The lift came to rest forty feet below the stage. Pei Jing stepped out into air cold enough to leave frost on the ceiling bolts. He could taste salt and copper.
The Precursor Tablet lay on a granite carriage in the middle of Vault Three. Two technicians had folded its lead shroud and left it on a bench. They had backed up to the wall, where they could stand without feeling the worst of its hum. Feng Danding waited by the carriage. Ye Qinghan stood by one of the pillars with her sword still sheathed.
Pei Jing set his hands over the open chest from the earlier sale. One hundred and twenty of the large gems came out of his marrow and settled onto the felt. Feng counted them in rows of ten.
“Twelve hundred,” he said. “The tablet is yours. The Pavilion leaves the transport to you.”
Pei Jing walked toward the carriage. At five paces, he could feel the tablet through his sandals. He counted the beats. Seven a second, steady as a sound deep under the ground.
He laid his bare palm on the bronze. A jolt ran up his forearm and struck his ribs. It was the same vibration he had felt through the floor, only strong enough now to make his bones ring. There was no qi in the tablet for his Dantian to take in.
