Page 89 of Empire of Shadows

“It’s not there anymore.” Bates flopped himself back to rest against the remaining portion of the rail.

“Can you fix it?”

“Not unless you’ve got another prop stashed in that corset of yours,” Bates quipped in reply.

Darts of panic leapt to life in Ellie’s chest, rattling there like stray marbles.

“So what do we do?” she demanded.

“Float,” Bates returned. “Presumably downriver. Until we stop.”

Her heart sank as she looked over the shattered transom to the now peaceful waterfall.

“Well,” she said numbly. “I suppose that settles our debate.”

Bates flashed her a guilty and uncomfortable look.

He kicked out with his boot. One of the boards of the deck popped up in response. Reaching into another of his stashes, he pulled out a tin box, cracked it open, and removed a stick of desiccated meat.

“Tapir jerky?” he offered.

He held it out like a peace treaty.

“I’m… er… quite all right,” Ellie replied awkwardly. “But thank you.”

He snapped off a bite and chewed it with obvious effort.

“There’s plenty here if you change your mind,” he said.

“How long will it take for us to make it back like this?” Ellie asked.

“Maybe a week or two?” Bates guessed.

TheMary Leehad stopped spinning. The rudderless steamboat settled into a lazy drift down the river. Her bow was pointed back at the waterfall. The craft bobbed stern-first past rows of vine-draped trees.

Ellie looked out over the broken transom as Bates gnawed on more tapir.

Tapir, she thought numbly.Tapirus bairdii. Herbivorous mammal distinguished by its extended, fleshy proboscis.

The knowledge anchored her against a wavering, uncertain shock that threatened to swallow her.

They would float back to the mouth of the river for a long, mosquito-swarmed hike to town. If they ran into another boat along the way, perhaps they could get a tow… and then she and Bates would go their separate ways. He would return to his cigars on the veranda between his mud-soaked trudges through the swamp, and Ellie would go back to England… where she probably should have stayed all along.

She would keep the map from falling into Jacobs’ hands one way or another. Just because her hopes had been smashed didn’t mean she had to hand the parchment over to a batch of criminals. If she had no other options, she could simply burn it. Surely that was better than allowing looters to empty whatever lay at the end of it, leaving it as devastated as the cave from the day before.

The notion of the map’s potential curling into ash and smoke made her stomach churn.

Ellie forced back the thought. She wouldn’t face that possibility until she had to. Instead, she focused her attention on the shore, where thickly forested slopes were framed by peaks of gray stone.

A fork in the brown current of the river glided past. The two streams were broken by a jagged islet covered in spindly brush and ferns.

The sight unexpectedly jarred her.

“Bates?” she called out without turning back to look at him.

“What?” he returned through a mouthful of jerky.

“We’re going the wrong way.”

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