Kushiel's Chosen - Jacqueline Carey [173]
I had to take a chance. I tried the handle, and found it locked.
Well and good, there must be a key on Fabron's ring. I unfolded them from my gown and sorted through them by touch in the dim light cast by the lantern in the corridor behind me. There were three that were larger than the others, and one smaller. I tried one of the larger, then a second, and that one unlocked the door. Muffling the keys once more, I worked the latch and opened the door a crack, peering through the gap.
There was not much to see, and little light in which to see it. An empty wardroom, it seemed, with a bench alongthe section of wall visible through the cracked door and an unused charcoal brazier. I daresay the cells grew cold and dank in the winter; the room must serve as a place for guards to warm their hands between trips below. The voices I heard came from well beyond the wardroom.
Nothing else for it, I thought, and slipped cautiously through the doorway, leaving the door an inch ajar behind me. Strange, to hear the endless roar of the sea muted at last.
Beyond the wardroom lay what would have been the great hall in any other fortress this size. Only a few torches lit it, and those guttered low. I gazed cautiously around the corner of the arched entryway. A fireplace at one end, cold and bleak, and a long table; only a few chairs. There were hallways at either end. From the entrance at the far right came lamplight and the sound of voices.
The other was dark, but it was from thence that I heard running footsteps. I drew back into the shadows as a hurried guard emerged, boot heels echoing across the hall. The faint light gleamed on his steel helmet and corselet, and he carried a short spear in one hand.
Lack of knowledge is deadly. I left the wardroom and followed him, keeping to the shadows. Even if I had not known how to move silently, my bare feet made no sound on the cool flagstones.
The hallway branched, a broader corridor leading to the left, a narrower one lying ahead. Light spilled out of a room to the right on the narrow way, and that was where the voices came from. Feeling dreadfully exposed, I crept near enough to hear.
"... no answer from the watchtower, warden sir!" the guard I'd followed was reporting, an urgent strain in his voice. "We gave the signal three times, sir, as ordered!"
The warden's voice, flat and implacable. "And on the island?"
A deep breath. "Nothing visible, sir. It's too dark to make out the ground, even."
There was a pause before the warden spoke again. "Continue combing the island. Double the number of torches; there aren't many places an intruder can hide. Gitto, leave four men to hold the bridge on this end, and take four across and secure the watchtower. Signal when you hold it. Balbo, on post in the tower, and alert me the moment they do." Silence, and then his voice rose a notch. "What are you waiting for? Go!"
I hadn't waited for his order; by the time he gave it, I was retreating stealthily to the corner. Ducking around into the wider corridor, I hitched up the trailing skirts of my filthy dress and ran, fear lending wings to my bare heels.
And I saw, ahead of me, the torch-cast shadow of a figure emerging from another side corridor.
There was a small alcove holding a statue of Eshmun on a black marble plinth; a smiling youth crowned with a grain wreath. I had no other choice. Whispering a plea for forgiveness to the slain deity, I slipped into the alcove, huddling crouched in the shadow of his plinth.
Jogging footsteps sounded in the hall, a rattle of sticks. I dared not look, keeping my head down lest my face catch the light. Spears, I thought, or torches; somewhat from a storeroom. Intent on his errand, the guard passed me by unseeing, and I heard the even pace of his