The Fifth Healer

64.

Exiting through the front door of the mansion, we turn away from the Acropolis and walk down the hill toward downtown Athens. Our group is too close together in these narrow alleys for me to question Ainsley about my watch and flask. After a few blocks, the alley opens into a street wide enough for cars, but we are still a packed unit as we move down the sidewalk.

"What is this tower we're going to?" asks Niles.

"The ancients call it the Horologion, from the Greek word meaning timepiece," replies Dr. Khan. "It was the first clock tower ever erected."

"In Greece?" asked Niles.

"On Earth."

We reach a wide plaza littered with piles of collapsed stonework, and pillars crumbled to about half their original height, ancient ruins in the middle of a tourist district. Fourths snap selfies in front of the rubble, blissfully unaware of the healing work going on beneath their feet in the Kastro and, even further down, in the RESTS lab. It seems like an easier life than being a Fifth. For one thing, Fifths experience their trauma. Then Chronopathic Fifths are forced to make a terrible choice-heal themselves or heal others. Do I envy Fourths? Would I prefer the bliss of ignorance? I'm not sure. Truth, once accepted, is hard to let go of. And having found myself quite ignorant not so long ago, I know ignorance brings its own set of challenges.

Overall, the area is packed with extra tourists-it turns out there's a marathon taking place today, following the ancient path from Marathon to Athens. That's what Dr. Khan meant when she took us by the stadium last this morning "before it gets crowded." Spectators are gathering to cheer for their friends and family in their final mile. Sounds nice. The only people waiting at the end of our marathon were a few hostile security guards and a stone Abraham Lincoln statue.

"There it is," says Dr. Khan. "The Tower of the Winds."

A single structure stands intact above the ruins-a tower about three stories high, built with giant blocks of timeworn white stone. Carvings of robed women decorate the rim right below the roof.

"This is a clock tower?" says Wally. "Where's the clock part?"

"Archaeologists think that in ancient times, there was a natural spring on top of the Acropolis that poured down the side of the mountain. The Greeks directed the stream to flow into The Tower of the Winds, where it powered a water clock. And, of course, there is an opening in the roof to let in light from the sun. You can probably guess-"

The world goes black...

...I come to again at 11:34 a.m., gasping for a big gulp of air like waking up from a nightmare, though, as always, I have no memories of the time I was out. I look around, momentarily confused. I touch my forehead and see the blood on my finger. I dab at it with my cravat, then tuck it back into my shirt, feeling fortunate I was only out for eighty-four seconds-and most importantly, that I regained consciousness before noon. The others are gathered around, reassuring passing tourists that I'm alright and making sure no one steps on me. Helpful, but how will I get away from the group at noon? What I am inside the tower, with no access to sunlight?

I stand and we continue walking toward the tower.

I say, "Dr. Khan, perhaps you've covered this, but the answer you sought before was a sundial. That's why there's an opening on the roof of The Tower of the Winds. It's a sundial."

"Correct," says Dr. Khan. "Although for thousands of years, we Egyptians had been using obelisks to split the day into two halves, the Greeks employed geometry to create sundials, of which this was one of the first, precise enough to separate the day into twelve equal hours."