Chapter 35 #2
My gaze slowed on a case against the far wall, glass-fronted and small.
Above it was a plaque reading Landsdown Relics, and inside, two pieces of unmistakable blue stone.
One was a dodecahedron, though it was not the one Lewis and I had found.
The patterns in the stone were signature—just like threads.
The other was a palm-sized pendant, covered with small, neat rows of Old Sarren script.
I stormed across the room, snatching up a fire poker as I went. I smashed the case with a single, brutal blow. My strength was truly returning now, and with it my ire.
I shook the artifacts free of glass, clasped them to me, and smashed as many instruments as I could on my way to the door. Their proximity made my altered power hum and my head feel light, but I kept my focus on the task at hand.
A woman’s coat hung beside the door, along with a neat bowler.
I took a moment to twirl up my hair, stuffed it under the hat, and pulled on the coat.
I settled my shoulders and attacked the buttons, tightening my resolve with each brass fitting.
I shoved the artifacts into the pockets and returned to the desk for more destruction—I threw every notebook and paper that would not fit into my pockets into the fire, and gave it a good stoking.
Then, poker in hand, I stalked into a stone hallway.
I immediately turned my head, letting my hat hide my face, and tucked the poker into the folds of my skirts. A man, just about to turn a corner up ahead, called back, “Miss Thera! The riots have passed Communion Square!”
I gave an affirmative gesture, taken aback though I was, and the man hurried on. Well, riots in the city were no good thing, but they would at least serve as a distraction.
I paused for an instant, looking both ways and trying to decide which direction led to Lewis’s and my cell. One way was grey stone. The other, red.
I hurried off down the latter and rounded a corner.
A guard in a grey uniform startled, started to salute, then gaped. Her hand dropped to a pistol at her belt.
I slammed my poker into her arm and smashed it immediately back up, at the side of her head. She stumbled, letting out a grunt of pain, and fumbled to draw her sidesword.
I kicked her knee. She went down with a crack of skull against stone and gave a pitiable, drawn-out moan.
I divested her of her weapons—pistol, sword, and shot. Now properly armed, I continued on my way.
Searching the catacombs that night was one of the most distressing experiences of my life, and if luck is with me it will remain unsurpassed.
Plagued by worry for Lewis, anxiety over my waning sorcery, and a sickening anger at the situation at large, I wandered.
I hid from guards, lost my way and retraced my steps, and engaged in an exceptionally brief but lively duel with a strange gentleman who I kicked into an unoccupied office and trussed behind a desk.
In the midst of this, the ground began to rumble. I disregarded it at first, thinking the quaver the aftereffects of sedation. But the next rumble was more distinct, and dust rained from the ceiling.
I stumbled into a wall and heard, from far up ahead, a chorus of screams and shouts.
I rounded a corner, panting. There, to the sides of a large, circular chamber, were a series of massive cells.
They were packed with men and women from every class, from barefoot beggars to a society lady with a wilting hat perched stubbornly atop her head.
They were crowded against the bars, reaching for and calling to another group of figures dressed as guards. I say dressed as, because they most certainly were not guards. They were attempting to pick the locks, and Emrys Harden was in the thick of them.
“Artha Fucking Thera!” someone roared. A prisoner’s finger stabbed through the bars towards me, its red-faced wielder practically foaming at the mouth. “That’s her!”
Separatists rushed me.
“I am not—I am not her!” I protested. I brought up my sword and levelled my pistol, backing into the mouth of the corridor. A bullet chipped at the wall next to me and I threw up an arm, barely keeping stone dust from my eyes.
“Mr. Harden!” I shouted. “Mr. Harden!”
Harden’s voice overrode the mayhem, though I could not make out his words. He shouldered through the crowd and pushed someone’s rifle down impatiently.
“Miss Fleet,” he said. “Thought I might see you here.”
The sight of him sent a scurry of ill-fitting feelings through me, but the most prominent one was relief.
“I have the keys,” I said, weapons still raised. I continued to the crowd at large, “I am not your enemy. Mr. Harden, use the keys, but I do need them back.”
Weapons lowered and I tossed the keys to Harden. He briefly left me, unlocking the remaining doors, then returned to me as his people began to organize into small groups and disperse down the passageways. Several brushed past us, offering apologies which I waved at with forced nonchalance.
“You were captured, and have escaped?” Harden observed, looking me over. “Or are you on a rescue mission?”
“Both, I fear. Have you seen Lewis?”
“No, I’ll help you find him.” He glanced over his shoulder at his people and called, “Maggie! I’m off!”
The familiar older woman saluted him.
Gratitude momentarily over whelmed me. I did not resist as Harden gathered me to him with a light touch on the back and we started down the corridor through which I’d come.
“Lead the way,” he prompted. His presence beside me was both steel in my spine and a new ease in my step, a natural consolation that I could not look at too closely.
I smiled at him, a tight but genuine thing. “Thank you.”
He drew his pistol and we set off at a run.