt and Between in the corridor where they can see both ways. Then I set Athena on a high doorway, where she can see farther down the corridor and warn the dragon.
“Why let the stricken deer go weep, the hart ungalled play,” I tell them. “For some must watch, while some must sleep: so runs the world away.”
“We’ll watch, Sarah,” Between promises. “But how can you sleep now?”
I don’t waste time hunting for an answer, but duck back inside Jersey’s office before either my resolve fades or I am discovered. In what I plan to do, I suspect that my allies and my enemies would unite to stop me. Indeed, I realize that what I am doing is crazy by most standards, but at least I am comfortable with that thought. Being crazy is not new to me.
Too much time would be wasted if I were to seek out specific codes and processes, so I decide to be direct. First, I search along the walls for power cables—I have a few bad moments when I realize that they run straight into the walls and so cannot be easily unplugged. Then I check where they connect to the computer itself. After a few experimental jiggles, I decide that I can loosen them at this point. When I do so, with a groan that is almost like a person, the computer whirs and most of the lights on its panels go off.
But some of the lights tell me the thing still lives and I search for a quick way to ruin it for good. Knowing only the vaguest details of how such machines work limits me some, but I start by blocking up various drives with any card or slip that fits—or better—that almost fits. Any exposed wire gets jerked loose. After a severe shock that leaves my arm tingling, I put on a pair of oversized gloves and appropriate a set of wire cutters from a tool kit in Jersey’s office.
Rapidly, the remaining lights go off and as they do, I smash the little eyes of sparkling glass or plastic with the head of my wire cutters. I am rooting through a panel that has fallen open, strewing chips on the floor and grinding them under my foot, when I hear Betwixt calling.
“Athena says that someone is coming, Sarah. Wake up!”
I want to reply, “I am awake, as you must know from the noise in here” but I settle for “Yes.”
Feet come pounding down the hall, heavy and hurried upon the carpet. Voices reach me. “There’s her dragon! She must be in there!”
The door is flung open, just as I am moving to open it and as I reel back to avoid it, I am temporarily blocked from the sight of my rescuers.
“Shit! Someone’s trashed the place real good,” Grey Brother curses.
“Sarah?” Abalone begins to call.
Her voice breaks off suddenly as she sees the limp figure on the other couch. The lights are dim around Eleanora’s body, masking the brighter gold of her hair and for a moment as though through Abalone’s eyes I see myself sprawled there dead. The vision chokes me, but I manage to swing the door back and step forward.
“We be of one blood, ye and I,” I whisper and when Abalone turns, the smile that lights her face seems to burn away the tears that streak her painted cheeks.
“Sarah!” she cries, leaping past Grey Brother to squeeze me. “I thought we were too late. The message only came a few hours ago and it took us time to find the place.”
“Whose hand the message writ?” I ask, squeezing her in return.
“I don’t know,” she admits. “It was weird, so weird that I almost missed it. It just said, ‘I’ve found the Brighton Rock girl!’”
Grey Brother cuts in, “We’ve got to move now. Midline and the rest won’t hold the guards for long and there may be reinforcements coming in.”
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