The Fourth Sage (The Circularity Saga) (24 page)

"You did all this?" she asks.

Jeremiah nods. "Yes."

Aries approaches one of the walls, looks at the formulas that spread into each of the corners and up to the ceiling.

"I wish I could... understand, Jeremiah. I wish I could understand your language," she says.

A smile crosses Jeremiah's face. "It's not that h-h-hard once you get it."

"It's the getting it that's usually the problem. But how did you even learn it? All I have been taught are the absolute basics."

Jeremiah thinks about this. "I close my eyes and I can s-s-see it in front of me. I understand it. I don't know how else to describe it t-t-to you."

"This is so far advanced that I can't even begin to comprehend it," Ty says. He is studying the walls as well.

"This is n-n-nothing compared to what Amber is doing," Jeremiah points at the fourth wall. It is filled with words and letters and their translation underneath. In the center of the wall, there is a small drawn box. Aries reads it out loud:

"Have you ever seen the sky?

Have you ever wondered why

So many stars abide

Inside the firmament?"

Amber smiles. Part of her initial shyness is dissipating.

"That's beautiful," Aries says.

Aries can see—behind the shyness and the girl’s tall, skinny appearance—something deeper, something stronger than what meets the eye.

"There's more," Amber says. "Let me show you."

Aries follows Amber out of the room.

"Wait t-t-till you s-s-see this!" Jeremiah exclaims.

They leave the room and go down the gently curved hallway.

"When Mila drew the machine," Amber says, "we had to move into the next room."

"How long did it take you to fill this one?" Ty asks.

Amber and Jeremiah look at each other. "About three w-w-weeks," Jeremiah answers.

"Three weeks?" Ty replies. "What did you do before that?"

"What do you mean?" Amber asks.

"I mean, which room were you in before that?"

"This is our fourteenth room. We always run out of space after a while," Amber says, as they enter the next room.

Aries cannot believe her eyes. One wall has a perfect representation of Mila's drawing on it. It fills the wall completely. The stone pillars on either side of the machine reach from the floor to the ceiling.

"This is so much more detailed than what I saw," she says into the silence.

"It's only more detailed than you remember it," Mila says. "I saw it as you saw it. I didn't add anything, nor did I take anything away. This is how you saw it. Even though you can't remember it fully."

Aries goes to the opposite wall, looks at the drawing from there. She can't deny its pull. It stirs something inside her, as if awakening an ancient memory of sorts. On the floor she sees a small sculpture, minuscule in size and unrecognizable from where she stands.

"What's this?" she asks, as she kneels beside it. When she looks closer she sees it’s a sculpture of a girl. It can't be more than an inch in height.

"That's you," Tevis says. Max stands next to her, signing to her. Tevis continues. "This is a fairly accurate representation of your size, compared to the machine, taken from Mila's drawing. I'm not sure about the exact distance to it, but based on the height and width, you’re standing pretty far away.

Tevis must have seen Aries’s bewildered expression.

"We'll help you figure it out," she says.

Aries isn't so sure. In fact, she doesn't really want to figure it out at all. Max signs something to Tevis. Aries knows what he said before Tevis translates.

"We believe in you, Aries."

Nothing ever contradicted her view of herself more than this statement. Part of her recognizes that there is more at play here than meets the eye. Her coming here, her meeting the children—it all seems to have happened not by chance but through something greater than herself. Before she can say that she needs a rest, that she needs to lay down and let all this settle in, Tevis continues. "Are you ready for one more?"

"Yes," she says, even though she wants to say no.

"Come." Tevis takes her arm. "I think this one you might enjoy."

Aries can't think of anything right now that would make her feel any better. They leave the room and make their way further down the hallway to a set of stairs leading downward. She somehow thought the children would only occupy one floor. Now that they are descending the stairs, she realizes it makes sense that they’ve spread out into the others.

"We couldn't find a room high enough up there so we had to go down two levels," Amber says. Aries can see her excitement. Her eyes reveal a sparkle that Aries hasn't seen before. She feels more and more in awe of the children, what they have endured, are still enduring. She would've probably given up, already, lost all hope somewhere down the line. Two years is a long time.

They arrive at the platform two stories below and walk down another hallway until they come to a door. They enter a dark room that is larger and taller than all the others. It reminds Aries of the room in which they spoke to Sam earlier. A large cylindrical object stands in the center. Right now, it's a dark shadow. Max enters, moves to one of the corners of the room, and turns on a switch. A couple of dim lightbulbs come on. They cast enough light for the object to become recognizable.

"No way!" Aries says. "This is... how did you do this?"

Max shrugs and smiles. The cylindrical shape must be twenty feet high at least. It’s scored with vertical lines that reach from the floor all the way up. Close up, Aries sees that it’s made from cardboard, paper, and other materials she can't identify.

Max signs to Tevis, and while he does she can hear him in her thoughts.

"Two hundred and eighty-two stories high," Tevis says.

"This is our building," Aries says.

Max nods.

"How long did it take you?" Aries asks.

"Fifteen months, more or less," Tevis says. "But it's not finished. A few dozen floors at the top are missing."

Now that her eyes have adjusted to the dim light, Aries can see a small vertical gap in the center. Amber and Max move to either side of it and place their hands inside. Jeremiah squeezes between them, places his hands into the gap as well. Two of the other children each grab a rope that hangs from the ceiling on either side. Then Amber pulls from one side, Max from the other, and Jeremiah uses both hands to push. The two children pull on the rope. The gap enlarges as both halves of the model move away from each other. The sides swing open, laying bare the inside.

The core of the building, now sliced into two equal parts, extends all the way up toward the ceiling. They can see the floors they are in now, the prison further up, the water treatment, and food processor, and more. Several more ropes hang from the ceiling next to the model.

"What are they for?" she asks.

"We have to be able to get up there and we don't have ladders." Tevis translates Max's signing. "There are usually four of us working at any given time, with two others at each rope making sure it's securely fastened, and also to let us down or pull us up."

"This is ingenious," Ty says. "To make all this out of... nothing. It's remarkable."

"We've got t-t-time," Jeremiah says.

"Can I go up there?" Aries asks.

"I'll take you," Tevis says, while pointing at Max. "I mean, Max will take you."

"Great!" Aries says, already seeing if she can make out her floors. "Ty, you should come up too."

"That's quite alright. I can see it all from here," he says. "You can report back to me."

"Okay," Aries replies, as the ends of two ropes are lowered. They look thin but sturdy. When she thinks about where they possibly could have gotten them from, Max signs something that she, in turn, understands without Tevis translating.

"Sam brought us many things that we didn't have before," Tevis says. "Without him, this would not be here. Neither would most of us."

Several of the kids quietly repeat his name, "Samuel Eikenboom. Samuel Eikenboom. Samuel Eikenboom."

"Why are they repeating his name?" Aries asks.

"Repeating one’s name three times is a sign of honor and gratitude," Tevis says.

Most of the kids are here. Their faces remind Aries of the faces of the children in the dining room of the orphanage she sees every day; faces filled with both the hopelessness of their lives and the fervent wish for change. "I would like... to get a list with the names of the children here," she says to Tevis. "I would like to call out their names. All of them."

There is a moment of silence in the room. Then Aries grabs the rope and tightens it onto her harness.

"I got you," Sam says, as he takes the other end of the rope. Max has slipped into a harness of sorts, as well. Two older kids hold the other end of his rope. He nods. Aries feels a pull as she is lifted off the ground. Every twenty-five floors, there is a plate with the number of the respective floor on it. They must be about eight feet up when they reach one hundred. Aries figures that each floor is roughly an inch. Max nods.

How can you understand what I'm thinking?
she asks. There is a slight delay, then he nods again.

Your friend is translating,
she hears.

Born-of-Night?

That's what you call her, yes. Somehow, she understands me and through her I can hear you.

Aries looks for the hawk but can't see her.

I'm up here.

When Aries looks up, she sees her sitting on a small ledge below the ceiling.

What floor were you on?
Max thinks.

Two hundred and second.

Max signs to Sam to pull them up to the 200th floor.

How can you remember all this?
Aries asks.
You couldn't possibly have been everywhere in the building.

Most floors are alike,
Max answers.
In fact, each set of four floors is pretty much identical to the next. For example, the room we are in is three times as high as a regular room. Those rooms happen every four stories. I haven't seen the whole building but it makes sense that, if you know the layout of one set of floors, you can get a good sense of the rest.

When they arrive at two hundred, Sam anchors the rope on a hook in the floor.

"All that's missing is a mini version of you, Ty, walking around in here giving orders," Aries calls out.

"I hope I wasn't that bad," Ty answers.

"No. You weren't," Aries replies with a smile. Then she points a few stories up. "Somewhere around here are my sleeping quarters and the dining room of the orphanage. Too bad we can't look inside somehow."

We can,
Max replies in her thoughts.
At least I can give you an idea.

Max signs to Tevis who translates, "Can you pull us up to the current floor?"

"Sure thing," Sam says. He and the two kids on the other side loosen the rope and pull them up until they arrive at the unfinished part of the model.

You can see the layout better where it's unfinished,
Aries hears
. Just imagine those are your floors. The layout is identical.

Aries now can see the unfinished section of the building: The curved hallway of the first tier, the sleeping quarters, and what is used as the dining room in the orphanage, now a room the same size a few stories above. She can see where Kiire's room is in relation to hers.

You see this opening here?
she thinks.

Yes,
Max replies.

The square opening is actually round. It's one of the main vertical air vents. I think there are six altogether.

I've never seen one in person,
Max thinks.

Also, the horizontal spaces you left open are correct. Those are air ducts as well. Somewhere, not far from there, a few stories up, is the room I was... held in.
She looks at Max, his blond hair disheveled, his eyes looking straight into hers. Tears form in her eyes. She thinks for a second that she should hide from him the remnants of the horror that night brought, but she realizes she can't do that, doesn't even want to.

I'm sorry.
She hears him in her thoughts.

"What shall we do?" she says, not realizing that she said it out loud. "What are we supposed to do?"

Max takes her hand. It's warm. Not uncomfortable, but warm compared to hers.

I think we should try to get your friends,
Max thinks.

How?
she asks.

We should go up there and get them,
Max replies.