I nodded, as did Sing, and we continued along the perimeter of the musty library chamber. We walked in silence; the sight of the apprentices had reminded us of the need for stealth. However, it quickly grew apparent to me that searching through that room wouldn’t lead us to the Sands of Rashid. Despite the room’s many alcoves (the thousands upon thousands of bookshelves made it feel like a cubicle-filled office for demonic bibliophiles) it didn’t seem like the kind of place where one kept objects of great power. I figured that the sands would be in a locked room, or perhaps a laboratory. Not a vast storage chamber. I spotted a stairwell to the right, and I waved to the others. “We should go up to the second floor.”
Bastille raised an eyebrow. “We haven’t finished checking this room yet.”
“We don’t have time,” I said, glancing at the hourglass Grandpa Smedry had given me. “This room is too big. Besides, it doesn’t feel right.”
“We’re going to let the fate of the world rest on your feelings?” she asked flatly.
“He is our Oculator, Bastille,” Sing reminded her. “If he says we go up, then we go up. Besides, he’s probably right – the sands aren’t likely to be here in the stacks. Somewhere in this building should be a Lens forge. That’s where they’ve probably got the sands.”
Bastille sighed, the shrugged. “Whatever,” she said, pushing past me to lead the way toward the stairs.
I was a little bit surprised that they’d listened to me. I followed Bastille, and Sing took the rear. The stairwell was made of stone, and it reminded me distinctly of something one might find in a medieval castle. It wound in circles around itself and was encased entirely in a massive stone pillar, lit by little frosted windows that let in marginal amounts of daylight.
After several minutes of climbing the steep steps, I was puffing. “Shouldn’t we have reached the second floor by now?”
“Space distortion,” Bastille said from in front of me. “You didn’t honestly expect the Librarians to confine their entire base into a building as small as this one looks?”
“No,” I said. “I saw the stretching aura outside. But, I mean, how far up can this stairwell go?”
“As far as it need to,” Bastille said testily.
I sighed but continued to climb. By that logic, that stairwell could go on forever. I didn’t however, want to contemplate that point. “For how ‘advanced’ you people always claim to be,” I noted, “you’d think that the Librarians would have elevators in their buildings.”
Bastille snorted. “Elevators? How primitive.”
“Well, they’re better than stairs.”
“Of course they aren’t,” Bastille said. “It took society centuries to develop from the elevator to the flight of stairs.”
I frowned. “That doesn’t make any sense. Stairs are far less advanced that elevators.”
She glanced over her shoulder, looking at me over the top of her sunglasses. I was annoyed to note that she didn’t seem the least bit winded.
“Don’t be silly,” she said. “Why would elevators be more advanced than stairs? Obviously, stairs take more effort to climb, are harder to construct, and are far more healthy to use. Therefore, they took longer to develop. Don’t you realize how stupid you sound when you claim otherwise?”
“No,” I said, annoyed. “The opposite is stupid to me. And does everything you say have to sound like an insult?”
“Only when I intend to be insulting,” she said, turning and resuming her climb.
I sighed, looking back at Sing, who just shrugged and smiled, still carrying his gym bag of guns. We kept moving.
Stairs are more advanced than elevators? I thought. Ridiculous.
Caves. Caves, shadows, and cheesecake.
We eventually reached the top of the stairwell, and it opened out into a long hallway constructed of stone blocks. Along this hallway was a line of large, thick, wooden doors set into stone archways.
“This is more like it,” I said. “I’ll bet the sands are behind one of these doors.”
“Well,” Bastille said, “let’s try one, then.”
I nodded, then walked up to the first door. I listened at it for a moment, but either there was no sound on the other side of the wood was so thick that I couldn’t hear anything.
“See any darkness around the door?” Bastille whispered.
I shook my head.
“The Dark Oculator probably isn’t in there, then,” Bastille said quietly.