Risen for a Tower Read online

  Chapter 2 - Tilted

  The Arctic winds howled through the night and remained unabated as the black winter sky lightened only a few shades into a softer gray by morning. Those chill gusts betrayed no want to weaken as they hissed across the tall and slender tower that dared stand so tall against the cold’s ire.

  Ethan shivered as he stood in the tower’s newest and still unfurnished level. The tower’s grumbling furnace, many, many levels below Ethan’s current position, strained to push air with any remaining warmth into the chamber. The windows remained frosted, preventing Ethan from having the opportunity to peek down upon the warehouses, in which his night’s dreams had envisioned a return of that pale face leering from a window.

  “Don’t you think it will be a grand view, Ethan?”

  Cedrick’s blood coursed for the excitement the old man always felt after the addition of a new level upon his tower, flushing his face no matter that his words frosted in the cold chamber. Though Ethan and the architect dressed in layers of clothing, their fingers and ears covered by mittens and muffs, Cedrick wore not even a coat.

  The architect inhaled a breath before speaking. “I’m afraid there’s a problem, Mr. Pyle.”

  Cedrick frowned. “I don’t understand, Mr. Hampton. It appears to me that you’ve added this new level without an issue. Thanks to you and your crew’s efforts, I can now claim another ten feet to my tower.”

  “Well, the new addition’s really only added nine new feet,” the architect replied.

  Cedrick shrugged. “A minor concern. The main thing is that the tower has a new level. Wouldn’t you agree, Ethan?”

  Ethan felt his jaw drop. Cedrick Pyle, the master of minutia, had just proclaimed a detail to be frivolous. It was too much for Ethan to believe, and that made him nervous.

  “It sounds like a very important detail to me,” Ethan replied.

  Cedrick merely waved a hand. “We’ll just make sure to add a little more to the next level we stack onto this tower.” Cedrick clapped the architect’s shoulder. “How quickly can you start construction on the new level?”

  Ethan felt certain that his grandfather had turned mad, and he wondered if the time had come to consult the legal department to begin transferring to him the reigns of Cedrick’s empire.

  “In this cold, grandfather? Construction material and tools do not behave properly in this temperature. Contractors would freeze.”

  Cedrick’s eyes brightened with heat. “Ethan, you can be guaranteed, that somewhere out in that big world, a rival is laying a new foundation for a tower of his or her own. I am not going to stand still and wait for whoever that is to catch me. And I will not give Clavius Turner the satisfaction of seeing me stumble. Ever onwards. Ever upwards.”

  “The cold’s not our most pressing problem,” the architect sighed. “Rather than try to explain it, let me show the problem to you both.”

  Mr. Hampton removed a green tennis ball from a coat pocket. He gently set the ball upon the center of the chamber and stepped back as Cedrick and Ethan stared upon it. The ball moved very slowly at the start before momentum pushed against it. No one said a word as the ball increased its pace and rolled into the corner.

  Ethan looked into his grandfather’s face. Again, those eyes, burning in frustration and anger, looked so young though the surrounding face had turned so old.

  “You’ve built this new story off of level!” Cedrick hissed at the architect. “I wouldn’t be surprised to learn this entire chamber is off of square. A new story on top of my tower. My demands get simpler and simpler in my age. Yet they get harder and harder to realize!”

  Mr. Hampton peeked at Ethan, as if pleading for empathy. Ethan glanced at his shoes and offered none.

  “It’s not our new addition, Mr. Pyle.”

  Cedrick’s hand clenched. “Then what the hell is it?”

  “It’s the tower,” the words rushed from the architect. “It’s the tower itself that is off level. It’s starting to lean. It’s as if the foundations are sinking.”

  Cedrick slowly shuffled and grunted as his back bent to retrieve the architect’s tennis ball. He glared at Mr. Hampton as he returned to the center of the room. With a sudden flash of energy, Cedrick hurled the ball against the wall. Ethan held his breath as he watched the ball bounce. The ball came to a rest in the opposite corner into which it had originally rolled during the architect’s demonstration. Cedrick’s eyes peered at the ball, and Ethan thought they might succeed in defeating the natural laws of physics and pin that ball in place. But momentum again soon pushed against the tennis ball, which repeated its previous performance by rolling back into the opposite corner of the chamber.

  The architect frowned. “I’m afraid you could repeat this demonstration on every level of your tower, and that the tennis ball is going to wind up in the same corner. Somehow, your tower has developed a tilt, Mr. Pyle.”

  Cedrick shook his head. “When can you start on the next level?”

  “I can’t stack one more level on top of your tower until we repair the lean. We’re going to have to dig, and it’s going to be some time before the ground warms enough so we can get at the foundations with even heavy machinery. And it’s going to take a lot of equipment to support the tower while we repair the foundations. It could be months.”

  Cedrick shuffled to the window and stared through the frosted pane. “I can’t afford to wait so long. I can’t show Clavius Turner that he’s forced me to pause.”

  Mr. Hampton’s face was puzzled at he looked towards Ethan.

  “Listen to the architect, grandfather. Can’t you hear the wind outside that window? Don’t you feel the tower swaying beneath our feet? You can’t expect to add another level now. You’ll topple it down after stretching it so far. You must pause to repair the foundations.”

  “You cannot do it?” Cedrick repeated his question to the architect.

  “I cannot.”

  “And if I paid you three times as much as you earned at the construction of this level?”

  The architect peeked at his shoes. “I could not put my crew in such danger.”

  “Give the man his check, Ethan,” Cedrick growled. “You do fine work, Mr. Hampton, but you disappoint me in the end. You concern yourself too much with the welfare of your men. One more story on top of this tower, no matter the lean, would provide an excellent opportunity to allow the most competent and courageous of your crew to rise. By making this choice, you only shelter your weak, Mr. Hampton. In the end you will see that it will be the weak who drag you down.”

  Ethan did not look at the architect as the man walked to the descending stairs. He thought for a moment that even his grandfather appeared crestfallen as Cedrick’s shoulders slumped. But Cedrick allowed himself only a short sigh before turning his burning eyes again upon Ethan.

  “Clear your afternoon’s schedule.”

  “I planned to meet with supervisors from several of our distribution centers.”

  “They can wait,” Cedrick snapped. “We have more urgent business. Dangerous business. The architect proves my suspicions. There are monsters gnawing at this tower’s foundations, and I have a very important shipment arriving in the afternoon that I hope will turn the tide in my favor in my battle against Clavius Turner.”

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