The Red Wyvern - Katharine Kerr [113]
In ranks of four they entered the dark tunnel. At the head of the line Caradoc’s lantern bobbed and gleamed, showing the way as they tramped along, heading downhill from the dun. Branoic had never been so aware of noise: the sound of their boots slapping on the muddy ground, their breathing, the occasional cough, the rustle of cloth on the concealed mail. He reminded himself that out in the open air the same amount of noise would sound much less.
The tunnel abruptly jogged. When Branoic reached out a hand, he touched the pillar of worked stone Lilli had mentioned. They were passing under the walls of Dun Deverry. From there the tunnel sloped up a good long hike that had Branoic sweating by the time it finally levelled out. A murmur to halt passed down the line. They had reached the door.
Branoic could see some of the men milling about at the head of the line, but no one spoke. The lantern suddenly brightened, held aloft in Peddyc’s hand. It seemed that Caradoc was doing something to the door itself. The candle lantern dipped down and went out. Fresh air drifted down the passageway; the doors were opening, but in silence rather than with the shriek Lilli had mentioned. Slowly, carefully, the line began to move forward. Branoic took a deep gulp of the cleaner air and followed his troop through the cellar, then up the wet steps to the deserted ward.
Overhead the clouds were hanging thick. Branoic could only make out large shapes: the walls of the irregular ward, the broken broch behind them, a distant rise of buildings. The ground lay slick with mud and drizzle, and over everything hung the wet scent of decay. Caradoc motioned the troop back. They crowded into the cellar, then two or three at a time jogged across the ward to the wall at the far side. In the shadows they spread out and pressed back against cold stone in a ragged line one man deep. When Branoic reached the wall, he looked back across the little ward to see a distant confusion of dark towers rising against a drift of clouds. The moon broke free again and revealed the confusion as the false king’s broch complex, a good safe distance away. As the light faded he saw Caradoc, running to join them. The captain slipped into place at the head of the line next to Tieryn Peddyc.
Caradoc had of course drilled them on the plan over the past few days. They would find a way out of the little ward that enclosed the bolthole, then begin looking for a place to climb over the fifth wall. With Peddyc there to guide them, the first part of the plan proved easy. They left by the same gate as Lilli had, but where she’d gone uphill toward the broch complex, they walked down a narrow space between two walls, then turned to their right and found themselves in an alley between deserted outbuildings. The fifth wall loomed beyond empty sheds—impossible to judge the distance in the murky half-light.
Slowly, moving a few men at a time and for only a few feet at a time, they crept down the alley, which debouched into a muddy open space, too narrow to be called a ward. On the other side rose the stone curve of the fifth wall. The moon broke free of the clouds. With hand signals Caradoc moved his men back among the sheds, while he remained crouching at the alley’s mouth. When the moon’s light faded, he dashed across and gained the shadow of the wall.
In their hiding places the silver daggers waited. To Branoic it seemed a large eternity before Caradoc appeared again, motioning them over with a wave of his arm. A few at a time, gauging the moonlight, they ran across the open space and spread themselves out along the wall. While they waited, they uncoiled the ropes from their waists. When the moonlight dimmed, Caradoc worked his way down the line.
“No guards on the fifth wall,” he whispered. “Some on the fourth. We go over a few at a time.”
The first men up tied the ends of the ropes