It took forever to traverse the twisting passageways. She was aware of time passing, of precious minutes ticking away. The first gallery opened out in front of her and she gulped a breath and stared sightlessly across it. Her imagination leapt, telling her the chamber was full of men. Their clothes whispered as they moved, as they drew their blades. The air stirred with a hundred indrawn breaths.
She strained to see, to hear, the knife gripped in her hand, but the blackness was impenetrable and she couldn’t hold her breath long enough, couldn’t quiet the beating of her heart.
For too long she stood frozen in terror—and then the desperate need to know
who
overrode her fear.
No one touched her as she crossed the gallery, no one plucked her sleeve or grabbed her arm. Nor was there anyone in the passage beyond, or in the next chamber. Saliel’s pace became faster. The whispers of sound—imagined or not—were behind her now. They followed, chasing.
She ran the final yards and crammed into the storage room. Her hands shook so violently it seemed she’d never open the door into the chamber beyond.
The door opened with a gritty sound. Faint light leaked into the darkness.
The candlelight showed her two black-garbed men who turned and came swiftly towards her. Saliel stood in the doorway, clutching the knife. She couldn’t trust herself to speak for fear of crying.
“Are you all right?” the Guardian asked.
Saliel nodded, her eyes on the other man. She swallowed and strove for a semblance of control. “They have Two?”
“We think they’re holding him in the old cellars,” the Guardian said. “It should be possible to locate him.”
“We can rescue him?” Hope was painful in her chest.
“Perhaps,” said the Guardian. “We shall try. You must wait here.”
The shadows stirred beyond the candlelight, swelling and shifting. Her heart began to beat louder, faster. “Let me go with you. Please.”
“No.”
“But what if the Spycatcher knows about the catacombs and the sewers? What if he—”
“It’s a risk we must take. You will wait here.” The Guardian turned on his heel and strode away from her.
Saliel looked at One. “Please,” she begged.
Don’t leave me alone here.
One reached out and took her by the shoulders. His grip was strong, reassuring. “If it comes to a fight, you’ll be safer here than with us.”
“I have a knife. I can—”
One shook his head. “I’ll fight better if you’re here.”
“But I can help—”
“I would have to protect you,” he said. “It would slow me.”
The words, the quiet intensity of his voice, made her throat tighten. Saliel bowed her head. She squeezed her eyes shut.
“Please stay here.”
She nodded. Emotion choked her throat, making it impossible to speak.
“Thank you.” One released her shoulders. “We’ll be back. I give you my word.”
Saliel inhaled a slow, trembling breath. She raised her head and looked at him. The black hood hid his identity.
“You’ll be safe here.”
She believed him. Her fear faded. The shadows in this room were merely shadows, nothing more. “Be careful.”
“We shall.”
One turned away. She watched the darkness swallow him. The sound of his footsteps, the Guardian’s footsteps, faded.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
T
HEY TRAVERSED THE
ancient sewer system cautiously, but once in the service tunnels Athan moved faster. This was his terrain and Two knew nothing of it.
It was his usual practice to leave the tunnels as soon as he could, but tonight stealth was more important than the need to stand upright. Speed was difficult to achieve in the cramped stairwell, but finally the steep, crumbling steps went no higher. They had reached the uppermost level of the ancient cellars.
Athan paused to allow the Guardian to recover his breath. The space ahead of them was musty, dank, a tunnel that serviced the cellars on this level.
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
Athan moved as fast as he could in the narrow space, crouching, his shoulders brushing rough stone on either side. The air he inhaled smelled of mold. After several dozen paces his gloved fingers encountered a protuberance on the tunnel wall.
“Stop,” he whispered.
The Guardian grunted and halted. “Access door?”
“Yes.”
Athan manipulated the mechanism gently. There was a faint grate of stone on stone and a stirring in the air, a freshness, but no change in the blackness. He slid the door shut. The Guardian said nothing.
Dim light leaked in when he opened the fifth door.
After a moment’s hesitation, Athan stepped through the opening. He slowly straightened to his full height. The cellars were silent. Ahead, a lamp hung from a bracket, casting a circle of light. He moved aside and heard cloth brush against stone as the Guardian followed him.
Athan eased the access door shut. He looked at the Guardian and saw his silent nod.
Their soft leather boots made no sound as they walked towards the lamp. It hung at a junction of corridors. Athan knew where he was, although it was an area he normally avoided; his own route through the cellars used more obscure pathways.
They halted. Athan strained to listen. All he heard was his own breathing.
To the left a staircase led up to the newer and inhabited levels of the Citadel. Another lamp hung in a bracket on the first landing. To the right were cellars, unused for centuries, their doors lopsided and broken. A third lamp hung outside one door.
In the silence came a sound that made his skin crawl. A whimper, a moan: pain.
Athan bared his teeth in a snarl. He covered the distance to the third lamp with swift, silent steps, the cloak flaring behind him. He unsheathed his knife. The blade gleamed in the dull light.
The Guardian’s fingers closed about his wrist. “Wait,” he breathed.
Athan shook the man’s hand off.
Do you take me for a fool?
He leaned his head close to the cellar door and listened.
The door was constructed of timber bound with bands of metal. It had warped with the years and hung crookedly on its hinges. Athan heard movement inside and then the sound of flesh striking flesh.
“Curse it!” It was the Spycatcher’s voice. “He’s fainted again.”
“Perhaps cold water, my lord?”
There was the sound of a bucket of water being emptied.
Silence.
“No?” The Spycatcher sounded disgusted. “Curse it!”
Someone paced inside the cellar. After a moment the footsteps stopped.
“This is unproductive.” The Spycatcher appeared to have regained control of himself.
“My lord?”
“I have other prey to hunt, and now is as good a time as any to start. Therlo, come with me. I need to change my clothing. You two, stay here.” The Spycatcher’s voice approached the door.
Athan stepped back. A silent stride took him to the empty doorway of a nearby cellar. He looked around for the Guardian. The man was nowhere to be seen.
“Send word when he rouses.” The Spycatcher’s voice became louder as the door opened. “One of you must remain with him at all times. Be on your guard.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“I’ll be in the courtesans’ salon.”
“Yes, my lord.”
The door closed with a dry scrape.
Athan’s hand tightened around the knife hilt.
I
should kill you now.
He clenched his teeth together and waited until the flat echo of footsteps had died, then stepped back into the corridor. The Guardian joined him. Athan held up two fingers:
Two men.
The Guardian nodded.
Athan gestured to himself and then to the right:
I’ll take the one on the right.
The Guardian nodded again and adjusted his hood.
Athan tightened his grip on the knife. Fear flickered in his chest—as quick and bright as the gleam of lamplight on his knife blade—but he pushed it aside and inhaled deeply, focusing on his rage.
He looked at the Guardian:
Ready?
The Guardian nodded.
Athan released his breath in a slow hiss and pushed open the door.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
S
ALIEL COUNTED SLOWLY,
shaping the words with her lips but not saying them aloud—
one thousand five hundred and ninety-six, one thousand five hundred and ninety-seven
—trying to keep her attention on the numbers and not on what One and the Guardian were doing. Had they found Two yet?
Her mind shrank from imagining what would happen when they did. What if they were injured? What if the Spycatcher caught them? What if—
Fear was so tight in her chest that it was difficult to breathe.
Don’t think about it. They’ll come back.
She hugged her arms and counted—
one thousand five hundred and ninety-eight, one thousand five hundred and ninety-nine.
The chill of the chamber sank through the thick woolen cloak. She began to shiver.
When the shivering became too intense to ignore, Saliel stopped counting and took the candle and explored the chamber. Shadows drew back from the tiny flame. She saw stone sinks along the walls, deep and dark-stained, and drainage gutters, and urns stacked high. The walls were lined with fine-grained black stone. A frieze was chiseled into the tall slabs. The carved images depicted the journey of death as it had been for the ancients who’d built the Citadel.
Saliel lifted the candle high and shielded the flame with her hand. Here a corpse lay in state on a bier. A few steps further on, past the main entrance from the Citadel—locked and barred—the candlelight revealed a funeral procession, with a bier carried high upon the shoulders of six men. The long train of mourners was particularly detailed. Women wept with their faces raised to the sky, while small children clung to their skirts.
Saliel averted her eyes from the mourners’ grief and turned to the next wall. Here were the storage rooms and the secret access to the catacombs. The frieze detailed the preparation of the dead: the process that had taken place in this chamber. A body lay on a table and men with knives stood alongside. It looked as if they removed the corpse’s internal organs and stored them in jars. Saliel glanced behind her at the row of stone tables, grooved and stained, and the gutters that criss-crossed the floor. She repressed a shudder.
The third wall was dominated by the official entrance to the catacombs, unopened for centuries. The door towered high, its heavy metal wings corroded with age. On one side, robed priests wrapped the dead man in intricate layers of cloth. On the other side they carried the body into the catacombs and laid it in a niche.
The fourth wall... Here was the low door that led to the disused sewer tunnel. She laid her hand on the rough stone and felt its coldness through her glove.
We’ll be back
, One had promised.
Saliel turned away. She placed the candle on the nearest table. Its surface was pitted and scored, stained with ancient blood. She sat on an upturned urn and clasped her hands together and waited. She didn’t count this time; instead she watched the candle become shorter by tiny increments, watched the flame twist and flicker, watched the wax melt.
It seemed that many hours passed before the door finally swung open. The rush of noise and movement was momentarily frightening, before it resolved itself into two hooded men with black and swirling cloaks carrying the body of a third man between them.
Saliel leapt to her feet and reached for the candle. One and the Guardian eased the limp body onto the stone table. She caught her breath at the sight of Two’s battered face.
“Is he alive?”
The men were breathing heavily. “Yes,” the Guardian said in a harsh voice. “He lives. But I don’t know for how long.” He gestured for the candle. “I think his heart’s failing.”
One turned away from the table. “I’m going to the courtesans’ salon. Perhaps I may learn something from the Spycatcher.”
“What?” Saliel jerked her head around to look at him.
One didn’t glance back, nor did he halt. “I’ll be back as soon as—”
She pushed away from the stone table. “No! Wait!” She caught his wrist as he reached for the door. “You must beware of the Spycatcher’s eyes!”
One turned towards her. His arm was tense beneath her hand. “What do you mean? Witch-Eye?”
She nodded. “His eyes make you want to speak the truth.”
“Are you certain?” The Guardian left Two’s body and came to stand with them.
“Yes. Last night, when I danced with him...” She shuddered, recalling her conversation with the Spycatcher. “When he looks at you there’s a compulsion to speak the truth.”