The western ravine took runoff from all three lower peaks. Water poured down the cliffs and broke into spray on boulders the size of hay wagons. The air smelled of wet moss and dead willow leaves. Once Pei Jing reached the bottom, he could hardly hear anything over the rush of the torrent.
He waited in a dry fold of the cliff until the next night. Then he dropped to a boulder and laid his palm on the rock. Beneath the noise of the water, he felt a sharp pulse every two seconds. The array was sending its excess charge into the earth. If there were no way for that charge to leave, it would come back through the dome in flashes of lightning.
He waded upstream until he came to a wall of ivy. When he pulled a thick stem aside, the whole mat peeled away enough to show a crack. Dry air came out. It smelled of hot lead.
Ten paces in, rough rock gave way to square blocks of dark iron. The ravine had already cut down to the level of the chamber. Twenty-four arm-lengths of rock still lay between it and the slope above. An eight-sided pillar rose twelve feet from its floor. A longer section extended down through the floor into the bedrock. Tarnished lead foil covered its sides. A blue ripple ran down the old cloud runes every two seconds and vanished at the base.
