Read-along: Seven Ancient Wonders - Part 21

Then her eyes narrowed... and focused. They blazed in the firelight, scanning the ancient symbols closely now.
I wish I was blazed. Does this mean that she wasn't looking at these symbols properly before and is only now starting to look closely at them? I am getting the feeling that this girl may not be the perfect companion for such a quest...
To West, it seemed as if she had just entered a trance-like state.
Have you tried turning her off and on-
Actually, never mind.
Then the flaming drop-stone above him creaked again. He snapped to look up.
Take a shot.
The torch-riddled ceiling above the moat kept lowering. Smoke was now billowing into this area from the main cavern. West swivelled to see the entry chamber behind him getting smaller and smaller...
He can swivel? Does that not just make these stone socks pointless?

What I believe is happening in the cavern, leading to all of this smoke. Actually, it does make sense and give us a reason as to why Wizard  gives so few fucks.

Lily was still in her trance, reading the runes intently.
She is definitely feeling the effects of Wizard's magic herbs.
"Lily..."
"Just a second..."
Take two shots. Does anybody actually believe that West is going to die here, or that Lily isn't going to miraculously solve this puzzle? If I wanted tension from this situation, I could replicate it by doing a crossword on the toilet whilst my brother launched fireworks at me.
"We don't have a second, honey." He eyed the hazy, smoke-filled chamber closing behind them. The smoke was getting denser.
Then, abruptly, one of the flaming torches attached to the descending ceiling dislodged from its bracket...
Oh. No. The humanity. I wonder if he will escape.
... and fell.
Bravo, Reilly. Take a shot.
Down toward the oil moat where West stood helpless!
I am getting sick and tired of this style of writing. We know where West is and where the torch is going, why does Reilly keep feeling the need to tell us this? Unless West has actually burst free of the socks by transforming into a monkey, or Horus has freed him off screen, then I am pretty sure that he is still there.
"Oh, God no-" was all he had time to breathe.
He echoes our thoughts.

I made the same face when I saw "Project X"

The flaming torch dropped through the air, into the oil moat-
-before, six inches off the surface, it was plucked from the air by the swooping shape of Horus, his falcon.
Can we end the book there? Horus is the best.

How the movie would look, in my mind

The little bird gripped the flaming torch in its talons, before dropping it safely in the closing entry hall.
"Why don't you leave it to the last second next time, bird," West said.
Sitting now, Horus just returned his gaze, as if to say: Why don't you stop getting into stupid predicaments like this, human.
Horus is actually a man reincarnated as a bird, I am sure of it. Where is she sitting? On his shoulder? The relationship with his bird is the closest thing to any sort of character interaction for West, and Horus remains the best character throughout the entirety of the book. When the bird does something incredible, I believe it.
In the meantime, Lily's eyes glinted, staring now at the symbols on the rightmost of the three pendants:
There is also a diagram of the weird symbols here.
She read in a low voice:
"Beware. Atone
Ra's implacable Destroyer cometh
And all will cry out in despair,
Unless sacred words be uttered."
Then Lily blinked and returned to the present.
Wait, what? Did she just travel back in time simply by reading the notes on the wall? This just became the Butterfly Effect, probably as a result of that wizard weed and whatever is burning in that oil. The fumes from that thing must have more drugs than a night out in Plymouth...