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“No,” she said, trying not to roll her eyes. “A bottle has a neck, but no head.”
“Clever girl,” he said. “We have to go pretty close to him to get it.”
The cat was practically touching the table with the bottle.
“Why don’t I go?” Chloe said. “I’m smaller.”
Jubal frowned.
Chloe took off right away, before he could argue and waste precious time.
As she slipped past the metal monster, one of its paws flexed, nearly touching her foot.
She froze in place for a moment, praying it didn’t wake.
A moment later, she heard another snoring sound, and kept walking.
She lifted the champagne bottle from the table and saw there was another piece of paper under it.
She moved as quickly as she could back to Jubal, then unfolded the new clue.
“What is more useful when it is broken?” she read out loud.
“A promise,” he said gleefully.
She blinked at him in dismay, feeling like the helper bot.
“Sorry,” he said. “I was just spitballing.”
She nodded, racking her brain and looking around the room for inspiration. The bottle had caught her eye the last time, but this time she was coming up with nothing.
“A seal, a hand warmer gel, a cob of corn, a firecracker,” she listed off, knowing none of them had the satisfying zing of a riddle’s answer, and none were in the room.
“How do you keep thinking of stuff?” Jubal asked, staring at her like she had twelve heads.
She searched the room and its overflowing contents until her eyes lit on a glass beaker with a plastic egg inside.
“An egg,” she declared. “An egg is more useful when it’s broken.”
Jubal moved carefully to the table that had the beaker with the egg, but he couldn’t reach his hand inside to retrieve it.
“It’s stuck,” he said.
“Oh, I know,” Chloe said.
She headed over to the pitcher of water. If she poured some in, the egg should float to the top of the beaker.
But before she could get back to him with the pitcher, she heard glass shattering.
“Jubal and Chloe,” Oberon’s voice said from somewhere above. “There will be no need to break anything inside the room to get what you need.”
“Sorry,” Chloe said.
“You were the one who gave us a clue about breaking things,” Jubal said, holding up the egg. “And it worked, didn’t it?”
“I was going to pour water in there to make the egg float up to you,” Chloe told him, lifting the pitcher.
“Smart,” Jubal said, nodding approvingly, without seeming to feel particularly bad about his caveman approach.
