Raggah.’
After a careful inspection of the door, he gripped its handle and slowly opened
it. Freshly oiled, it swung noiselessly. They went out into a very large room
illuminated by six great torches at one end.. Here streams of water ran out from
holes in the ceiling and down wooden troughs and onto many wooden wheels set
between metal uprights.
Against the right-hand side of the far wall was another closed door as massive
as the first. It, too, could be barred shut.
Unlike the bare walls of the other caves, these were painted with many strange
symbols.
‘There’s magic here,’ Smhee said. ‘I smell it.’
He strode to the pool in which were set the wheels. The wheels went around and
around impelled by the downpouring water. Masha counted aloud. Twelve.
‘A magical number,’ Smhee said.
They were set in rows of threes. At one end of the axle of each were attached
some gears which in turn were fixed to a shaft that ran into a box under the
wheel. Smhee reached out to the nearest wheel from the pool edge and stopped it.
Then he released it and opened the lid of the box beneath the wheel. Masha
looked past him into the interior of the box. She saw a bewildering array of
tiny gears and shafts. The shafts were connected to more gears at the axle end
of tiny wheels on uprights.
Smhee stopped the wheel again and spun it against the force of the waterfall.
The mechanism inside started working backwards.
Smhee smiled. He closed the box and went to the door and barred it. He walked
swiftly to the other side of the pool. There was a large box on the floor by it.