The Waystation #2
“Walk through the front gate.” Allyn’s voice was certain.
“He sent you terms, didn’t he? Your life for the prisoners.
He thinks you’ll come alone, surrender yourself and give him whatever it is he wants.
He’s got guards watching the main road day and night, waiting for a single woman approaching on foot. ”
“He’s not watching for a small group approaching through the sewers.”
“No. I don’t think it ever occurred to him that you might try something else.”
Lark considered this. Then she asked the question that had been weighing on her since Allyn first mentioned it.
“The prisoners who died. The ones who were tortured for information.” She kept her voice level. “How many?”
Allyn’s face went gray. “A dozen. Maybe more. They brought back maybe twenty from the Narrows. Most of them didn’t last the first week.
” He looked at the table, unable to meet her eyes.
“I didn’t do it. I wasn’t part of it. But I didn’t stop it either.
I just tried not to see. Tried not to hear.
” His voice broke. “That’s why I ran. Because I couldn’t pretend anymore.
Because staying meant becoming one of them, and I’d rather die in the wilderness than become that. ”
Silence fell over the waystation. Lark thought of the soldiers who had been captured at the Narrows, men and women who had fought to defend Autumncrown and been taken prisoner when the line broke.
They had trusted that the rules of war would protect them, that being captured was not the same as being killed.
They had been wrong.
“If I tell you everything I know,” Allyn said finally, “will you let me go? I’m not asking for forgiveness.
I don’t deserve it. But I can disappear.
Head south. Find a ship. Put an ocean between myself and this continent.
” He looked up at her. “You’ll get the same information either way.
But if you let me walk out of here after, I won’t slow you down.
And you won’t have to waste time guarding me. ”
Darian glowered. Lark could see him wrestling with it, his instinct to secure an enemy combatant warring with the practical reality of their situation. They couldn't afford to be slowed down by a prisoner or to split their already small group to maintain a guard.
“Fine,” Darian said at last. The word came out harsh and begrudging. “Finish talking. Then get out of here.”
They questioned him for another hour, extracting every detail he could provide about the Citadel’s layout, its guard rotations, the location of the dungeons, the cages and the main keep. Allyn answered everything he could, his desperation making him more cooperative than threats ever could have.
By the time they were finished, the light outside had faded to dusk.
“Go,” Lark said. “South. Don’t stop until you reach the coast.”
Allyn scrambled to his feet, relief flooding his features. “Thank you. I mean it. What they’re doing, what Duskwood is planning, someone has to stop it. If you can actually get in there, actually free those people …” He trailed off, shaking his head. “Good luck. You’re going to need it.”
He edged past them toward the door, giving Noctis a wide berth. A moment later, the sound of running footsteps faded into the gathering darkness.
Pippa let out a long breath. “Well. That was informative.”
“And convenient,” Darian said. “I still don’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” Lark admitted. “But the story holds together. And his fear was genuine. I’ve spent enough time around liars to recognize actual terror.”
She moved to the hearth and began feeding the fire, building it up, her hands working automatically while her mind processed what they had learned.
A fortress with high walls and a guarded gate.
An army of at least three hundred. Corrupted creatures in cages.
And beneath it all, a dungeon where Rion was being held alongside the few prisoners who had survived the Ashen Enclave’s interrogations.
Once the fire was burning steadily, she crossed to the rough wooden table and swept aside the accumulated dust. From her pack, she retrieved a scrap of parchment and a stub of charcoal.
“The Ashen Citadel,” she said, beginning to sketch. “Moat on three sides, fed by the river. One gate facing west. The dungeon is below the main keep, accessible by a guarded stairway from above or by the sewer tunnels from the moat.”
She drew as she spoke; the layout taking shape in rough lines and angles. It was imprecise, based on a frightened man’s fragmented memories, but it was better than nothing.
“The army is camped inside the walls. Three hundred soldiers, give or take. Corrupted creatures in cages on the north side. Duskwood is expecting me to approach from the west, alone, during daylight.” She looked up at the others. “So we approach from the water, together, at night.”
“Through the sewers,” Pippa said. Her voice was carefully restrained.
“Through the sewers,” Lark confirmed. “We dive into the moat, find the drainage grate, swim through the tunnels and come up inside the dungeon level. We free Rion and any other prisoners who can travel, and we get out before anyone knows we were there.”
Darian studied the sketch, his expression thoughtful. “Getting in quietly is one thing. Getting out with wounded prisoners is another. What’s the plan once we’ve freed them?”
Lark had thought about this. The stairway up into the fortress proper was guarded and would certainly be blocked once an alarm was raised. Fighting their way through three hundred soldiers was not an option, no matter how skilled they were.
“We go out the way we came in,” she said. “Back through the sewers, into the moat, and then east into the High Greenwood. We make for Springhope. Just like I told the council we would before we left Autumncrown.”
“Oh right,” Pippa said, “we were supposed to do that. Instead of, you know, this.”
Lark shrugged. “We had diverging interests. But now, going to Springhope serves our purpose because it’s isolated.
The paths are narrow and treacherous, and they don’t welcome outsiders.
The Ashen Enclave won’t follow us there because they can’t, not without losing half their army to the terrain before they ever reach the gates.
” Lark traced the route on her rough map.
“If we can get to the mountain pass, we’ll be safe.
They can’t pursue us where they can’t go. ”
Darian nodded slowly. “It’s not a bad plan. Risky, but not totally suicidal.” He paused. “What about the grate? The deserter said it leads up into the dungeon level, but he didn’t say how it opens. If it’s sealed from the inside, we could swim all that way only to find ourselves trapped.”
“I can handle locks,” Lark said. “It’s one of my particular skills.”
“Underwater? In the dark?”
“If necessary.”
Pippa had been quiet, studying the sketch with a mechanist’s eye. Now she looked up. “I won't pretend this doesn’t terrify me. Swimming through a moat and up a sewer tunnel is not what I envisioned when I volunteered for this mission. But if it gets us to Rion, I’ll do it.”
Lark met her eyes. “You don’t have to. Either of you. This is my fight. Duskwood wants me. Rion was taken because of me. If you want to wait outside the Citadel while I go in alone, I would understand.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Pippa said immediately.
Darian shook his head. “Rion is my best friend. And Duskwood’s army nearly destroyed my home. I’m not sitting outside while you do all the work.”
“Besides,” Pippa added, “someone needs to make sure you don’t do anything stupidly heroic. You have a tendency toward self-sacrifice that I find deeply concerning.”
Lark felt warmth spread through her despite the grim nature of their discussion.
“Thank you,” she said.
“Save the thanks for after we’ve actually done something,” Darian replied. But there was a softness beneath his gruff tone that belied the words.
They spent the rest of the evening refining the plan, poking holes in it and patching them, discussing contingencies and fallback options. The fire burned low as they talked, and outside the waystation windows, the stars emerged one by one in a clear spring sky.
Two days to the Ashen Citadel. Perhaps less if they pushed hard.
Lark lay awake for a long time that night, staring at the shadowed ceiling, running through the plan again and again in her mind. So many things could go wrong. So many places where a single mistake would mean death for all of them.
But somewhere in that fortress, Rion was waiting and alive. For now.