32

The woman seems caught off guard; you catch the slightest smile, quickly hidden. She repeats your name, slowly: "Crowchar."

"Stop disgracing yourself before that naked savage," Stralchus says.

Beside you, Alexius says, "Let me try a few languages and see if she speaks any I know."

Alexius flits through Koiné Greek, Armenian, a few Bantu languages, Punjabi, and others you don't recognize.

Dr. Sabbatine chose the young Persian for a good reason. Though, in the languages you speak, you realize he is complimenting Keimia's appearance.

Alexius and Keimia trade languages, the merchant's fingers twitching as if he were tabulating sums, the warrior fiddling with a braid from her long black hair. As Alexius tries language after language under the increasingly hot midday sun, a piece of the Specular previously lost beneath ferns sputters to life. Keimia and Alexius both jump back. Then, realizing there's no threat, Alexius edges toward the machinery.

"The chronometer," Alexius says. "Years past. Day. Month."

It reads 0000000011000.

"She really did it," the merchant says. "Eleven thousand years ago. The dawn of time."

Keimia looks ready to smash the machine.