[size=150]Section Three – First Night[/size]
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___It looked like any other tower door.
___But Seifas knew it wasn’t.
___“Be careful,” said the juacuar, as Pooralay knelt beside it.
___“Ah-duhhh!!!” the short man slapped his head. “C’n you c’ntribute somethin’ a little more specif’c?!”
___“Qarfax changed this door somehow.”
___“Y’mean it’s gonna turn me inside-out?”
___“No…maybe…” Seifas tried to puzzle what he had seen.
___“Then git, y’gangly shadow-throwin’—!” Pooralay broke off in mumbles, reining in his temper. “All o’ yous, back! Left, right, anywhere, not in m’ light!”
___Ignoring the glowers at his back—but they moved, including Dagon—the thief returned attention to the door. He pulled a thin metallic stick from one of many jacket pockets. Crouching close to a side, he probed the doorjamb with the strangely-ended implement.
___Seifas thought to tell him that when last he’d left the Tower, no one was alive within it. But he caught himself before he spoke: he didn’t know if anything had happened during the slopings since. And he heard the rumblings…
___“Nothin’ I c’n find,” the thug reported, not too happily. “An’ there’s no lock t’ pick—”
___“—ah-DUHHH!” retorted Dagon at this obvious announcement.
___“Okay, doll-boy, you c’n be th’ one t’ push th’ door wide open, then! G’wan, it seems t’ be complet’ly safe! Can’t y’hear th’ noise inside!?”
___“This is why we brought the red-shirt ‘sap-boy’,” Dagon smugly answered.
___“True enough,” the fair man said. “You all stay back, and let me test it—”
___Seifas reached with his aasagai and poked the handle-latch, pushing the door slightly open.
___“GAH!” Pooralay cried. “Dammit, lemme get back from th’—!”
___“It didn’t hurt me when I left it last time,” Seifas said. “And you decided it had not been trapped.”
___Pooralay sighed. “Y’wanna fill some details in f’r some of us?”
___Seifas briefly told him of his garrison.
___“A pile-a ash. Great.” The little man stared sullenly into the narrow darkened gap. “So, who goes first?”
___“Jian!” Dagon said.
___“No, I will,” corrected Seifas. Dagon tried to protest, but—“Silence!” said the juacuar. “I was last to leave this place, and I shall go in first!”
___Dagon aborted his complaint; perhaps because the juacuar had pointed around with the aasagai. The needled tip was floating like a wasp a fingerwidth from Dagon’s face.
___“Be my guest,” he gestured to the door—while staring at the tip. “May be better anyway…” he muttered.
___Pooralay warily stepped away, as Seifas pushed the door more open with the aasagai, letting sunlight stream into the room.
___“It’s the basement,” he announced, half to himself, as the noise increased.
___“Hmph. Funny place, above the ground,” Gaekwar drawled.
___Seifas nodded. “Very true. What you see,” he told them as he crossed the threshold of the large stone room, “is what we called the ‘basement.’”
___“Kind of stupid, weren’t you?” Dagon said. The group was gathering round the door, while Jian was next to step inside.
___The juacuar looked back to them. “This was the basement, at the time. The doorway you’re all pressed against, opened to the floor* above.”*
___They froze, except for Jian, already wandering curiously.
___“Be my guest,” Othon grumbled—then shoved Dagon in.
___“Careful,” Seifas warned them, as he barred the stumbling Krygian with the aasagai. “In the middle of the room, there is an open hole.”
___“I don’t see a hole,” said Portunista as she squinted.
___“Maybe that’s b’cause th’ door ain’t wide enough f’r you an’ sunlight both, doll.” After a poisonous glance—which the short man disregarded as he checked the doorway’s inner frame—the maga whistled through her teeth. Floating wisplights lit the wide round room.
___“Thanks,” absently nodded Poo, as Portunista walked inside, then “Oomph!”—she kneed his ribs in passing.
___“So, what we have here,” Gaekwar mused as he and Othon followed after, “is an empty level of the Tower…”
___“Half a level.” Othon bounced his forehead off the oaken beams above.
___“Three quarters of a level,” Seifas said. “An intervening space above us holds some gearworks.”
___“They run that, I guess.” Portunista gestured at a plank which hung from thickly woven rope. The rope led to a metal ring from which two smaller ropes descended into eyebolts in the sturdy plank. The main rope dangled through a hole above, itself the size of the hole below the plank.
___“Exactly,” Seifas said. “Although I think there are more gears than needed for this simple lift.”
___“You’ve been up there?” Gaekwar asked.
___Seifas nodded, edging to the hole and peering up into the crawlspace depths. “I was curious one day while I was off my watch. The mechanism operates by pulling these.” Two other finely woven cords descended from the hole above, connecting to some levers set on each side of the plank.
___“Wait, wait—back up,” Dagon waved. “What about the door? Where does that door lead?”
___“Out,” Seifas smiled. “See?” He pointed to the dell outside. The floor was gleaming oranger as the sun descended to the final hour. “Going in, it used to open on the next floor up, where our garrison was stationed.”
___“Yeah? And where did that door lead?” Dagon asked.
___“Also out. Right there, outside that door.”
___“So…” pondered Gaekwar. “What if guys went out both doors at once?”
___Seifas grunted wryly. “We were told to never use the basement door, except in an emergency. When Qarfax died, the door upstairs led nowhere any longer.”
___“Pooralay!” called Portunista.
___The little man anticipated her. “No sigils on th’ frame, or near th’ door,” he answered. “Nothin’ near th’ door at all, ‘xcept f’r this here lever.” He tapped a wooden brace, next to the door, into which ran another rope, knotted thickly at the bottom.
___“We also were told to never touch that lever!” Seifas warned.
___“Yeesh, okay, no probl’m!” Pooralay backed away.
___“What’s the pail for?” Jian inquired. From simpler rope, a large tin bucket hung beneath the plank.
___“Drawing water,” Seifas answered. When he yanked a thin cord down, it pulled its opposite number up, thus racheting up the opposite lever by a notch. The deep and steady rumbling underneath them now was joined by different clanks and rattles overhead. The plank and pail descended slowly. Seifas pulled the other cord, making the plank to stop. “It goes up similarly,” he added.
___“Why a plank?” the maga wondered. “Why not just a pail?”
___“To get to the works above, of course!” Dagon snorted.
___“You mean, if they break down?” retorted Portunista.
___“Right!”—then Dagon winced.
___“Probably to reach the gears below,” corrected Seifas.
___“You mean, if they break down?! “ the Krygian answered witheringly. Now it was Seifas’ turn to wince.
___“Interesting,” Jian observed. “How does a person reach those gears, should something happen? Not by the plank!” he quickly added.
___“Doors?” suggested Othon.
___“No,” said Seifas. “None I ever found.”
___Portunista sniffed. “Qarfax studied superspace. He could jott and bind a tesser—he must have bound one on that door,” she pointed. “Getting into places wouldn’t be a problem for him, nor for anyone helping him.”
___“Which brings us,” Jian concluded, “back to why he has a plank.”
___They all considered this, for a minute.
___“Well!” said Dagon finally. “Let’s send Jian into the hole!”
___“Ready!” Jian hopped onto the plank. Dagon blinked, then smiled in anticipation…
___“Wait!” protested Portunista. “I am going down the hole!” Incredulous looks surrounded her. “We’re in the tower of a Cadrist; I’m the one most qualified to figure out what he’s done down there—”
___“—if anything…” interrupted Poo.
___“…and it’s my brigade!”
___“I think you shouldn’t go alone,” warned the juacuar.
___“Fine,” she snapped. “Hold still!”
___She leaped on Jian, pulling her legs around his waist until they dangled behind the plank.
___“Don’t even think…” she growled beneath her breath, “of trying anything…”
___The startled man blinked once or twice…
___And then he said: “Let’s go!”
