32
Fort Temperance, 4 March 1871
The base clock struck one. Chad untied Patrick’s wrists and tried to figure out what to do with Claire.
“We could carry her, but I don’t think I could get her over the wall safely,” he said.
“No, you’re going to have to bring her back,” Patrick said.
Chad muttered something under his breath that would have made most of the soldiers blush. “I can’t! If the ring and the letter put her under like this, I’m the last thing that will bring her back. Dammit, I wish the aether device had worked!”
“How do you know it didn’t?”
Chad frowned at Patrick, who rubbed his wrists and flexed his fingers.
“Because it increased her hallucinations. In fact, we all felt them.”
“What if what we heard and saw weren’t hallucinations? Remember how the statues moved in Paris
