Lex and Bastien have just about caught up to me as I stride through the foyer.
“The hell, Midnight?You wanna share the tea?”Bastien says, slapping me on the arm.
We descend the tower.Making our way down the floors: Theoretical Death studies first.Then Business dealers.Minus three floor is the Memory Magic student’s floor.Then Lex’s Etyomancy on floor three.The lower we descend, the tighter we huddle together.
“We’ve been thinking about this all wrong,” I start.
“Going to need more information,” Lex mutters, a distinctly grumpy tone in her voice.
“We were assuming there was only one way to cross from the underworld to Ora.”
Bastien pulls up short.“The doors?”
“Exactly.We just have to convince the goyles.”
The tower seems to grow darker and cooler the further we descend.I quietly pray to the seven devils that it’s not an omen.Level five is one of the floors I’m on regularly, Fabric Weaving.We pass minus six for Bastien, Resurrection Magic.Last, is my most used floor: Veilwalkers.
Tonight, though, we have to go lower still.Beneath the foundation of the tower and into the basement.The place none of us are meant to go, or not without permissions.
I figure, given Ignatius wants me to bring Lucy back, he’s not going to resent me this.
The stairs spiral on and on for what seems like eternity, descending us into a faux hell.Designed as such to put wandering students off.The steps become less and less smooth and more and more raw, like they’ve been carved out of the stones of hell itself.
The walls grow coarse and craggy, cement replaced by cliff rock and haggard stones.The sconces struggle to stay alight this deep underground, the arid whip of breeze from the underworld cooled by the depths of Ora City and the chilled stone.
It’s a heady mix that makes me dizzy.Finally, we slip off the staircase and find ourselves in a darkened hallway.
Gardon sits above the arched stone gateway to the underworld.
“Hey,” I say, hoping he wakes up.
He opens a solitary eye and blinks at me, but closes it again, making no move to reveal the Veil.
I clear my throat.“Gardon?If you might be kind enough to talk to us…”
He huffs out a stony breath through his nostrils before peeling both his eyes open and glaring at us.“What do you want?Don’t you realise everyone has gone?All vanished.Shouldn’t you have gone with them?”
And I see the problem.He thinks everyone abandoned him.A few stone crumbles remain on the frame around his head.No one came to check on him after the Veil tore and Architecti put the tower back together.No wonder he’s feeling stroppy.
“They’re not gone.The campus is still here.”I reach up and flick the stone chips from the top of his frame.He growls as my hands sweep around his head, but I brush my fingertips against his cold little horns and stroke a finger down his cheek.
He huffs at me again.So I reach up and tickle under his chin.“I apologise on behalf of the campus that no one came to tell you what had happened.”
This makes the pout on his plump lips loosen.Bastien and Lex both side-eye me, so I continue.
“The Veil tore beyond any kind of rip we’ve experienced.Architecti has returned, Interitus is on the loose and a professor—Corvine—had her soul reaped.She’s stuck in the underworld.”
Lex is nodding along and adds, “And a lot of lives were lost.We’re sorry no one came to check on you.”
“The tower crumbled, I was hanging off the arch.All on my own, I was.Then the stone resealed itself, and I was back hanging the right way.”
“That must have been scary,” I say.
Bastien purses his lips.“You know what, you’re right, that was shitty on our behalf.We were only thinking about ourselves and how we were doing, I don’t think I’ve checked on any of the goyles.I apologise, Gardon.”Bastien lowers his head in deference to the goyle.
Gardon ruffles a little, seeming to fill with life a bit more so I follow suit.
“You, and your brothers, are the keepers of our campus, and I, too, apologise for not having thought of you.I hope you will accept my apology?”I also lower my head.
