"You with me?" Seth asked, surprised.
Warren tucked his feet beneath himself, and Seth helped him stand. "So cold... like the grove," Warren mumbled.
"We have to hurry," Seth exclaimed. He started across the kitchen, but Warren did not follow. Once again, he appeared paralyzed.
Seth returned to Warren and grabbed his hands. Life rekindled in his eyes.
"Your touch," Warren murmured.
"Run," Seth said, leading his friend by the hand through the house toward the entry hall. Staggering along with stilted strides, Warren managed a respectable pace. They reached the bottom of the stairs and started up. Breathing hard, Warren stumbled, fighting his way up the steps with his free arm and both legs. Seth tried his best to pull the struggling man forward.
Glancing down the steps, Seth saw the shadowy apparition return to the entry hall. Garments unfurling and billowing with dreamlike slowness, she drifted toward them, levitating forward and upward.
Seth and Warren reached the second-story hall, passing a photograph of Patton and Lena hanging on the wall. Seth held Warren with both hands-the added contact seemed to invigorate him. Shambling forward, they arrived at the foot of a staircase to the third level just as the spectral woman reached the second floor and came floating down the hall. They were most of the way up the stairs when Warren stumbled badly. Seth lost his grip and Warren tumbled down several steps, coming to rest in a motionless heap. Seth leaped down to him, clasping one of Warren's hands in both of his.
Warren stared at him, pupils unevenly dilated, blood trickling from the corner of his lips. "Go," Warren mouthed. He dug a hand into a pouch at his waist, pulling out a fistful of flash powder.
The shadowy apparition appeared at the base of the stairs, dragging her numberless dark wires. Warren flung the powder at her. There was no crackle or flash. Her fluttering garments flowed toward them.
Seth released his friend and charged up the stairs two at a time. If he failed to claim the artifact, all these sacrifices would be in vain. He dashed down the third-story corridor to the north end of the manor, relieved at how fast he could run without towing Warren, eyes fixed on the door at the end of the hall. His legs and arms pumped hard until he rammed the door with his shoulder, clawing at the knob.
It was locked.
Seth stepped back and kicked the door. It shuddered but did not open. The shock of the impact hurt his shin. He kicked the door a second time to no avail. Taking a few steps back he crouched and charged, shoulder lowered, transforming himself into a projectile, aiming not at the door but beyond it. Wood cracked and split, the door flew open, and Seth tumbled through to land on his hands and knees.
Rising, he shut the splintered door as best he could. The room he had broken into was broad, with two shuttered windows. A huge oriental rug covered the hardwood floor. Bookshelves lined one wall. There were a couple of chairs in a sitting area beside a canopied bed. He saw no safe.
Had they been correct to account for daylight saving time? Had the safe come and gone? Or was it yet to arrive? Perhaps the safe was currently there, but hidden. Whatever the answer, Seth had only seconds before he joined the others as a shadow.
He raced to the bookshelf, frantically scooping armfuls of volumes out of place, hoping to find a hidden safe in the wall. When that yielded no result, he turned, eyes darting around the room, and there it was, standing in a corner where it had not been a moment before-a heavy, black safe, almost as tall as Seth, with a silver combination dial in the center.
Bounding across the room to the safe, he began turning the dial. It rotated smoothly, unlike the dial on his locker, which was jerky and clicked a little when you reached the correct number. He spun the dial right twice to 33, left once to 22, then directly back to 31. When he pulled the handle, the door swung open silently.
A single object rested on the floor of the safe, a golden sphere approximately a foot in diameter, its polished surface interrupted by several dials and buttons. Seth could not imagine what the peculiar device did.
He pulled the sphere from the safe, finding it somewhat heavier than it looked. The room had been cold when he entered, but the temperature was now dropping rapidly. How near was the shadow lady? Perhaps just outside the door.
Seth dashed to a window and threw open the shutters. There was no roof outside this window, just a three-story drop to the yard. Desperate, he began pressing the sphere's buttons.
And suddenly he was not alone in the room.
A tall man with a mustache appeared in front of him. He wore a white shirt with the sleeves rolled back, gray trousers with suspenders, and black boots. He was fairly young, with a solid build. Seth instantly recognized the mustached man from his photographs. It was Patton Burgess.
"You must be the youngest safecracker I have ever seen," Patton said amiably. His expression changed. "What is going on?"
The door to the room blew open. The shadowy apparition hovered at the threshold. Sweat beaded on Patton's brow, and he stiffly tried to turn, his body jerking weakly. Seth took his hand, and Patton swiveled to face the apparition. "Hello, Ephira."
The apparition recoiled.
"What has happened to you?" Patton backed toward the window, keeping hold of Seth's hand. "I suppose darkness always was a downward spiral."
"No roof," Seth warned quietly.
Turning, Patton leaped onto the windowsill. Releasing Seth's hand, he jumped, not down, but up, twisting to catch hold of the eaves of the roof above. His legs scissored as he hoisted himself up. Then he reached a hand down. "Come on."
Ephira glided into the room, face enraged, fabric unwinding, rippling toward Seth. Clutching the sphere in one arm and blindly trusting Patton, he climbed onto the windowsill, stretched out his free hand, and pushed off.
Patton's hand closed tightly around his wrist and swung him onto the roof.
"We need to get out of here," Seth said.
"Who are you?"
"The caretaker's grandson. Fablehaven is at the brink of destruction."
Patton rushed along the roof, shingles groaning and splitting beneath his boots. Seth followed. Patton ran toward the corner of the roof near where a tall tree grew. Surely he wasn't going to jump!
Without hesitation, Patton sailed off the roof, catching hold of a limb that sagged and broke. Releasing it, he caught hold of a lower limb. Hand over hand, Patton made his way toward the trunk. When he got there, he swung up, straddling the bough. "Toss me the Chronometer."
"You expect me to jump?"
"When jumping is the sole option, you jump, and try to make it work. Toss it."