Oliver towed me the rest of the way, yet the instant I was steady, he backed off. And he even offered Daniel a nod, as if to say “She is all yours.”
I did not like that. Oliver always jabbed at Daniel given the chance. His temper always ignited around my inventor. But there was no time to dwell on it, for Joseph joined us on the first level.
“Take these,” he said, withdrawing a pulse pistol from his belt and a crystal clamp from his pocket. “We should all be armed. We do not know into what we are walking.”
I accepted the pistol, placing it exactly as Joseph had in my belt and ignoring how the copper coils rubbed against my stomach. Then I shoved the crystal clamp into my pocket.
Joseph offered a pistol to Oliver. My demon pretended not to notice, and in an easy leap, he ascended to the next level. Daniel followed, offering me his hand—but his posture was stiff. His gaze constantly moving and checking our surroundings.
So up we went until I lost all track of time and the sun seared over Cairo. By the time the jackal had stopped his ascent, I was parched and sunburned. I thought surely we must be near the top . . . but a glance back showed we had barely risen half the way. The airship listed in the wind, and a lone figure paced in its shadow.
Jie.
Wiping sweat and sand from my eyes, I turned ahead . . . and found the jackal was now racing horizontally along the stone steps.
Hurry, he insisted. Then he hit the pyramid’s corner and disappeared from view.
“This way,” I said tiredly, kicking into a jog. Joseph, Daniel, and Oliver hurried behind. I was panting even more desperately by the time we rounded the pyramid’s edge—and I caught sight of the jackal once more.
He had stopped halfway along the next ledge. Darkness cloaked this side of the Great Pyramid—and a pointed shadow ran off for what seemed like miles of rocky desert. I squinted into the sudden shade and chose my steps carefully. The stones were more eroded than on the south side, and loose pebbles were everywhere.
When we had crossed almost half the length of the pyramid, I realized with a start that the jackal had abandoned me yet again. I picked up my pace, my gaze darting up and down, ahead and behind. . . .
“What is it?” Oliver called after me.
“I do not know where—” My heel slipped on a rock. I toppled sideways, my arms flinging out. . . .
Oliver’s hands grabbed my waist.
Time slowed. Electricity shot through me from his fingertips. His emotions—his absolute anxiety over this day—sizzled into my skin. Into my lungs.
He was scared, but not because of the unknown. Because of how long he had waited for this one moment—because of how much depended on it.
Oliver towed me around. Each fragment of a second lasted a heartbeat—a full, painful heartbeat. And as I tumbled into his chest, each gust of dry wind was a lingering kiss.
My eyes latched on to Oliver’s . . . and I was scared. Terrified. I thought each of my ribs would snap beneath the weight of his fear. Beneath the desperation in his gaze.
He had searched and fought for months to find the Old Man . . . and now he was about to fulfill that mission.
At last he could claim some peace. He could release this need—this burning, writhing drive in his gut from Elijah’s final, unfulfilled command. . . . And he could feel normal again. He could return home to the spirit realm, and he could shed this human body with all its human feelings.
Yet no matter how bravely I, Eleanor, acted or how fearlessly I forged ahead, a single misstep would mark the end of everything Oliver had fought for.
If I failed now, I failed everyone—not just myself.
The dusty, shadowy steps blurred around me. I saw nothing but Oliver’s blazing, golden eyes; I felt only his scorching fingertips.
Then a single word thundered into the front of my brain.
Hurry. And with that thought I spotted where the jackal had gone.
Two levels above us there was an unnatural crack in the rocks that had not been there moments before.
I had no doubt this entry into the pyramid was magical. Supernatural, even. It shimmered with a hazy blue light.
Time reclaimed its hold on the world, lurching forward in a flurry of seconds, breaths, and whipping wind.
Oliver released me, his gaze pleading. His desires clear: Do not ruin this for me.
I stumbled back, my fears and his fears already melting away beneath the jackal’s command. “There,” I shouted, and then I set to scrambling up once more.
Oliver, Joseph, and Daniel followed, and in mere moments we reached a narrow gap between two stones. A black tunnel descended within—but it was not so dark that I could not see the jackal. His ears were back, his hackles risen.
Hurry.
I scrambled after him, but just as I wedged myself between the stones, Daniel called out, “Hold up! Be careful!”
Then came Joseph, clipped and wary: “You are certain about this, Eleanor?”