Prince Thief

CHAPTER FOUR

I was surprised to realise I had a fair idea of not only where I was but where I was going. Mounteban had insisted I spend an hour poring over plans of the palace — without ever feeling the need to explain where he’d found those plans — and now, almost unbidden, the details were returning.

I was in the east wing, somewhere near the main entrance and nowhere near where I wanted to be. The only way into the sublevels that my memory threw up was towards the kitchens, in the northwest corner. Since the palace was essentially a vast quadrangle, even getting that far meant covering quite a distance.

I couldn’t tell what was happening behind me — except that a lot of people were running, and many of them apparently in my direction. Whether that meant the duel had been called off, whether Alvantes and his men were making a break for it, I didn’t know or much care. I had more than enough trouble of my own approaching.

Seeing the chance of a shortcut as I met the corridor around the inner garden, I vaulted through a wide window arch, rolled through a bed of crimson blossoms and crashed into the line of low shrubbery beyond. That brought me out near a paved pathway, with a little cover and a significantly extended lead. I was nearing the far side before a shout let me know my pursuers had me back in sight.

Leaving the gardens via a mosaicked arch, I saw what I was looking for: a descending flight of stairs. I took them four at a time. It wasn’t often I had an advantage, over anyone or anything. Right then, however, I was unencumbered by weapons or armour, being chased by men with more than their share of both. Even without that, I was better built for speed than those muscle-bound clods. Lastly, I was following a precise mental map through regions of the palace its guards might never have encountered. All in all, I was startled to realise I’d gained a decent lead.

What I couldn’t do was lose them. I doubted this lower level had ever been cleaned as fastidiously as the rest of the palace, and it certainly hadn’t been touched since Panchetto’s death. The tiles I sprinted across were thick with dust. Even without looking back, I knew I was leaving a trail that anyone could follow. My only chance of losing my pursuers would be to stay ahead until they gave up — and from what I’d heard of the Palace Guard, that meant no chance at all.

It only occurred to me then that Mounteban’s secret passage, which I’d been running towards all this while, might not be the best of my options. It might not even exist; I had no reason to trust Mounteban, or to put faith in his information. Even if it were real, wouldn’t I have done better to flee the palace by a more conventional route, and the city soon after?

Too late now. And if the passage was real, it offered the easiest route out of both palace and city that I could hope for.

Another flight of steps led me into a yet lower level; one that, from the thick grime on the flagstones, was rarely entered these days. The walls were of a different stone to those above, stained with mildew, and echoed my footsteps hollowly. There were brackets of soot-blackened iron but no torches, so that the only dim light filtered down from the stairwell and failed as I penetrated deeper. By the time I reached the door at the far end, it was all I could do to feel out the keyhole sunk into its ancient timbers.

I bent over, panting, straining my ears for any sound of footsteps. There was only a faint rumble, as of distant earthquakes; but I knew that unless my pursuers had abandoned the chase altogether, they couldn’t be far behind. I unslung my pack and fumbled inside, grateful that my captor had only made the most cursory of searches. Probing beneath the clinking vials, I felt the cold touch of metal, and drew it out.

The key was nearly as long as my hand, and complicated, eight teeth jutting awkwardly. The lock must be fiendish, and I was glad I wouldn’t be trying to pick it. Instead, I slipped the key in and turned it.

Or at least I tried to. The key fit perfectly, but it was stiff. I applied both hands and threw my weight into it; this time, in a series of heavy jerks, the key clicked round. There was a metal ring beside the keyhole, so I gripped it, pushed with all my strength. The door gave, but barely. How often would crews be sent to check the boat, assuming it was more than a figment of Mounteban’s imagination? Once a month? Once a year? It wouldn’t take long for hinges to grow rusted down here. I put my shoulder to the door, dug my heels against the damp slabs and drove with all my strength.

For once, being half starved was an advantage. It didn’t take much of a gap for me to be able to press through. I pushed the heavy door shut and, with great relief, locked it behind me. Even with every guard in the palace working together, it would take them a good hour to break it down — assuming, of course, that no one else had a key.

Less to my liking was the weighty dark pressing around me. With great care, I put my bag down and fumbled inside until I found the tinderbox I had stashed there. Lying upon my stomach, I placed the tinderbox before me, plucked out the flint and iron, and scraped one against the other above the tin until a spark found the char cloth inside. With the tiny light that gave, I drew out and lit the oil lantern Mounteban had given me, a neat little device that looked more ornamental than useful.

Once its wick was alight, however, the lantern just about served its purpose. I could make out the walls and ceiling, not with any detail but as a more solid black amidst the gloom. I reclaimed my pack and set off at a run; less because of the guards beyond the door than for my doubts that the miniature lantern’s oil reserve would last until I reached my destination. Mounteban had assured me it would suffice if I hurried, but that was a vague notion indeed, and I was already weary from my race across the palace.

Thinking about Mounteban brought to the surface a thought that had been prying at my mind all day. Back when this had all begun, Mounteban had supposedly been retired from a life of crime, leading a relatively quiet life as owner of Muena Palaiya’s most notorious bar. I’d always suspected his retirement was a sham, but only now did I fully appreciate how thorough the lie had been. The ease with which he’d gathered other criminals to his cause during his time as Altapasaeda’s resident tyrant suggested a network fostered over years or decades; and what kind of a man had stolen plans to the local palace in his possession?

Mounteban had mentioned that the staff had left the palace soon after Panchetto’s death, at the order of the palace guard. It was conceivable that some enterprising manservant had known about the key to the secret passage, thought to secure it, had smuggled out the maps as well or else drawn them from memory and then decided to approach Mounteban. Yet I had a curious sense that this went deeper. Could Mounteban have known about this for longer? Maybe for years? What else might he have hoarded away like some villainous magpie, and to what ends?

I remembered something Mounteban had told me, long ago. We know everything, he’d said. Had it been mere braggadocio, or a glimpse into the mind of a criminal genius? I hated to give him that much credit, or any credit at all, but time and again he’d proved himself a dangerous man to underestimate.

My lamp was already noticeably dimmer. How far had I travelled? In the diminished light, the tunnel seemed almost featureless. It ran straight, but all I could see in front or behind was deepening darkness.

Then, brutal amidst the silence as a boulder hurled into a pool, a reverberating crash rushed down the passage and over me. Another followed — and this time I recognised it for what it was. So I did have the only key. On the other hand, those mammoth blows were such that I couldn’t believe the door would hold up long.

I picked up my pace. The lantern flame jogged with me, weaving wild shadows across the walls. The noise continued, steady and remorseless as a war drum — but worse was when it stopped, with one last splintering crack. Because the silence that followed could only mean the door had offered less resistance than I’d hoped; it meant I no longer had the tunnel to myself. Most of all, it meant Ludovoco had no intention at all of letting me go.

Though I’d already spent most of my strength, I broke into a faltering run, and kept it up for as long as I could bear. Once my muscles were filled with slow-burning fire, I relented to a fast walk, and tried to judge whether other footfalls echoed my own. No luck. As deep underground as I must be, every sound was deceptive.

Logic told me I must have twenty minutes’ lead or more on my pursuers; but it was hard to trust logic as I stumbled along in that close darkness. I had no doubt they’d be narrowing the gap, and even if they weren’t, pursuit was hardly my only reason for haste. By the time I reached the junction, my lantern was less than half as bright as when I’d set out, and every step set its timid flame quivering.

One branch of the passage continued the way I’d been travelling; the other broke to the left and inclined gently. Unless I’d altogether lost my sense of direction, the choice was obvious, and I hurried into the turnoff.

This time, I didn’t have far to go. After five minutes of what felt like slight ascent, I realised I’d come to the tunnel’s close. There was no question about it — and I stopped and stared, dumbfounded. Because the door I’d been expecting wasn’t a door at all. The tunnel ended in blank wall.

It took me a minute of mounting alarm to notice the faint, irregular outline towards the wall’s edge; only that and the lever jutting from beside it suggested it might be anything but a dead end. It seemed we’d underestimated just how little Panchessa’s ancestors had trusted the City Guard. I doubted there was any way short of a sledgehammer to breach that entrance from the barracks side, even assuming you could find it.

How long since it had last been opened? Had it ever? A fresh wave of panic swam over me at the thought that I might be trapped down there in the blackness, cowering while I waited for the palace guard to find me. Before my lantern could blink out altogether, I set it down and yanked at the lever with both hands.

It gave just slightly. I could smell the faint tincture of old grease. It might have been months or years since the mechanism had been oiled — but it had been oiled. I leaned my whole weight into the lever and it groaned. I lifted my feet from the ground, so that nothing held me but the slim beam of metal — and only when it started to move did the possibility that it might simply snap cross my mind.

It didn’t. Rather, ever so slowly, the lever edged downward. As it did, the wall before me shifted, dust shivering from the old stones. A great section, almost the entire end, began to edge outward, opening like any normal door. By the time the lever was horizontal I could see faint moonlight softening the wall’s outer edge. By slow degrees, it opened, wider and wider — and then it stopped.

The mechanism complained; the lever moaned alarmingly. I strained my eyes against the failing lamplight, and finally saw why the hidden door had stuck. Had I ever considered this far ahead, I’d have guessed immediately. The barracks had been burned almost to the ground during Mounteban’s time in power. What reason was there to think this secret passage should come out in one of the few sections to have escaped the fire?

It hadn’t, of course. The door had come up against a beam as thick as my thigh. Beyond, I could see dim outlines of other obstructions, more timbers and chunks of masonry and mounds of dirt overflowed from the heat-shattered walls. Expecting the mechanism to push through that wreckage was like expecting me to dig to the surface with my fingers. Moreover, the moment I slackened pressure on the lever, the door began to edge shut. I didn’t know how long I’d have the strength to hold it — or if I once let go, if I’d ever get it open again.

Under the circumstances, there was only one thing to do. “Help!” I wailed. “I’m down here! Estrada, Saltlick… please, they’re coming! It’s dark! Someone, anyone, help me-”

“Be quiet, Damasco! We won’t work any faster for you bellowing at us.”

Estrada’s voice — and just then, it was sweeter than any music. A moment later came a resounding crack, closely followed by another. Stones rained from above, a great wooden balk came crashing down, scattering debris — and in its wake a massive shape plunged into view. It was only when it moved that I realised it wasn’t some chunk of the demolished barracks.

“Saltlick?” I asked.

“Easie!” Saltlick greeted me with such casual good cheer that we might as well have chanced upon each other in the street. He easily shouldered the beam aside, thrust out an arm to hold a leaning hunk of wall in place. The door opened a little further, then came to rest once more, this time against Saltlick’s foot. More stones bounced down to glance off his back, but he hardly seemed to notice.

There came a scrabbling from the shadows behind him. A moment later, Estrada ducked beneath his outstretched arm and brushed past me. She acknowledged me with a terse, “Damasco,” and called back, “Hurry, before it all collapses!”

There followed a stream of indistinct figures. First came Navare, who greeted me with a quick nod before hurrying on. Of the rest, half were in guardsmen’s uniforms, men I dimly recognised, and the rest were obviously Mounteban’s freebooters, looking powerfully disgruntled with the company they’d found themselves in. Every fourth or fifth man carried a lantern, so that the passage was soon bright with ruddy light.

“All right. Now you, Saltlick,” said Estrada.

I realised, suddenly, what was about to happen… but too late. Even as I let go of the lever, even as I flung myself forward, Saltlick was in the gap. I came up hard against his leg, bounced backwards. As he crammed himself through the too-small opening, dust billowed round him. Loose bricks tumbled past his feet, piling in the diminishing gap. Beyond the door, it sounded as if the entire barracks was settling to fill the hole that Saltlick had vacated.

“No!” The door was still open a crack, but I didn’t think for a moment that I could squeeze through — or if I could, get past the rubble on the other side. “No no no!” When Saltlick only hung his head contritely, I rounded on Estrada. “This wasn’t our deal!”

“Fine. I’m sorry, Damasco,” she said calmly, “but what’s done is done, and you might as well make the best of it.”

Did I detect that familiar look in her eye? That look that said, I know you better than you know yourself, so why not just let me decide what happens? “You planned this!” I hissed. “You want me dragged into this ridiculous expedition of yours.”

“Why would I possibly want that?” Estrada asked — and before I could begin to formulate an answer, she’d set off to catch the buccaneers and guardsmen, who’d already pressed on without us.

“I’m leaving,” I muttered. “First chance I get. I won’t be pressganged into another of your suicide attempts.”

In the immediate future, however, I had no desire to be left amidst the rapidly descending darkness. I hurried after Estrada, just as my exhausted lantern sputtered out the last of its life. As Saltlick shuffled behind me, bent almost to hands and knees by the low ceiling, I heard a crunch that could only have been its annihilation beneath a giant foot.

When I drew near to Estrada, she glanced back and said, “When you were making all that noise, Damasco, you said someone was coming. Did you mean the Palace Guard?”

Amidst the horror of realising I was caught up in another of Estrada’s hare-brained schemes, I’d almost forgotten the far more immediate danger. “I gave them the slip,” I lied, “but it won’t take them much effort to pick up my trail.”

“And Lunto and his men?”

“I don’t know.” Not quite a lie this time, though I had a fair idea. The likelihood of them fighting their way free from a palace full of highly trained soldiers was remote, to say the least. Still, I wasn’t quite ready to admit that — not to Estrada, not even to myself. “I’m sure they’re fine. You know Alvantes.”

“So what went wrong?” she asked.

Yet again, my brain automatically resisted the honest answer; it was the suspicion in her voice that changed my mind. Just because she was right, it didn’t make her assumption that it was my fault any less insulting. “A misunderstanding,” I said. “To do with a few of the Prince’s personal effects finding their way into my possession. I could have explained it easily enough if anyone had cared to listen, and if Alvantes hadn’t started swinging his sword around.”

“Oh Damasco, you didn’t.”

“Didn’t what?” I snapped. “Commit a victimless… I won’t even use the word crime. A redistribution of no-longer-required wealth.”

“I thought you were past all that,” Estrada said, sounding more sad than angry.

A part of me wanted to explain my motives in precise and comprehensive detail, to point out how her meddling had done nothing but bring the Castoval to the edge of ruin, to propound my new understanding that so-called heroism brought nothing but trouble for all concerned. But even if she listened, what good would it do? “It seems you were wrong,” I replied sullenly.

Estrada shook her head — and the disappointment in that gesture cut me more than I’d have imagined it could. Then, as if she’d already dismissed me from her thoughts, she called to the next figure in line, who happened to be one of Alvantes’s buccaneers, “We need to hurry. We have company down here.”

He made some sullen reply, grunted to the man before him. It barely passed for language, but it had the desired effect. Seconds later, as whatever message he’d passed forward reached the end of the line, the entire column picked up pace. Estrada matched her speed to the man ahead and I did my best to keep up.

It didn’t take us long to reach the junction. I’d almost expected to see our assailants closing from the direction of the palace, or at least the distant glow of their torches; but the only lights were those of Estrada’s party, melting the blackness of the branch to our left into wavering pools of honey and amber. Given how straight the passage ran, the lack of any sign of pursuit meant we had a respectable lead — or that the palace guardsmen had given up altogether.

If I’d assumed that might be enough to make Estrada slacken our pace, I couldn’t have been more wrong. Whether she was erring on the side of caution or whether, as I came to suspect, she was simply punishing me, she let our column keep up its unreasonable speed. Soon my sides were burning once again and my breath coming in shudders; but the guardsmen showed no signs of flagging, Mounteban’s buccaneers seemed unconcerned, and Estrada herself wasn’t so much as short of breath. Of course, none of them had endured the travails I’d already been through that day. I had every right to be exhausted, and it was only stubbornness that kept me from pleading with her.

As it happened, however, it wasn’t me who eventually brought us to a halt. Estrada glanced over her shoulder for the first time since we’d left the junction, perhaps beginning to doubt whether our pursuers existed outside of my imagination. “Wait,” she called. “Everyone, wait!”

Relieved as I was, I couldn’t imagine what could possibly warrant a full stop — until I turned and saw that Saltlick wasn’t behind us.

For one strange moment, it seemed as if he’d vanished altogether. It was only when I concentrated that I realised a patch of the distant darkness was lumbering towards us. As Saltlick drew closer, as the lanterns illuminated his hulking form, it became more and more clear why he’d been lagging. He was bent double by the low ceiling, almost crawling on hands and knees. He looked miserably uncomfortable, and the rough walls and ceiling had lashed scratches across his arms and head.

“Oh, Saltlick! Why didn’t you tell me you couldn’t keep up?” Estrada asked him.

His look of horror at the very prospect was all the answer she needed. Saltlick was always the dependable one; it was against his nature to be the cause of problems, however small. Now here he was, placing us all in jeopardy and not able to do a thing about it.

“It’s all right,” Estrada told him. “It’s not your fault. We’ll just have to let you set the pace.”

If she meant it to sound comforting, it hardly came out that way. Anyway, it was easier said than done. How exactly did twenty people match their speed to the giant crawling along behind them? Suddenly, Estrada’s insistence on bringing Saltlick was looking ludicrous indeed, and I could hear the rumblings of discontent from further up the line. The loyalty of the men supplied by Mounteban was doubtful enough already and this surely wasn’t helping.

The night wore on — or so I assumed. It was frightening how quickly even the memory of daylight, of a sky above, had vanished in favour of the conviction that this subterranean channel was all the world there was. After a while — minutes perhaps, a couple of hours, a day for all I knew — I muttered to Estrada’s back, “How far can it possibly be?”

“All the way beneath the western mountains,” she replied, without looking back.

“Which is…?”

“A long way.”

At least, thanks to Saltlick, I’d been able to recover my strength a little, and the added light of so many lanterns meant an opportunity to properly examine my surroundings. Alone, I’d thought the passage was blank-walled, little more than a mineshaft. Now I could see it was far more than that. The vertical supports were all of stone, and every one was patterned, in curious swirls and designs I could make no sense of.

I couldn’t believe that Pasaedan royalty had fashioned this sunless way, however desperate they might have been for an escape route. It was clear, though, from the clumsier workmanship, that the ceiling had been extended a good way upwards at some point. Had it not been, we would all have had to duck, and Saltlick couldn’t have moved at all.

The passage brought to mind the ancient tunnels behind Muena Palaiya where I’d first met Estrada — and I remembered the strange stories I’d heard over the years about those fathomless warrens. The deeper we travelled, the warmer the air became, and the more my nerves began to torment me. The final straw came when exits began to appear to either side, their arches too low for human traffic. What had Mounteban got us into?

“How do we even know which is the right way?” I asked Estrada, my voice a little tremulous.

Estrada showed me what she held in her hand, a map much like the designs of the palace I’d studied. This one, however, looked more like an abstract representation of a spider’s web. I assumed the dotted line running more or less straight across its middle was our route. Given how many opportunities to go wrong it offered the careless navigator, I couldn’t take much comfort from it.

I soon realised, though, that all we really needed to do was keep to the main tunnel, readily identified by its heightened ceiling. The answer to the side passages was simply to ignore them — even when odd shambling sounds seemed to drift from their mouths, or the splash of dripping water, or unidentifiable, musky odours. I tried to tell myself that with guardsmen and buccaneers in front of me and a giant behind, I was probably as safe as I could be anywhere.

As it turned out, however, it might have been better had our route been a little more intricate. Had that been the case, we might have stood a chance of losing the palace soldiers.

I was never sure what tipped Estrada off; whether it was some noise I’d missed or just a lucky guess. But out of nowhere she called another stop, and when the line had shuffled to a halt, sent word for the lanterns to be masked. It took me an effort of will not to protest. The thought of absolute darkness was almost more than I could bear. Only knowing how Estrada would ridicule me kept my mouth shut. Still, my heart sped up with every light that went suddenly black, until by the time there was only one distant glow left, it was hammering a tattoo in my ears. I held my breath, trying and failing to ready myself for that last plunge into total obscurity.

It took me the seconds my eyes needed to adjust to appreciate that total obscurity wasn’t what I was surrounded by. Deep gloom, certainly, but I could make out Estrada’s silhouette before me, and trace the border of my own outstretched hand. I turned and — seeing only the outline of Saltlick’s bulk — knelt down. Just visible between his legs, far back in the passage, was a dim glow, like a glint in the pupil of a mammoth eye. I couldn’t see movement, but that didn’t mean much; the slightest turn in the passage would be enough to hide our pursuers from view.

“They’re close,” I said, “and gaining.” I was surprised by how calm I sounded.

“We just need to keep our lead a little longer,” Estrada said. “I’m sure we’re nearly there. They can’t possibly follow us over open water.” Then, to the group at large she called, “All right… unmask the lanterns. Pick up the pace. They’ve found us.”

Pick up the pace — as if it were that easy. Saltlick had been travelling as fast as he could since the beginning, and I wasn’t about to let him fall behind again. What made it all the more excruciating was that, with our lanterns relit, there was no way to judge whether the palace troops were closing on us. Likely we’d only know when arrows or sword blows started raining upon Saltlick’s back — and given his resistance to complaining, perhaps not even then.

“Can’t you go a little faster?” Estrada asked him, though it was obvious he couldn’t.

Saltlick’s expression was pained beyond measure. He shook his head, and even that slight gesture brought dust shivering from the ceiling.

Estrada considered only briefly. Then she bellowed up the line, “Run, all of you! Prepare the boat… we’ll catch you up!”

We? Was Estrada’s plan that hacking their way through Saltlick and me would keep the palace guards occupied long enough for her and the others to make their escape? Right then, I’d have put nothing past her.

Soon the nearest lantern was only a distant glow, leaving us travelling in thick darkness. I was briefly amused, and then horrified, by the thought that if the next man in line got too far ahead we’d have to depend on our pursuers for light. However, even as the glimmer shrunk to nothing, I realised we were past the point of needing to rely on it. The walls were charcoal now, not black, and lightened ahead. Somewhere in that direction was natural light.

When the passage opened, finally, it was both sudden and dramatic: one moment the dark around us was the closeness of stone-chiselled walls, the next a cavernous space, the outlines of which I could barely distinguish. We’d come out in a huge cave, its domed ceiling descending to a distant line ahead, where it gave way to the faded blue of an early morning sky. We’d travelled through the entire night.

The shale beneath our feet ran down to a wooden jetty, and from that a wide pier extended towards the cavern’s distant mouth. The rest of the party were already upon the pier, and nearing its far end — where the means of our deliverance lay, chopping slightly in the creased grey water.

To call it a disappointment was an understatement. I’d feared that the boat might be absent, or left to rack and ruin beyond any hope of saving us.

It had never even crossed my mind to worry that there might be two of them.