Dellen got to his feet. “Thank you, I appreciate this,” he said to Tristan; the atmosphere between them shifted from leisurely to focused.

“What will we do if we find something down there?”

“I don’t know.” Dellen said, “I suppose it will depend on what we find.”

Tristan stood, and they strapped Dellen into his flight harness. Steam ejectors whirred to life. Once again, the air around them became damp and uncomfortably hot, then the frame pulled them into the air.

“I’ll wait for you in the family library.” Said Gilgamesh, “The chasm is too deep; I won’t be able to keep up.”

Dellen nodded his understanding.

Tristan steered them higher than he had in their practice flights, taking them up over the gardens. The estate looked larger at first as more of the grounds were revealed, then smaller as it shrank below.

They flew to the edge of the cog. Tristan lowered his thrust, bringing them to a hover ten feet above the edge, still over the spinning metal, just a foot away from the chasm.

With a deep breath, Tristan pointed the ejectors and pushed them over the edge.

Dellen’s stomach dropped; it felt like they should have fallen, but they hovered over the inky black.

The first thing he noticed was how thick the cog was. When he flew in a carriage above or stepped from cog to cog, he could see that the cogs were at least ninety feet thick, sometimes as much as three times that, depending on the cog, but it seemed appropriate given their scale.

Descending next to Aurum Heights, the cog felt much thicker.

After passing the seemingly endless wall of brass, they were surrounded by a vast network of support structures that stretched out in all directions, keeping the city suspended above the chasm. A dizzying array of metal beams, gears, and cables crisscrossed beneath them.

“Where do we even start?” Tristan said.

“The central attachments for the larger cogs,” Dellen said.

He knew many of those would be falling; he hadn’t done as good of a job keeping track of the smaller cogs.

The light around them dimmed.

Dellen looked up, Aurum Heights had spun while they hovered; it now blocked the sun. He took out a lamp and shone it in a diffuse beam, improving visibility for twenty or thirty feet.

“That’s not as helpful as I’d hoped.” Said Tristan; his voice was off. Dellen could hear the nerves.

“Nothing has happened; fly us over as fast as you dare so we can begin our inspection.”

Tristan exhaled a long breath. “And I have your word that you will help me leave the city?”

“I’ve already visited the Mercantile Guild,” Dellen said.

“What did they say?” Tristan asked, voice immediately more chipper.

“They said that the least expensive destination I could purchase for you would be one hundred and fifty thousand sovereigns.”

Tristan gasped. “One hundred and fifty thousand? Do you have that much money?”

“If I could just spend one hundred and fifty thousand sovereigns, I wouldn’t need you to assist me with this, but I have an idea for how to make it work.”

“Oh,” Tristan said, sounding disappointed.

“No one was willing to bring me here.” Dellen said, “I have a talent for achieving my goals.”

Tristan brightened again, “That’s true.” He said. “Let’s inspect those supports.” He maneuvered them through the maze of beams, brought them to the edge of a large cog, and flew under.

The hum of the city above faded, replaced by the creaks and groans of the support structure. The air grew cooler and damp, the darkness thicker, heavier, more resistant to the lamps; Dellen held one in each hand.

“We’re looking for anything out of the ordinary,” his voice barely audible over the sounds of the chasm, “Loose cables, damaged gears, out-of-place lumps.”

“None of this is familiar,” Tristan said.

“I know, keep looking.”

They came to the central axis of the cog. It was a pillar of metal that Dellen thought was perhaps fifty feet across. It seemed all but inconceivable that even an explosion would be enough to damage it.

“Are you sure that an attack could damage something down here?” Tristan asked. He landed on the support beam leading to the central axis. His flight frame screeched across the metal and grated in Dellen’s ears, making him shudder.

“Everything alright?” Dellen asked.

“Just taking a break,” Tristan said, his voice a little rough. “If we have an emergency, I don’t want to need to stop.”

“What kind of emergency are you worried about?”

Tristan moved his head in every direction, “I don’t know, saboteurs, massive serpents, a hive of squid.”

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

“I don’t think squid grow in hives,” Dellen said.

“You sure?”

“No.” He admitted.

They waited half an hour for Tristan to recover from the strain of his Aether use. “There doesn’t seem to be anything here.” Dellen said, “Can we keep going?”

Tristan spun the steam ejectors back up to speed, and they returned to the air.

“Can we circle this column?” Dellen asked.

Without answering, Tristan backed them off the column and flew them sideways around it so that Dellen always had a view of the entire surface. As far as he could tell, it was unblemished by sabotage.

“Let’s check another,” Dellen said.

Tristan sighed, then looked around. From above the city, it was easy to see which cogs were larger than others; under the city, in the dark, it was a bit more challenging. They could have descended to look for cutouts of sunlight, but Dellen didn’t want to push his luck with Tristan and have him abandon the entire expedition.

Smaller cogs had smaller supports, though smaller was relative; at thirty or so feet across, the central axis for a smaller cog still appeared to be more than strong enough to support whatever might rest atop it.

The second large cog was also without visible sabotage.

“One more,” Dellen said.

This time, Tristan groaned. “I’ll look at one more with you, but if we don’t find anything, I want to go back to where I can see the sun.”

They flew through darkness that was almost unaffected by Dellen’s dim light. Gears groaned around them, threatening to hit them if Tristan lost focus. They came to another fifty-foot wide support axis.

“Look, there’s nothing here,” Tristan said with annoyance and relief.

Dellen’s eyes fixated on a suspicious lump. “I think there is.”

“Now let’s just get out of here and, wait,” Sweat streamed down Tristan’s face, and his cheeks were red, then his voice came out coarser, “What did you say?”

“I think I see something.” Dellen pointed in the direction of the lump. “There, close to the top of the column.”

Tristan flew them closer and muttered a mantra under his breath, Dellen wasn’t certain that he was conscious of what he was saying, “No, no, no, no, no, no.”

“Bring me closer, please.”

Tristan brought them closer; Dellen could almost reach out and touch it, even if they were bobbing up and down.

The ‘lump’ was large, larger than Dellen, and it had been welded into place.

“What is that?” Tristan said.

“I don’t know, but I do have a theory.”

“Which is?”

“I think this might be an Aetheric Infuser. It stores Aether, and when it reaches the end of a countdown, it funnels the power into an object. I think it would funnel enough power into the metal to cause localized rapid expansion.”

On one side of the infuser was a complex panel covered in dials, switches, and what looked like a clock.

Tristan was silent a minute, then he spoke, his voice filled with mounting horror. “The metal that was infused would heat up, but the metal around it wouldn’t; it would snap, violently; with this much metal, it would sound like an explosion, and the axis would topple.”

He looked up at the axis above them. “If that went off right now, the entire thing could fall on us. There’d be no escaping it.”

“Think of the people up top,” Dellen said. “They’d have no warning whatsoever; you at least, can fly.”

“We need to check more,” Tristan said at last.

They checked central axis after central axis, and found a variety of Aether Infusers beneath the city, all attached to supports.

They landed, and Tristan drew in breath after breath, lungs heaving like bellows, “What do we do with these?”

“Hold me steady to see if I can work out whether there’s a timing mechanism attached,” Dellen said. “I don’t want to set it off early by tampering with the Aether, but maybe there’s a way to determine when these are set for.”

Tristan looked around. “Do you think that’s a good idea?”

“I think it’s a better idea than being caught unaware,” Dellen said.

“Why don’t we figure that out once we get back to the surface?” Tristan suggested.

“Let me take a look. I wouldn’t know who to bring back here and look at these, do you?”

Tristan released a reluctant sigh. “Fine, just so that you can describe it better.”

They took off and bobbed in the air before an infuser before Dellen said, “It’s too hard trying to focus while we jitter up and down in the air; let’s find one more; maybe it’ll be welded lower down on the support.”

Dellen’s request was met by discontent silence, then, finally, “One more, that’s it.”

Tristan pulled them away from the cog’s central support and scanned the area, looking for the best direction to fly in search of another infuser.

Dellen pointed a lamp ahead of them. “That way?”

“As good as any,” Tristan grumbled.

They accelerated faster than they’d dared fly before, a sure sign that Tristan was impatient to leave.

Darting through the blackness, Dellen saw them approach the curtain of light that heralded the end of one cog and the beginning of another. Warm sunlight bathed over them for a brief, beautiful second, then Tristan took them into the darkness below another cog.

Dellen shivered. Having seen the infusers, it was somehow worse.

They flew through the darkness; wind tore at his clothes, and Dellen did his best to point both beams ahead. He wanted to ask Tristan to slow down but didn’t want to risk him turning around and ending the expedition.

A central support column loomed before them.

“Do you know which cog we’re under?” Dellen said.

“No, it’s hard to keep track with no markings. I don’t know where we are.”

They circled the column, looking for an infuser. The column was huge at over one hundred and fifty feet around; searching it in the dark was slow.

“There’s nothing here,” Tristan said. “I’m done; let’s get back to the.”

Dellen’s arm shot out like a striking snake. “There.” He pointed his lamps; near the base was another infuser.

“Damn it,” Tristan wheezed out.

“Let’s set down on a support beam,” Dellen said. “You can rest, and I’ll see if I can get closer enough to that infuser to examine it properly.”

Touching down, the steam ejectors hissed as they released their last puffs, and the frame shuddered to a stop. Metal scraped against metal, but the touchdown was marginally fainter than the previous landing, and the screech in Dellen’s ears was marginally better.

Tristan slumped and caught his breath.

Still secured in his harness, Dellen said, “You did great; take a break.” He knew he was pushing Tristan unfairly hard. He unbuckled himself and took his first steps out onto the beam. The beam was still; he could see that it was still, but it felt like it was moving beneath him.

His stomach quivered. All of a sudden, now that he was untethered, the beam didn’t look quite so wide, and the darkness below seemed to want to come up to claim him. The lamps in his hand felt like they were getting in the way of his balance. He strapped them to his belt and considered the metal beneath him.

Dellen licked his lips and looked at the infuser. It was only twenty or so feet away.

He looked back down at the metal beneath his feet. It was lightly curved, tapering towards the abyss below.

His feet felt heavier, and his stride was slower. He paused after each step, making sure his footing was firm.

The wall drew closer and closer.

He was ten feet away, then five, then one.

The metal of the support axis was the green of old copper and looked smooth.

Dellen looked over at the infuser. The weld scars marred the copper at every point of contact.

Examining the mechanism, Dellen found it easier to focus on now that he wasn’t bobbing up and down, but the feeling of the ground shifting beneath him distracted him.

He wasn’t ready to touch it yet, but he was ready to try and decipher how the components worked. The dials appeared to be related to pressure and Aetheric flow, while the knobs seemed to control the direction of the energy, the switches were more enigmatic to him, but he was all but certain that the timepiece to the side was counting down to a date four days hence.

Dellen reached out his hand to touch the switch closest to the clock. Then he stopped; if he pressed the wrong thing, there was a real chance he’d trigger the infuser early.

He put his hand out to steady himself on the support axis instead.

Aether shot out of the metal and up his arm.