up, which led to the fourth floor of the Mountain. Sancia fooled the doorway there into opening, and it fell away to reveal…
Berenice gasped. “My God.”
“Shit,” said Orso softly.
The interior atrium of the Mountain was a dripping, dusty, shattered world of sputtering lamps and scattered shadows. Mold bloomed here and there and crawled across the green plaster walls in waves. The air was heavy with a scent of mildew and rot. Daylight spilled in from the cracked ceiling, which had apparently been ripped open when Sancia had turned on the gravity rig, and beams of shifting light danced across the floor as the overcast drifted through the darkening skies.
The oddest thing was how it still resembled her memories of the building it once had been. It still retained the brilliance of its original structure: the concentric walkways lining the atrium’s interior like ribs, stacked one on top of the other, with balconies running all along them so you could stop and look down into the massive chamber from wherever you were. But this was deceptive, she knew, for the Mountain was far bigger than just the atrium: hallways splintered off from the concentric walkways and led to ballrooms, assembly bays, design workshops, cellars, and more.
And yet now all of it had corroded, and degraded. All within just three years.
Sancia studied the giant atrium with her sight, and spied nine Dandolo armaments roving through the walkways above and below them—nine soldiers, five on patrol, four on watch.
And that’s just what I can see here, she thought. God, there’s got to be a small army in here with us…
A crackling, weary, ancient voice whispered in her mind: <…eh? What is this Presence? Who…Who is that??>
“I’ve got it,” she said, tapping the side of her head. “It’s still alive, still active!”
“Then ask it what the hell is going on!” said Orso.
she said to it.
said the Mountain.
She looked out on the atrium floor. One of the lifting rooms that took you to higher floors had collapsed. Broken glass and crystal lay glittering across the dusty marble floor.
asked Sancia.
it said. It sounded like it was relishing the memory.
said the Mountain.
said Sancia.
said the Mountain.
There was a pause. it added.
“The Dandolos are working on five out of six of the lexicons,” said Sancia aloud. “They haven’t successfully gotten the definition out of any of them yet—but