tilted away from her, but something very close to fear covered the part she could see.
“No, you need to get it open now. There’s a black cloud in the sky coming from the Badlands, and I’m pretty sure it’s not the kind filled with rain.”
Shea grumbled to herself. A bright flash of light near where Trenton crouched caught Shea’s attention.
“What’s that?” Shea pointed.
Trenton looked down, blinking as his eyes adjusted to the dim interior. His gaze went to where she was pointing. “It looks like a mirror or a glass of some sort.”
“Of course, that’s it.”
Fire. What was the sun but a massive ball of fire creating heat and light? Shea wasn’t really sure where the eye portion came from, but this place was built right around the cataclysm. There could have been all sorts of weird sayings or religions to explain the world falling apart.
“Trenton, I need you to climb down to that mirror and aim at the middle of the circle.”
“Do you see where that mirror is? How do you expect me to cling practically upside down and then move it? Not all of us are descended from spider people,” he shouted back.
“I need that light to get this entrance open. You’re the one that can see what’s coming; you tell me if it’s possible.”
There was a growl from above and then he threw a leg over the edge, lowering himself over the side. Shea hoped his arms weren’t spent during their impression of mountain goats earlier.
She bounced lightly on her feet as Trenton made his careful way down the side of the monolith he’d been crouched on and across to the mirror. Time was of the essence, and every second he took felt like grains of sand sliding through an hourglass—inevitably bringing doom closer with every breath.
“Come on, come on,” she muttered under her breath. She didn’t want to distract him or cause him to fall, but he was taking so long.
“I’m here. What do I do?” he asked, not looking back at her.
“You need the mirror to catch the light and shine it down here.”
He nodded and reached over to tilt the mirror to catch the sun that shined down at an angle, the beam never touching the pillar on which Shea stood.
“It’s stuck,” Trenton grunted, wrestling with the mirror. He moved over, finding grips in the rock face for his hands and using a leg to kick at the mirror.
“We need that mirror, so don’t break it,” Shea warned.
“I’ve almost got it. Almost there.” With one last kick, the mirror turned with a screech to rival the eagles’ cries.
It glittered as the sun caught it, rotating and reflecting down into the crevasse. Its beam dragged across the rock, closer and closer to where Shea stood.
“There! Keep it right there.” It was pointed directly at the middle of the circle. Shea saw why they’d called it the eye of fire in the story. From this angle, with the mirror reflecting the light it looked like an eye had caught fire.
“Time for my part,” she said in a soft voice. She pulled out a knife and looked at her hand.
“Shea, what are you doing?” Trenton asked in a calm voice. He’d paused in his descent when Shea withdrew the knife.
“It needs sun and blood to work. Don’t worry; I know what I’m doing.” Sort of. She hoped.
“The Warlord is not going to be happy about this,” Trenton muttered.
He was right. Fallon was going to be very upset if he got in here and found Shea bleeding, even if it was from a self-inflicted wound. That was to say, if he survived the eagles and whatever black cloud Trenton had spotted.
She set the knife against the palm of her left hand. Hesitation stayed her hand. She moved the knife to her forearm. She might have need of her hands before this journey was through, and a cut on the palm was an absolute bitch to heal when you used it constantly. Not to mention painful.
“Here goes nothing.”
Shea drew the knife across her skin, biting down to keep the sound of pain inside. Cutting yourself on purpose was totally different than a wound you received while going about your life.
She knelt and held her arm over the eye. The story hadn’t said where the blood needed to fall, so she figured the eye was as good a place as any.
“Work.” She willed the thing. If it didn’t, she didn’t know what else to try.
For a long moment, the cavern