12
Trapped
‘In.’ Silas held a
door open for Kate, ordering her into a room lit by glowing
firelight. For a cell, it was not what she was expecting. It was
bright and warm, and the sight of a soft bed was enough to make her
realise how tired she was.
For Kate, entering
that cosy room was like walking out into the summer sun. The cold
that had sunk so deeply into her bones began to retreat against the
woody air of a welcome fire, and she felt the numbness fade from
her skin as the water that clung to it evaporated away. She knelt
in front of the fire at once, letting its flames warm her face
until her cheeks turned red.
‘This room will be
your cell tonight,’ said Silas. ‘Da’ru has ordered for you to be
treated well, despite your defiance towards her. Appreciate these
comforts while you can. They are not offered to
everyone.’
There was only one
window in the room: a wide arch of clear glass looking out over the
buildings that made up what Kate supposed were the High Council’s
chambers. Silas walked over to it, signalling for the two wardens
to go outside, and waited until they had closed the
door.
‘Da’ru is keen to
gain your trust, especially after your interesting revelation back
there,’ he said. ‘The next time you see something that you cannot
explain, I expect you to keep it to yourself. The more you give
Da’ru, the more she will take from you. That would be costly for
both of us.’
‘I gave her what she
wanted,’ said Kate. ‘Whatever happens, it will be no more than she
deserves.’
‘You let yourself see
something that was not meant for you,’ said Silas. ‘Da’ru will not
let this “foresight” of yours pass easily. She has devoted her life
to manipulating the veil and yet you have just shown more of a
connection to it in one night than she has been able to develop
across many years. She must decide if you are to be an asset or a
threat. If she cannot control you, she will kill you, so you will
stay here and you will be quiet. You have already drawn too much
attention to yourself. As far as those guards out there are
concerned, you will be as silent as the dead. Do you understand?’
He waited for her to answer.
‘I’ll be quiet,’
promised Kate.
‘You are fortunate I
was the one to escort you here,’ said Silas. ‘Anyone else might
have seen talk of the councilwoman’s death as treason and have
taken action against you. People have been executed for far less in
this place.’
The words stung, but
Kate tried not to show it.
Silas stood there for
a moment, then he walked out of the door and locked it behind him
without another word. Kate heard him giving orders to the wardens
outside and she ran to the door, peering out through an eyehole set
into the wood. Silas glanced at the eyehole from the other side, as
if he knew she was standing there, then he turned and walked
silently down a long empty corridor, leaving the two wardens to
stand guard over her.
Kate could hear
people moving on the floors above her and below, but despite all of
the distant sounds of life around her, she had never felt more
alone.
She turned her back
to the door. Thoughts like that would get her nowhere. If Tom was
right and Edgar had found his way out of that tiny cell, there had
to be some way out of this room. All she had to do was find
it.
Driven by new
purpose, Kate stuffed the eyehole with a rag she found on the floor
and decided to explore her prison. It did not take long. The walls
were bare stone, enclosing a bed, a tiny fireplace and a washstand
with soap, towels and a jug of hot water. Next to the bed was a
table with a lit candle upon it and a tray covered with a white
cloth. She lifted the cloth carefully to find a glass of water, an
apple and a plate of sandwiches underneath. Food could wait. She
had to get out of her freezing clothes, and that water was not
going to stay hot for ever.
She undressed quickly
and put her boots and clothes out to dry in front of the fire,
before rinsing her hair and scrubbing her skin clean. When she was
finished, she wrapped herself up in a towel and found a pile of dry
clothes folded in a box at the end of the bed. She pulled out a
long skirt and a red jumper and tugged them on before throwing a
blanket around her shoulders and running her fingers through her
clean hair.
Dawn was still a few
hours away. It was time for a plan.
She tested the
window. Locked. Even if she could break the glass, she was at least
three floors up overlooking a guarded courtyard and she could see
no way down. The walls all looked solid enough but she inspected
them anyway, feeling around for secret doors or loose stones. She
found none. Even the chimney was too narrow for her to squeeze
through and a grille had been fitted over it just in case anyone
was desperate enough to try.
It was not long
before Kate was forced to accept her situation. There was no way
out and nothing she could do to help herself escape that place. She
ate some of the food to keep her stomach quiet and curled up on the
bed, determined to check the entire room again in the morning,
before finally giving in to the comfort of the fire and letting its
warmth carry her into a restless sleep.
Kate woke some time
later to the sound of a key turning in the door. She grabbed one of
the bed blankets, flung it around herself and pretended to be
asleep. Then the door opened and someone stepped into the
room.
The candle on the
bedside table had already burned out and her hand tightened around
its wooden candlestick as the door clicked shut. Footsteps crept
across the floor. The intruder skirted the bed, fingered the
blankets, leaned over and - ‘Kate?’ - the candlestick struck the
intruder’s head with a sharp crack and Kate squirmed away as he
flopped on to the bed groaning in pain.
‘Ow! What was that
for?’
Kate stopped halfway
to the door. ‘Edgar?’
‘Of course it’s me.
Did you have to hit so hard?’
‘What are you doing
here? How did you get past the wardens?’
Edgar sat on the bed,
rubbing his sore head, and Kate threw open the curtains to check
that it was really him.
‘No! Wait!’ he said,
as the moonlight streamed in. ‘I have to explain something
first.’
It was too late. He
smiled nervously and Kate stared at him in disbelief.
Edgar was wearing the
long black robes of a warden.
‘Now that is
something I never thought I would see,’ she said.
‘As plans go, you
have to admit this is a great one.’
‘Are you insane?
You’re at least a foot shorter than the rest of the wardens and
those robes don’t even fit. How did you get in here?’
‘A little charm, a
sprinkling of deception and a lifetime’s worth of luck. Those
wardens’ll believe anything if they think it’s an order. Just put
their robes on and they think you’re in the club.’
Edgar was trying to
sound relaxed, but he was sweating. Kate gave him what was left of
her water and he gulped it down at once, the glass shaking in his
hand.
‘To be honest, I
thought I’d be rat food by now,’ he said. ‘This is going a lot
better than I hoped.’
‘But, how did you get
out of the holding cell? I saw Silas lock you in!’
‘Not so hard really,
when you know how. Every collector puts a dead-switch inside their
cells, just in case a prisoner turns the tables and locks them in
instead. Not all of them are as tough as Silas, you know. He‘d
probably never need something like that, so it’s a good job he’s
just as paranoid as the rest. Took me ages to find it, but it was
there.’
‘How could you
possibly know that?’ demanded Kate, stopping in the middle of
pulling on her boots.
Edgar looked at her
uneasily. ‘You don’t want to know.’
‘Yes, I do. What
happened to you before you came to Morvane? You told me Kalen was
lying when he said he knew you, but you were the one telling lies.
He did know you from somewhere, didn’t he?’
‘I promise, I’ll tell
you everything as soon as we get out of here.’
‘That’s not good
enough.’
‘It has to be. We
don’t have time to talk right now.’
‘Then what are you
doing here? We can’t get out! There are two wardens standing right
outside the door.’
‘Ah, but I have some
inside information.’ Edgar pointed at the window.
‘It’s locked,’ said
Kate.
‘Not for long.’ Edgar
walked to the window, Kate heard the lock click and a tiny key
sparkled in his hand. ‘All thanks to Tom. He was the one who told
me where to find you.’ Edgar threw open the window and looked out
across a sheer drop. ‘The wardens are going to change guards down
in that courtyard soon.’ He dragged off his robe and pushed it into
Kate’s hands. ‘Here’s the plan. You wear this. Go straight out of
that door, turn right at the end of the corridor and head down the
first staircase you see, all the way to the bottom. I’ll be waiting
for you there.’
‘I can’t do that!
They’ll spot me in a second!’
‘They won’t. They’ll
just think you’re me.’
‘And how is that
good?’
‘Wardens don’t ask
many questions if they think you’re one of them. Trust me, you
won’t get caught.’
‘What are you going
to do?’
‘Me? I’m going to
climb down there.’
The last thing Kate
could ever imagine Edgar doing was climbing out of a window into a
place full of wardens and, from the look on his face, he wasn’t too
sure about it either. He looked like he was going to be
sick.
‘All right, we’re
doing this,’ she said, throwing the robes back into his arms. ‘But
you’re using the corridor. I’m climbing down.’ She pulled on her
coat.
‘You don’t know where
to go!’
‘I’ll manage.’ Kate
tied her hair back, twisted the skirt into a knot at her hip and
tucked the fabric into the waistband. Once it was secure she
clambered out on to the ledge.
‘Tom said there are
hand- and footholds carved into the wall,’ said Edgar. ‘It’s a
secret way down from when this used to be a warden’s room. Look to
the right. You’ll see them.’
‘I can see one,’ said
Kate, trying not to look down.
‘Kate, please be
careful.’
‘I’m all right,’ she
said. ‘Go.’
Kate clung on to the
window frame, focusing upon the wall. The wind howled around her
ears, swirling up from the square below, and the sun was starting
to break upon the horizon, casting long rays of gold across the
rooftops. She slid her foot into the first foothold she could find,
let go of the window just long enough to grab the lower lip of a
tiny stone arch and then edged her way along, step by step, heading
diagonally down the wall.
The few guards that
were left down below were too busy talking to one another to think
about looking up. Darkness was Kate’s friend, for now, but at every
moment she expected to hear a shout or a warning, or to see arrows
come spearing up past her ears. Nothing came and the secret path
took her right to the ground, where an archway hid her from a pair
of wardens who were just starting their patrol. She dropped down
from the last foothold, freed her skirt and ducked behind the
stones, not daring to move until she saw movement off to her left.
Edgar was there, hiding on the opposite side of the square, waving
cautiously across the courtyard, which now looked much wider and
dangerously exposed. There was no way either of them could cross it
without being seen.
Something flapped
above Kate’s head, and she looked up to see a crow perched inside
one of the footholds. Silas’s bird. And if it was there, Silas had
to be close.
Whatever Edgar’s plan
had been, there was no time for it to work now. She could not risk
leading Silas to him again. They had to separate. She had to find
her own way out.
Kate did not see
Edgar’s look of fear as she left without him, or see him crawl
around a low hedge to avoid a warden that was heading his way. But
Silas saw it all. He was on his way down from the testing room
tower, carrying a stolen vial of what was left of Kate’s blood in
his hand. He had no intention of allowing Da’ru to use that blood
in her work. The councilwoman may have lost the book of
Wintercraft, but she had learned enough
from it to make that blood a very dangerous tool in her hands. He
could not risk her using it against Kate, not until his work was
done.
Silas did not know
how Kate had escaped from the holding room and he did not care. He
took the steps two at a time, his coat trailing through the stone
dust as he slid the vial into the pocket at his chest and swept out
into the open air.
She was out and she
was his.
Kate ran into a quiet
wing of the immense council chambers and raced along corridors and
through empty rooms, checking every window to find some way out.
All she saw were more buildings, more courtyards and endless grassy
squares. The place was a maze and the wardens were
everywhere.
Most of the doors she
found were locked, so she was forced to cut through a dining room
where two long tables were already laid out for breakfast. A door
hung open at its furthest end: a servants’ door, meant to blend in
with the rest of the wall. She ran straight for it and found
herself inside a network of passageways built right into the
walls.
The cramped pathways
were dusty and tight, with passing places sunk into them at regular
points wherever the thicker walls allowed. Kate often had to duck
inside to let busy people pass, but no one questioned her. Many of
the servants she saw there looked as bedraggled as she did, heading
off to build fires, serve breakfasts, lay tables, polish floors and
do a hundred other tasks that kept the council chambers running
smoothly.
Suddenly the
passageway came to an end and Kate squeezed out into a busy kitchen
filled with steam and smells and shouts. Most of the workers were
younger than her, boys and girls stolen from their own home towns,
stirring, baking, boiling and frying under the keen eyes of three
older cooks. Kate was not sure where to go next, until a young girl
carrying a bowl of potatoes looked her way, glanced at the nearest
cook and then changed direction, heading straight for
her.
‘You’re one of them,
aren’t you?’ she whispered. ‘Your eyes are different. I can tell.
Edgar told me you might come this way.’
‘Edgar was
here?’
‘He was looking for
you a while ago. He said if you came here without him, I had to
show you the door.’ The girl pointed to an iron hoop halfway along
the wall. The door behind it was so well disguised that Kate never
would have spotted it on her own.
‘Is Edgar coming
back?’ asked the girl.
‘I hope so,’ said
Kate, trying to smile. ‘Thank you so much.’
‘Good
luck.’
Kate left the girl
behind and stepped through the door into a short hallway that led
straight outside. The fresh air chilled her skin and she ran out on
to a path edged by an iron fence that was far too tall to climb.
Beyond that fence, the city rose like a black forest and a carriage
path led from the council chambers right down into the city
itself.
Kate followed the
fence until she found a missing railing that left a wide space
between the bars. She squeezed through and set off running down the
edge of the path towards the safety of the nearest street. She was
so busy worrying about what might be behind her that she did not
spot the man waiting up ahead until it was too late.
He stepped out in
front of her, snatched her up in his arms and pulled her into the
hallway of a narrow old house. Whoever he was, Kate was not ready
to be taken without a fight. She bit and scratched and punched and
squirmed until the man cried out in pain and two more hands grabbed
her in the dark.
Lanterns gathered
around her and five dirty faces glowed in their light.
‘Is she the one?’
asked a man behind her, holding a light close to her face before
she managed to free her arm and knock it away.
‘She fits the
description.’
‘And she’s right
where Edgar said she would be.’
‘What’s your name,
girl?’
‘Do you really expect
her to tell us that?’
‘If it is her, then
where’s Edgar?’ asked the first man. ‘Isn’t he meant to be
here?’
A woman’s voice rose
above the rest. ‘I think Edgar may be lost to us,’ she said, moving
round to stand in the light. Something about her was familiar to
Kate. Her hair was short and flecked with grey, and her eyes were
pitch black, edged with blue, like shining drops of
oil.
‘It’s you,’ said
Kate, remembering her at once. ‘I saw you. At the
bookshop.’
The woman smiled
kindly. ‘If you are who we think you are, then it has been many
years since we last met,’ she said. ‘Perhaps if we introduce
ourselves, you will understand why we are here.’
The woman reached out
for Kate’s hand and this time she did not resist. A gentle warmth
spread across her fingers and, for the first time since Artemis had
been taken, for no reason she could explain, Kate felt
safe.
‘It is her,’ said the
woman. ‘She is scared, understandably, but she is no threat to
us.’
‘Tell that to my
nose,’ grunted one of the men, whose face was swelling quickly
after taking a full punch.
The woman ignored
him, never taking her eyes off Kate. ‘We are going to let you go
now,’ she said. ‘We have a lot to talk about, so please do not try
to run.’
The men released
their grip, letting Kate stand by herself.
‘Who are you?’ she
demanded, glaring at them in the light.
‘You have no reason
to fear us,’ said the woman. ‘We are just like you, Kate. We are
the Skilled.’