‘Maybe the air in their part of the ether isn’t poisonous,’ Cress suggested, looking up from her work. ‘Maybe they’re not immune after all.’
Lady Cavendish’s face was pretty beneath the dirt, though gaunt and malnourished. She looked about Arcturus’s age, in her mid-thirties, with the beginnings of crow’s feet at the edges of her eyes. How old was she supposed to be again? There was definitely something familiar about her, as if he had seen her not long ago. Were those Rufus’s eyes that stared back at him?
Cress clicked her fingers.
‘Hello? I said maybe their ether isn’t poisonous at all,’ she repeated.
‘You’re welcome to test it out,’ Othello said drily. ‘If you want to be our guinea pig, be my guest. Personally, I’d rather take a few orcs with me.’
Cress shrugged and turned back to Lady Cavendish, teasing the knots in her hair with a comb.
Another boom shook the cavern, and a loose boulder tumbled from the pile of rubble blocking the passageway.
‘They’re impatient,’ Fletcher said.
‘I wonder if they’ll tie us to that manchineel tree,’ Othello wondered morbidly. ‘Worse than burning, isn’t that what Jeffrey said?’
‘Who can trust what that traitor said,’ Sylva’s voice cut through the darkness.
Fletcher was glad to hear her voice. She was sitting up now, her face cold and furious. Sylva had turned her anger on the right person.
‘Maybe we can chew on some of these, to numb the pain,’ Cress said, picking up one of the scattered petals and brushing off the dust.
She popped it in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully.
‘You know, it’s not too bad,’ she mumbled. ‘Makes my mouth tingle.’
‘Are you sure that’s a good idea?’ Othello asked, picking up a petal himself and giving it a sniff. He wrinkled his nose and tossed it away.
‘If I’m gonna die anyway,’ Cress said, shrugging. She paused and raised her eyebrows.
‘Hmmm,’ she mused, shaking her head slightly. ‘It’s doing something. No idea what, though.’
Fletcher frowned. He had heard someone say that before. Electra.
‘Wait,’ he said, looking at the petals. They were yellow, just like the vials Electra had shown him. In his mind, something clicked.
‘These petals are from the ether,’ Fletcher continued, holding a petal up to the light. ‘I bet you a hundred sovereigns this is what goes into those yellow vials Electra showed us. The ones which seemed to have no effect.’
‘So?’ Cress asked, munching on another petal.
Othello gave her a disapproving stare.
‘What?’ she said, grinning. ‘I like the way it tingles.’
Another boom from the corridor, so loud it shook the very ground. Fletcher could hear the bass voice of orcs, shouting guttural orders. He raised his voice.
‘It means that this isn’t just some drug the orcs use to get drunk – if Cress’s reaction is anything to go by. Maybe it simply makes the user immune to the ether’s poison?’
Othello stared at him for a moment, his brow creasing as he mulled over Fletcher’s words. Then he whooped and seized his friend by the shoulders.
‘You bloody genius,’ he said, shaking Fletcher back and forth. ‘That’s got to be it!’
‘I think you’re right, Fletcher,’ Sylva said begrudgingly. She shuffled over to them and examined the pentacle.
‘Now we just need to fill the pentacle’s grooves with something organic, so we can use the damned thing. Any ideas? Because I don’t see any blue orcs waiting to be sacrificed around here.’
Fletcher scanned the room. For a moment he settled on the pool of Rufus’s blood, but shook his head, disgusted with himself. Not that. Never that.
‘Didn’t Khan press some kind of button?’ Cress said, sweeping the thick layer of dust with her hands.
She grinned and pointed at a small nub in the ground in front of her.
‘Good thing I didn’t step on this earlier, or Othello would have had another bloodbath.’
‘All right, everyone eat,’ Fletcher said, stuffing a handful of petals into his mouth. The taste was mildly bitter, but not completely unpleasant. It reminded him of sour whisky.
He watched as Cress gently coaxed the noblewoman to eat one. She was so hungry that she gulped it down like a half-starved animal, barely chewing before swallowing it.
‘Well done, Cress.’ Fletcher smiled.
A huge blast juddered through the room. Through the rubble of the back exit, a tiny chink of light could be seen from the goblin torches outside. The voices of the orcs could be heard distinctly now, their harsh monosyllabic speech so loud it was as if they were in the same room.
‘We’d better hurry,’ Fletcher said, shuffling with Othello away from the carving. ‘Go ahead, Cress.’
She pressed the button, hissing through her teeth with exertion until it sank into the floor. For a moment nothing happened. Then, as panic began to take hold, the first drop of blood dripped on to the pentacle.