Calamity (Reckoners, #3)

I thought I felt our elevator shake as Abraham and Mizzy latched on to the cables above. They zipped up the lines, using the devices Larcener had made for us.

A few seconds later, some distant machine started whirring, and we began to rise. The climb was slow and tedious, with nothing to see—most of the levels still had doors on them, indicating the floors weren’t used. Mizzy and Abraham would have to slow their climb before each of the upper floors to peek out and make sure nobody was in the hallway beyond.

The elevator quivered and shook, occasionally grinding against the sides of the shaft, gouging out chunks of salt. What if Mizzy’s or Abraham’s device slipped, and they fell? What if they spotted someone in one of the upper hallways—where the elevator shafts didn’t have doors—and were forced to wait while the elevator approached, threatening to push them into the open? I wiped my brow, and my hand came away grimy with salt dust and sweat.

“We’re safe,” Abraham said into our ears. “No problems. Unhooking on the sixty-eighth floor.”

I relaxed with a sigh. It took us another few minutes to pass the open doorway where Mizzy and Abraham had climbed out, but we saw no sign of them. They still had a couple of floors to climb before reaching their target on the seventieth floor, but Tia’s plan indicated this floor would be less likely to be guarded, something Larcener had confirmed.

I let out a prolonged breath as light flooded us from the seventy-first floor. An old restaurant filling the top of the tower, and our target.

We piled out, the servers rushing to join others who were already delivering trays of food to the partygoers. Megan and I carted our packs into the kitchens, where a veritable legion of cooks used hot plates and skillets to prepare dishes. Large lamps had been clipped to parts of the ceiling, bathing the place in sterile white light, and they’d set out plastic over the floor and most of the old countertops. I wondered what they did when they wanted to salt a dish. Scrape some off the wall?

It was all powered by several thick cords that ended in a set of overtaxed power strips. Seriously, there were a ton of them. To plug in something new, you’d have to unplug two other cords, which I was pretty sure violated some law of physics.

Megan tried to get information out of a passing server, but was interrupted by a call of “There you are!”

We turned to face a towering chef who had to be nearly seven feet tall. The man stooped as he walked, to not bang his head on an old salt light fixture. His face was so pinched, he looked like he’d been drinking a lemon-juice-and-pickle smoothie.

“Stingrays?” he bellowed.

We nodded.

“New faces. What happened to Suzy? Bah, never mind.” He grabbed me by the shoulder, dragging me through the busy room to a smaller pantry on the side where they’d set out ingredients. A helpless-looking woman in a small chef’s hat stood here, overlooking a single tray of unfrosted cupcakes. Her eyes wide, she held a small tube of frosting in sweaty hands and regarded the cupcakes as someone might a row full of tiny nuclear warheads, each labeled Do not bump.

“Patissier is here!” the lurchy chef said. “You’re off the hook, Rose.”

“Oh, thank heavens,” the young woman said, tossing aside the tube of frosting and scrambling away.

The tall chef patted me on the shoulder, then retreated, leaving the two of us in the little pantry.

“Why do I get the feeling there’s something they aren’t telling us?” Megan said. “That girl was looking at these cupcakes like they were scorpions.”

“Yeah,” I said, nodding. “Right. Scorpions.”

Megan eyed me.

“Or tiny nuclear warheads,” I said. “That works too, right? Of course, you could strap a scorpion to a nuclear warhead, and that would make it even more dangerous. You’d have to try to disarm the thing, but wow—scorpion.”

“Yes, but why?” Megan said, setting her pack on the plastic-topped counter.

“Hmm? Oh, Loophole has executed three different pastry chefs so far for creating substandard desserts. It was in Tia’s notes. The woman really likes her cupcakes.”

“And you didn’t mention this because…”

“Not important,” I said, getting my own pack out. “We aren’t going to be around long enough to deliver any pastries.”

“Yes, because our plans always go exactly as they’re supposed to.”

“What? Was I supposed to take a crash course in decorating?”

“In fact,” Cody said over the line, “I’m not too bad at cake decorating, if you must know.”

“I’m sure,” Megan said. “You going to tell us about the time when you had to fix cupcakes for the Scottish high king?”