Telari's Arc

Chapter 9 of 11

The stair ended at a heavy inner door. Telari pushed it and it held. She pushed harder and heard iron grind behind the wood. A bar. She set her shoulder against it and felt the whole frame shift. Dust sifted down from the ceiling. She stopped. Above her, cracks ran through the old stone. Force the door blind, and the tower might drop on both their heads. "It's barred from inside," she whispered. "I can't see the mechanism. If I break it, the ceiling could come down." Katt stepped past her in the dark. He was the blacksmith who had fought beside her since the first pale creature fell, and he read metal the way she read tracks. He set his rare longsword against the wall and knelt at the door. From his belt he drew a small roll of cloth. Inside lay a set of lock picks, slim tools with worn wooden handles, each one he had shaped by hand. "I made these," he said. "I know how a bar like this seats." He slid two picks into the gap between door and frame. Telari held her short sword ready and watched the cracks above. Katt worked in the dark by feel. His thick fingers moved slow. Telari heard the picks tick against iron. "There's a hook holding the bar," he murmured. "Lift the hook, the bar drops free. Force it, the bar snaps and the whole set tears loose." He breathed out. "Steady now." A long moment passed. Sweat ran down his temple. Then metal clicked. The bar slid down and thumped against the stone, whole. No crack widened. No dust fell. The door swung inward on its own weight. Beyond it lay a round chamber, torchlit. Telari saw a desk, shelves of ledgers, and a robed figure rising from a chair with a knife in hand. Alone. The hand that paid for dead armies stood five paces away, cornered. Katt rolled his picks and rose, longsword back in his grip. Telari met his eyes. "You opened the way," she said. "Now we finish it." She stepped into the room with her blade low, wind marked down its length. The robed figure backed toward the far wall, eyes darting to a second door behind the shelves. Then the figure lunged for that door. Telari lunged too. She caught the latch first and slammed it shut with her hand. But her fingers found fresh ink smeared on the wood, and beside the latch hung a sealed order, half-written, addressed to more soldiers still coming from the east.