Chapter 39 · Give Back the Thirteen Minutes

The brass key turned inside the vault door with a sound like a bone being set.

Beyond it, the memory vault shuddered. Dust sifted from the ceiling. Somewhere below the black glass floor, the Living Core Clock began to turn faster, each rotation punching a dull pulse through Eve Calder’s ribs.

Tick.

Kieran’s hand tightened around hers.

Tock.

On the other side of the sealed door, metal boots struck the corridor.

“They’re here,” Sora said.

Blood darkened the side of her shirt, but she stood straight anyway. The brass key remained in her fist, its teeth glowing with thin lines of blue light. She looked nothing like the frightened clerk who had once brought them tea and forged transit stamps in a basement office.

She looked like someone the city had been waiting to obey.

Eve stared at the locked door. “You sealed us in.”

“I sealed them out.”

“You said you were a clerk.”

“I said what the Assembly needed me to say.” Sora’s mouth tightened. “The last appointed Clock Warden does not get to have a childhood. Or friends. Or a name that isn’t on a list.”

Another impact struck the door.