The dark air throbbed with sound: a chanted song surged from one corner of the hall to the other, like a translucent wave. Khassian, pressed so tightly up against Jolaine Tradescar he could hardly move, wanted to reach out and catch it as it passed – and instead found himself engulfed in it.

At the same moment there began a grinding sound as if some great stone wheel had been set in motion.

Khassian strained to see what was happening; Priests and Priestesses in an obscure corner seemed to be straining to work an elaborate system of cogs and pulleys.

‘Up! Look up!’ Jolaine Tradescar cried.

A ray of sunlight pierced the vault.

Khassian raised his head – to see a thin crescent of pale sky appear in the roof far overhead. The mechanism had opened a concealed window in the vaulted roof of the reservoir.

A breath of clean air wafted into the drowse-fumed hall.

‘This is it,’ murmured Jolaine Tradescar. ‘Will they fly?’

The crowd fell silent, as if waiting, collectively holding in a breath that could not be released until –

Until –

‘Well, I’ll be damned,’ Jolaine Tradescar muttered.

A murmur of apprehension passed through the onlookers. The Priests and Priestesses stood staring, dumbfounded. Amidst the murmuring, Khassian began to distinguish words, hushed words.

‘A sign. A portent. An omen.’

‘Ill luck…’

‘Mammie,’ came a little child’s voice, clear as a glass bell, ‘why won’t they fly?’

There was an uneasy ripple of laughter.

‘What does it mean?’ Khassian whispered to Jolaine Tradescar.

The Antiquarian scratched her ear. ‘I’ve never known such a thing. Not in eighty years.’

‘Is the weather not warm enough?’

‘Perhaps their breeding grounds have been disturbed.’

The elder Priestess came to the rim of the reservoir and passed her hands over the dark waters in a series of ritual gestures. As her hands moved, she began the chant again – and gradually, hesitantly, the onlookers joined their voices to hers.

The Priestess had closed her eyes and was drawing in deep, shuddering breaths.

The chant faded – as she fell backwards into the arms of her acolytes. A voice, hollow and inhuman, issued from her gaping mouth.

‘The souls of the Dead shall not be One with the Light…’

The hairs at the back of Khassian’s neck rose. He had been sceptical about the ceremony. Now he felt a deep and visceral terror.

‘Until the Rose and the Lotos are One…’

The Priestess’s hand lifted and – as though moved by a power more potent than her own – slowly pointed. Directly at himself and Jolaine Tradescar.

‘Violator of the sacred places…’

The people beside him began to edge away.

Her eyes, whites showing, stared sightlessly towards them.

‘Put back what you have taken.’

‘I? What have I taken?’ Jolaine Tradescar began to splutter. ‘I’ve been digging down here for over half a century. No one has ever made such an accusation before!’