“No.” She looked at the table now, then back at him. “You look.”

Elias said, “I have to.”

She studied his face with grave care, as if she could see the need there the way she might see a bruise. “Why?”

He almost said because my machine is broken and I may be trapped in your century forever. Instead he heard how that would sound in this place and stripped it down. “Because things don’t happen by magic.”

That held her longer than most things did. He saw the thought trying to stay lit inside her. “Maybe not magic,” she said at last. “Maybe just… there.”

Elias said, “There because someone built it. Runs it. Maintains it.”

She echoed, “Maintains?”

Elias said, “Fixes it when it fails.”

Her gaze slid toward the dark tower in the distance. For one sharp second her mouth changed, tightening in discomfort. Then voices rose behind them. Three of the others had started some game with thrown rings that flashed colors when they struck the paving, and they called to her. The thread in her face thinned.

Elias said, “Lina.” Elias moved a step to keep her attention. Pain caught in his side and forced him to stop. “Stay with me one minute more. That tower. What is it?”

She looked where he pointed. Unlike the soft white halls and glass bridges, the tower gave nothing away. No open terraces. No visible gardens climbing it. Its base sat on a raised platform reached by a broad run of steps, and even from here he could see no one on them.

“Don’t go there,” she said.

Elias asked, “Why not?”