Wynn leaned around him. To her further shock, the guard sat slumped beside the door, apparently unconscious. Before she could ask, Ore-Locks grabbed hold of the guard’s red tabard with one hand and half dragged, half carried the man inside, dropping him on the floor of her room.
“He never saw me,” Ore-Locks said quietly. “Remember, I cannot be seen. No one must know I was here or why. It would damage the bond between the guild and the Stonewalkers.”
For all Wynn’s skill with languages, his claim might as well have been gibberish amid her shock. She couldn’t get over the fact that he was truly standing there before her.
“How did you ... ? Where did you ... ?” she began babbling.
“We need to hurry,” he urged. “Chane has gone for the rear library to make certain the way is clear. He will get you out a window and down the wall.”
Suddenly, everything made sense. Chane had sent for Ore-Locks, and Ore-Locks had snuck Chane onto the grounds ... right through its walls.
She couldn’t help being moved, as Ore-Locks was taking a great risk. He was likely in trouble already with Cinder-Shard, head of Dhredze Seatt’s Stonewalkers, for having left without a word to follow her in search of Bäalâle Seatt. The Stonewalkers were the ones who now secured the ancient texts Wynn had brought back, moving them to and from hiding as directed by Premin Sykion. If Ore-Locks was caught helping her escape, she couldn’t imagine the repercussions. And, worse, guilt choked Wynn for an instant.
She kept a secret from Ore-Locks concerning his ancient heritage.
The ancestor he’d gone searching for in Bäalâle was Thallûhearag, the Lord of Slaughter, the little-remembered but worst of traitors in dwarven history. But Thallûhearag wasn’t the villain that few still remembered from a dark legend.
His true name had been Deep-Root, and he had been a stonewalker like his descendant, Ore-Locks.
Deep-Root had sacrificed himself, when his people had gone mad, to stop the Ancient Enemy’s forces from gaining a shorter path to what were now the Numan Lands. For the thousands that had died there, he had protected a hundredfold more in the north. All of this Ore-Locks now knew, but he didn’t know what Wynn had kept from him.
Deep-Root had had a twin brother.
Wynn looked at Ore-Locks’s disguise, that burnt-orange tabard of a shirvêsh of Bedzâ’kenge, and she cringed. Bedzâ’kenge—Feather-Tongue—had been Deep-Root’s twin brother. Ore-Locks was the descendant of both.
Feather-Tongue was now among the revered dwarven Eternals, the dwarves’ equivalents of patron saints. But Deep-Root was barely remembered, and only as the worst among the Eternals’ opposites, the Fallen Ones.
The reasons for keeping all this from Ore-Locks were so complicated that Wynn pushed them from her mind. There wasn’t even time to thank him for the risk he took for her.
“Get your staff and anything else you need,” Ore-Locks urged. “You may not be coming back for a long while.”
She winced, and at the sight of her, Ore-Locks looked about at the near-empty room.
“They took it,” she said bleakly. “They took almost everything.”
There was no time for more regrets. She wouldn’t let the efforts of Chane, Shade, and Ore-Locks go to waste. After ripping a blanket off the bed, she hurried to her chest.
She bundled up what remained of her belongings: her old elven clothing, shorter travel robe, and a few other items. Then she went to the desk and grabbed the few remaining pieces of blank paper, some writing charcoal, her elven quill with the white metal tip, and a bottle of ink. When she turned about, Ore-Locks held her cloak, and he pulled it over her shoulders.
“This is all I have left,” she said.
He nodded and hefted his iron staff. Pausing briefly at the door, and making certain the way was clear, he motioned Wynn to follow. They crept down the passage to the stairs, hurrying in silence to the door out to the courtyard. Ore-Locks held up a hand for Wynn to wait and then cracked the door open, peeking out.
“Is it clear?” she whispered.
He didn’t answer, but rather leaned his head out, looking to the right toward the keep’s main doors. It took too long, and Wynn leaned in on him.
“What are you looking for?” she asked.
“A glove,” he answered.
“What does that mean?”
He straightened in some unexplained relief. “It is not there. We can go on.”
Wynn was still baffled, and then she heard voices outside.
Ore-Locks peered out the open door’s narrow space and froze. Wynn thought he was looking toward the courtyard’s northern corner. Before she could lean in again, he backpedaled, nearly knocking her flat as he carefully shut the door.
“What?” she whispered in alarm.
“A wagon,” Ore-Locks answered. “Sages are unloading it, and Captain Rodian of the Shyldfälches is out there with them.”
Wynn wasn’t certain how Ore-Locks knew of Rodian. The Stonewalkers were connected to the guild, the sages were connected to the royals, and the royals were connected to the Shyldfälches. Anything more just spun in her head amid the tension.
“Is he looking the other way?” she asked.
Perhaps they could slip out and hurry into the keep. They were hardly safe just standing here behind a door in an open passage.
“Let me look,” she whispered, and stepped around Ore-Locks to crack open the door.
What she saw filled her with dismay.
Four metaologers unloaded cargo while a fifth was in the storage building’s upper bay, working lines to haul up the loads. A driver and a smaller companion waited on the wagon’s bench, and Captain Rodian stood beyond the courtyard’s center watching all this with his arms tightly crossed.
Wynn quietly shut the door and slumped against it; she and Ore-Locks were not going anywhere.
Chapter 15
CHANE HAD REACHED THE keep’s main doors without trouble. Once inside the entryway, he checked all ways before turning right and heading down the long passage along the front of the building.
When he reached the first side passage, he peeked around the corner. This way led between small divided chambers for classrooms, seminars, and the hospice, ending at the library’s southeast door. With no one in sight, he took the turn and moved deeper into the main building’s rear. When he reached the heavy oak door, he nearly sighed in relief.
This had all been much easier than anticipated.
When he pressed lightly on the door’s handle, it did not move. He applied more pressure, but with no better result. The door was locked.
Confused, Chane pressed harder, using his weight to try to force it, but it held fast. He looked over the whole door in disbelief. In all his time among the sages, he had never heard of the new library being locked. Perhaps this was an error? Worse, since the door opened outward, there was no way he could force it. He could try to shatter its heavy planks, but doing so would take time and make too much noise.
What else could he try?
There were two other doors into the library: one at its center and one on its northwest end. One or both might be open. Still, he hesitated, wondering how close Ore-Locks and Wynn were to leaving the barracks. By the main building’s layout, he would have to go all the way to the front in order to make his way to the central passage leading to the library’s main doors. He would be right in sight of anyone coming in the keep’s main doors.
But if he hurried and got into the library, and checked for a clear path to the window, he could unlock or force this door from the inside. Wynn and Ore-Locks could still enter as planned.
That seemed the only way.
Hurrying with care, Chane made his way back but paused short of the entryway with its overhanging cold lamp mounted above the main doors. Peering in all directions, he neither heard nor saw anyone. And then he turned right, slipping down the central passage.