"what matters," elyssa said, "is that these disguises should work on anyone who isn't a supervisor or battle mage."

they crept down the hall, listening for the approach of anyone else, but justin's ruse seemed to have cleared out most of the battle mages. elyssa checked the time. only fifteen minutes had passed since infiltration, but it felt like much longer. they had to hurry. and what if they couldn't find the transport schedule for justin's mom? she pushed her doubts away. they could worry about that when they reached the objective.

"there's the office," stacey said, pointing down the hall.

a placard on the wall read, arcsys information director.

elyssa peered into the office door. it was a large office, though cluttered with old arcterminals and other bits and pieces of equipment she didn't recognize. a young asian man sat at the desk inside, his eyes glued to the monitor in front of him. she aimed a lancer, and nailed him in the chest. with a startled grunt he slumped atop the touchscreen keyboard on the desk.

bella slipped a lanyard from around the man's neck, and inspected it. "this is his access card," she said, putting it around her neck and tucking it beneath the robes.

elyssa looked at the screen and saw the picture of a wet cat in a shower, its expression desperate. she pshawed. "looks like he was working hard."

"that poor kitty," stacey said, her lips pouting with empathy.

elyssa tucked the slumbering man away behind a pile of parts so he couldn't be seen from the doorway. at least the clutter had some use. the lancer dart would keep him asleep for a few hours.

while bella kept watch on the hallway, elyssa set her phone atop the touchscreen interface on the administrator's desk. the system looked like an advanced nom computer, though aether powered it instead of electricity and it used the aethernet instead of the internet. she activated the spell adam had put on the phone, and waited.

searching...arcsys node found.

accessing...

fail. attempting root spell hack...success.

elyssa breathed with relief at the last word her phone screen. files flashed past on the arcsys terminal, presumably as adam's script copied them to her arcphone. even with her enhanced eyesight, the images moved too quickly to see what it was copying.

root access secured. starting search *alice*...no results found.

starting search *alysea*...no results found.

"how much longer?" bella asked, her body tense as she watched the hallway.

"i don't know," elyssa said. "it's running searches, but it's not finding anything." she looked back at the screen.

starting search *secure transport*...results found. accessing...

the last word remained for so long, she wondered if the arcphone had frozen. "come on," she said.

"someone's coming," bella hissed. "oh, dear, it's a battle mage." she withdrew her staff, flicked it to full length, and aimed it down the length of the door.

"there's nowhere else to hide," stacey said, eyes flicking around the room.

elyssa ducked behind the desk, jerking stacey down next to her. bella backed away from the door too late. a man in a black robe appeared just outside the door and stared straight at bella. elyssa prepared to launch herself at the man the minute he moved toward the arcane.

instead, he merely grunted. "where the hell is he?" he muttered to himself. "lazy bastard always taking breaks." the man looked up and down the hallway. "hey, minh? i need you. my printer is broken again." he walked away.

elyssa and stacey blew out held breaths in unison.

"how the bloody hell?" stacey whispered.

"i put up an illusion to make the office look empty," bella said, wiping a bead of sweat from her forehead.

"why didn't you do that the minute we came in here?" stacey asked.

"i've been working on it all this time. it's not easy to make a convincing illusion of a complex scene."

elyssa looked at her phone to see if the program had finished. instead, large red letters flashed on the screen.

*access denied*

chapter 23

elyssa

fighting back the despair, elyssa touched the phone screen. no response. had they done all this for nothing? she flicked a finger across the screen again, but still nothing happened. out of frustration, she rubbed her hand all across the screen.

please be patient while i work...

elyssa breathed a sigh of relief. at least the program hadn't broken her phone or frozen it.

all attempts to access data have failed. touch screen to continue.

she did so.

account lacks permissions to access data node. if you receive this error, it means you'll have to access the arcsys datacenter directly. flick the screen to track the specific arcsys node location.

at least adam had provided good instructions in case of an issue. she flicked the screen.

tracing...arcsys node found. populating map.

a grid of hexagonal shapes filled her screen. near the middle of the grid was a section highlighted in red and labeled 00 access. in the center of the highlighted section, a big blue "x" appeared on one of the nodes.

"crap," she said. they'd hoped entering the basement wouldn't be necessary, but since the administrator lacked the credentials for the high-security files, it left them no choice. "it found the node, but we can't access the data from here," she told the others, showing them the map of the arcsys datacenter.

elyssa's phone vibrated. she flicked to a new text message from christian salazar. arcane council is demanding we reopen the arch. i can't delay for more than fifteen minutes. better hurry.

"no, no, no!" elyssa said, and showed the others the message.

"it bloody figures," stacey said, shrugging as if they had all day. "i love a challenge."

bella gritted her teeth and brandished the administrator's access card. "let's do this, people. to the levitator."

elyssa dispersed a couple more spy-bots down the corridor leading to the levitator and found the way clear. they hurried down the corridor to their objective. what looked like an empty security desk sat before it, but whoever was supposed to be stationed there had apparently left.

"broken scroll printer," bella said, pointing to a black printer with sheets of scroll parchment stacked next to it. its touchscreen flashed the message, "please clear jam."

"at least we got lucky on something," stacey said. "just hope he doesn't go into the admin's office while we're below."

"nothing we can do about that," elyssa said.

bella swiped the access card across the reader on the outside of the levitator. the door dinged open almost immediately. elyssa was about to step inside when bella barred the way with her arm.

"what's wrong?" elyssa asked.

the arcane pointed to a silver pattern etched into the marble floor inside.

elyssa had thought it was simply an aesthetic design. "what is it?"

"it's a ward. if we don't have the proper counter-ward, whatever that may be, we can't step inside there without it activating."

"what happens if it activates?" stacey asked.

bella grimaced. "i don't want to find out." she regarded it for a minute. "de-warding it is out of the question as well. i simply don't have time."

"maybe the administrator has the counter-ward," elyssa said. "or maybe his access card is all we need."

bella tapped her chin, staring at the pattern. "actually, i think i recognize this pattern."

"you do?" elyssa asked, daring to hope bella could deactivate it.

"it identifies whoever steps on it. if you're not supposed to be there..." she trailed off peering at the pattern for a moment. "i think this ward will shock an intruder, and trigger an alarm."

"what if we put the administrator inside and stood on top of him?" stacey asked.

"it'll still detect us," bella said.

stacey prowled the alcove. "every levitator has another access point for servicing."

"what if i send a spy-bot down the lift with the administrator?" elyssa said. "it could take a picture of the area below, and maybe we can use the portal to access it." she checked the time on her phone. "we have thirteen minutes before christian has to reactivate the obsidian arch in la casona."

bella knelt, eyes tracing the pattern. "see what happens when you put one of your gadgets inside."

hoping it wouldn't trigger an alert, elyssa activated a spy-bot orb and let it float inside the lift. it sparked, plunked to the floor, obviously dead. she held her breath, expecting an alarm to wail at any minute.

"interesting," bella said, not attempting to retrieve the tiny sphere. "i think the ward disabled, but didn't destroy it. perhaps it was designed such a way in case someone forgot a phone in their pocket."

"they're awfully protective of this place," stacey said, eyes scanning the corridor. "if only we knew if this levitation shaft goes up to the roof or not. if it does, we might find an access door."

"then we could lower ourselves down the shaft," elyssa said. "but what if there's not enough room to slide past the levitator?"

"as with most magical levitation devices," bella said, "there may be some slight give if we push it."

elyssa hadn't dealt with a levitator quite as well protected as this one. "do you think there's a chance the shaft will be warded?"

"i certainly hope not," bella said.

elyssa looked at the progress her army of magic roaches had made on the map and saw the second floor was nearly complete. she zoomed in on the section just above where they stood and noticed something missing. "there's no levitator shaft going to the second floor," she said.

"bloody hell," stacey growled.

elyssa knelt and opened a smaller clamshell case with more of the little critters inside, aiming the opening toward the gap between the lift and the wall. the roaches swarmed the shaft. one went inside the lift and promptly went belly-up, proving the ward had no mercy on anything with eavesdropping spells. the map of the levitator shaft filled in, showing only a few extra feet of space above the levitation car where the shaft ended.