Elena Rostova did not hesitate.
She launched herself off the oak floorboards. Her crepe-soled boots landed on the lower riser of the central proctor’s podium with barely three decibels of sound.
Directly above her, Matron Bell stood seven feet tall in her starched wool skirts.
The proctor’s chest was wide open. The torn white collar hung in ragged strips against her black iron breastplate.
Inside the exposed ribcage, the six-inch naval-brass school-bell gong gleamed under the harsh green banker’s lamps. Behind it, the heavy coil spring was compressed to its limit, locking a solid iron striker head the size of a billiard ball against a polished trip-sear.
A high-voltage solenoid hummed beside the release lever.
The Bogen decibel meter mounted on the center pillar read twenty-seven point six decibels. The four hundred fountain pens in the hall scratched against paper like dry leaves in an iron gutter.
“Elena, wait!” Julian whispered from the base of the riser.
