Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 104842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 524(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 349(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 104842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 524(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 349(@300wpm)
“What is this?” I asked him, needing to sit up, pleased that the second time I did, even though I was still nauseous, it dissipated quickly and I was vertical. My head still hurt, but it no longer felt like it was going to explode.
“I think we’re in someone’s house,” Cirillo said, “and if you can get up, I will explain why I think so.”
Standing was harder than I thought it would be, and I sat back down hard, a wave of dizziness washing over me.
“Will you let me help you?”
“Please,” I said, trying to smile at him.
He got up from where he was beside me on the bed, and helped me to cross the room to the heavy-looking quilted blanket. It was held above the opening with spikes hammered into the rock wall. When he moved it aside, gathering the blanket with the jute cord that there was a loop for, again, the hook having been hammered into the wall, I was suddenly looking at a panoramic view of a stunning sight.
I had expected Ophir to look like the catacombs under the palace, a place carved out of the stone of the mountain. And it did and didn’t.
This was no tight, dark, dust-filled area, but instead, an enormous cave that opened out to a lake, and beyond that, I saw mountains on one side and nothing but gray sky on the other—which meant that way was the river Zev had told me about, leading to the sea.
The sun was warm on my face as it came through vast open holes in the top of the cave. That did nothing for the chill in the air, though, and I shivered hard.
The balcony we were now on was, I was guessing, about sixty feet up. To the left, there were similar balconies, stacked one on top of the other. “This isn’t a house. We’re basically in an apartment,” I told him. “There’re probably more rooms here and a door that leads to those stone stairs.”
“You think each balcony is one apartment?”
“Yeah. I think we’re where the iceni live.”
“Why? Why wouldn’t they take us directly to the castle?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” I said, taking a step away from him, making sure I didn’t need him for balance before I pointed at the door. “Did you check that? Is it locked?”
“I didn’t. I was actually checking the drop from here to the ground.”
“You could jump this, couldn’t you?”
“Easily,” Cirillo said, and when I looked at him, he appeared confused. “But you can’t, and perhaps that was the point.”
“Yeah, but we could jump together or…” I walked farther out on the balcony and looked down. “I could probably go from balcony to balcony, dropping from one onto the other until I was down.”
“True,” he agreed. “So if the door is locked, we’ll do that.”
“I have to wonder, why put us in a room we can probably leave?”
“It only stands to reason that they don’t think we will. Perhaps they think we’ll be too frightened to journey out.”
It might have made sense, but the issue was, they didn’t know anything about either of us. I would put my mind to the mystery the second I stopped looking at the view.
The lake was huge, dotted with small boats, some with sails and oars, others with only oars, and several ferries were moving to and fro, either departing or about to dock. People were waiting to board, and I watched as a pole was used to guide the large craft, keeping the same route where, I was guessing, underwater, there were sizable rocks to push off of and against.
“I can’t see where the lake ends,” Cirillo commented. “The sun’s coming in now, but I wonder how cold it gets at night. I don’t know about you, but I’m not warm.”
Glancing around, feeling steadier on my feet, I saw white quilted coats, very much like the ones the people I could see from our balcony were wearing as they went about their day, getting off ferries and walking around beneath us on footbridges over water. There was water everywhere, which reminded me…
“I need to pee.”
He pointed at an archway. “Can you make it yourself?”
“Yeah.”
“There’s only a bowl in there, don’t get excited.”
It made sense that flushable toilets were not a thing here.
There was another bowl of water to rinse my hands in that was frigid, and a towel. Once I returned, I had a thought.
“This is Ophir,” I said to him. “Who came in and told you?”
“A servant. She welcomed me, was very worried about you, that you weren’t up, left you a pitcher of water and some kind of fruit, which I don’t understand, but clearly, they know you’re a human.”
I shook my head. “No. The iceni who live here, they eat food, so they probably think both of us do as well.”