The room was rather musty—hence the open window—from the traces of cigar smoke. Akterian cigars, like the sort my grandmother used to smoke. Her husband would bring them for her, whenever he’d gone back to visit his family. That’s how they met, those cigars. She hadn’t smoked a single one since he’d died.
I’d never particularly liked any of my grandparents, but something of the safety of childhood lingered in the smell, and I inhaled greedily as I wiped my feet on a corner of savoy-blue carpet and spied out the room.
The lights were off, of course, and the tinted windows more tinted than usual. That and the general décor said to me that this might be the prefects’ conference room, which gave me a funny feeling.
It was a large room but not enormous, and dominated by a shiny walnut table. Chandeliers hung heavy, and various green drapes over everything provided an extra layer of soundproofing and insulation. It was, in short, the sort of place Francis describes as masculine. Curly designs are manly when dark colored.
More importantly, it looked like the sort of place with drawers containing pens, notepads—and paperclips.
Keeping to the edges of the room, and frequently checking the window, I went through drawers and cupboards. I found plenty of pens, which might do but probably wouldn’t, a few scraps of paper, a tissue box, and—wonder upon wonders, something far better than any paperclip. I smelled it before I saw it: subtle, waxy, hint of lemon, lots of oil. Wood polish.
By dint of a variety of uncomfortable contortions and a tremendous mess, I soaked my wrists and hands until they glistened and stank. Then I dropped the bottle, squeezed the fingers and thumb of my left hand together . . . and slipped it right out of the cuff. My other hand came out a moment later, and then I shoved cuffs and polish back in the cupboard, along with the tissues I used to clean up my hands. The clues were there for anyone who looked, but no need to make them more obvious than necessary.
Rubbing my chafed wrists, I crept to the door and stuck my head out to check up and down the hallway. Maybe five minutes had passed since I’d dropped off the ledge above, and I wasn’t going to fool myself into thinking they weren’t putting two and two together. I needed to get out, and I wasn’t going to be able to do it looking like a blood-stained madwoman. Cliché though it sounded, my best bet was to steal a uniform and simply walk out. That meant I needed to locate a bedroom, laundry, or changing room. And then—then I’d figure something out.
This hallway was as stupidly overpriced as the rest of the building. Portraits of former prefects hung on its walls, smugly observing the lesser beings scurrying back and forth, their features enhanced by a flatterer’s brushstrokes.
Their eyes didn’t bother me. I was far more concerned with the eyes of the security cameras. I straightened my back, pretended to walk casually, and hoped they were in black and white and wouldn’t pick up on the blood.
The alarms shut off.
That . . . couldn’t be a good sign. I froze, skin prickling, feeling like a hare abruptly aware of a beagle. And then, like the hare, I went to ground. I sprinted to the end of the hall, swung through a door, and thundered down the stairwell. I made it past the first landing no problem, but a group of knights stood in conference outside the ground floor exit. I heard a shout as they spotted me, but I kept going—down one more flight and through the basement door.
This door had no lock, but the basement was stuffed full of filing cabinets. It was the work of a moment to shove the nearest cabinet over in front of the door. It crashed down with satisfying solidity, landing diagonally and creating a wedge between door and wall. With a bit of effort, someone could push the door open an inch or three, but not nearly far enough to squeeze through. No one would be getting in that way. If I could find a different exit—
Then so could they. Use your brain, Mercedes. They know this building better than you do. If you try to escape, you will be caught. If you hide, you will be found. And Silvertip’s told these knights you’re a dangerous criminal. Face it: you’re going to be caught. So get caught on your own terms. Have an open radio connection. Would a radio work in this basement? What was in here, anyway?
The room’s other entrance was an arch, and beyond that a veritable maze of storage shelves loaded with cardboard boxes, plastic tubs, and crates. I might be able to find a weapon in there or a communication device or a white flag or something useful. But I’d have to move pretty quickly, or I’d be caught red-handed and probably shot before I could open my mouth.
I paced, hitting my forehead with open palms, trying to think. If I were a crazy, paranoid prefect with a brand-new manor and delusions of kinghood, what would convince me to stop? What would convince my knights not to shoot first and interrogate never? Would I accept any form of negotiation? How would I trap her?
I lowered my hands slowly, staring at nothing, an idea forming. It was ludicrous unless I’d read Silvertip correctly—in which case it was inevitable.
If I were building myself a prefect’s manor, the first thing I’d do would be design an exit strategy, one with plenty of redundancies. Entrances to my super-secret, not-known-even-by-my-knights secret passage on every floor.
Knights outside the basement door rattled the knob. I stepped against the wall, out of sight as they got it open an inch and banged against the cabinet. They’d be able to see me if I went for the arch, but if I were fast, no way could they shoot me from that angle.
When they found they couldn’t get through, they closed the door again, and I heard the murmur of voices.
“But where?” I wondered.
The secret passage would have to be somewhere Silvertip could reach quickly, but which wouldn’t be within eyeshot of either door or arch. Preferably, it’d also be in a natural space—somewhere it made sense to have an extra-wide wall. Somewhere that wouldn’t draw attention or look weird.
Such as the wall blocking off the underside of the stairs.
Bangs made me jump. The knights were throwing themselves at the door, trying to push the filing cabinet out of the way, not able to see how it was wedged. Let them. There were more futile endeavors in the world, but not many, and I couldn’t be bothered to pay much attention. I moved as one hypnotized, hardly believing I could be right.
I traced my hands over the most likely spot, in the corner where the back wall met the stair wall. There were more filing cabinets here, lining both walls, dull industrial green with shining silver handles. Except—except the drawers of this cabinet were fused together.
The cabinet lying in front of the door rocked and slammed back against the wall. Knights cursed themselves, one another, doors in general, filing cabinets, and me. It occurred to me briefly that if I did want to try to convince them of anything, I had a captive audience—but no, better not let them know I hadn’t fled through the arch, to lose myself in the maze beyond.
I ran my fingers along the fake cabinet, trying each false drawer. Not one budged. I couldn’t see a keyhole or anything, so I tried kicking it. That didn’t work any better for me than it had for the knights.
A man’s voice rapped orders, and the swearing knights exchanged violence for listening. More orders were spat into a radio. They contained the words “back entrance.”
I tapped the false cabinet. Come to think of it, it’d make an awfully small door. Not too small for me, but Silvertip was tall and broad-shouldered. Besides, he might want to bring others with him—his wife or Dinez. And all three of them were considerably larger than I.
It couldn’t be in the wall behind the cabinets, but—yes, of course; the next cabinet over. The connection to this one was set back, but they were connected. I tried the handles, and, with a silent laugh, caught the middle latch.
The cabinets swung toward me as a single unit, revealing a dark space beyond, wood paneled on the sides and above, dirt below, smelling of dry earth and stale air. I stepped through and relatched the secret door behind me. As the light cut out, I spied a pile of glow sticks by my left hand and grabbed one.
Silvertip had been bright enough to forgo even minimal luxuries here; neither interior decorators nor electricians had ever been inside this passage. It was wide enough for me to stick out my arms, but no more than that. The dirt floor dulled my footsteps, and I walked quickly—glow stick in one hand, opposite hand trailing along the low ceiling above to support it in case the weight of the building decided to collapse on me.
The passage wasn’t straight, but it didn’t wind madly either. It turned along the edges of walls and then shot straight ahead. It must have come out somewhere beyond the manor grounds, in a shrouded area where he could emerge secretly and escape. If Silvertip was too paranoid (or not paranoid enough) to alert his knights to wait at the end of this passage—and thus ruin his secret exit—then I was free. I could run to my boss, if he hadn’t left without me—or to a newspaper office, or to my Akterian cousins. True, it was possible that Silvertip had the foresight to plant himself or Dinez at the end of this passage, but he’d no reason to believe I’d found—
I stopped. My fingers had run over a wide crack in the wood ceiling and then, yes, metal hinges.
I backed up and lifted the glow stick near the ceiling.
A trapdoor stared down at me, exactly square, two feet on a side. It wasn’t locked, didn’t have a lock—there was a pull rope that’d allow me to open it. No doubt, this was where the escape routes from the upper levels converged with this one.
Wasn’t that interesting.
My lips curled upward. Not like a smile, except maybe the Grinch’s version.
As long as I kept running, kept hiding, kept letting Silvertip decide the plays and set the rules, I would keep losing. Maybe it was time for a change of strategy.
I pulled the trapdoor open and started climbing.
Chapter 17:
Intimidation
Whoever had designed Silvertip’s secret passage system had done a solid job of it—and I say that even if it was the prefect who did it himself. Its brilliance was in its comfort and simplicity: the vertical metal ladder was roomy enough that one could wear a backpack or carry a child. On each floor, a passage led off the vertical shaft.
I followed the ground floor passage—it wasn’t long—to the door, and found a peephole, the wide-angle sort. Blobs of green obscured part of my view in the form of wide fronds. This entrance was from a greenhouse of some sort. In fact—yes, there was a peephole in the wall several feet earlier. From there, I could see directly out to the sunshine-lit glass walls and, beyond them, to the manor grounds. Apparently, prefectsmen had been recruited as backups, because they patrolled regularly, eyes peeled for a bedraggled personal assistant.
I again wondered why Silvertip felt he needed such excessive staff. What did they do all day?
On the second floor, I got peepholes along a hallway, and then an exit into a dark-wooded library bisected with double-sided bookshelves to obscure the view from the door. The third floor was Silvertip’s private office. For all his flaws, I’ve never heard a word about him neglecting his prefect duties. He might live in luxury, but he paid for it in hard work.
Then again, keeping your prefect in line is one of the primary jobs of the head knight. We’ve had executions before, by head knights who feel their prefect isn’t doing his job. It’s definitely not encouraged, but it is considered honorable on the head knight’s part—as long as he executes himself directly afterward, to show that the reason behind his action was necessity rather than ambition. Yet another reason choosing your head knight wisely is so important—especially nowadays, as the popular virtues are shifting away from honor and courage and toward diplomacy and circumspection.
The fourth floor exit opened into a bathroom; the fifth onto a roof. Silvertip’s private helicopter waited on that roof. He could fly it himself—a point of pride for the prefecture—and probably kept it ready to go at all times.
I have no more idea of how to fly a helicopter than of how to fly without one. I returned to the fourth floor.
The bathroom was luxurious, even beyond what I’d come to expect of this manor. It was dressed in pearly marbled beige tile and gold fixtures. Gold curtains hung in the windows like Christmas lights, and the bathtub could’ve doubled as a Jacuzzi. Light from outside gleamed off the curved mirror above the sink. The mirror had, not accidentally, two flaps that together gave anyone peering through the peephole an excellent view of the entire bathroom and a large portion of the room beyond—a bedroom sporting another mirror that reflected a reduced version of the otherwise hidden side of the bedroom.
In short, this exit was exactly as I might have wished, which I’m sure wasn’t the prefect’s intention in arranging it.
I released the handle and stepped out onto smooth tile. From inside the bathroom, this door was part of the rest of the wall, complete with a row of hooks supporting two spa-style white bathrobes. The nearest hook would let me back into the secret passage.
Blood and dust crumbled off my filthy feet and onto the spotless tile. Wrinkling my nose, I dampened a wad of toilet paper and retreated to the secret passage to wipe myself off. Then I dumped the wad into the toilet and flushed.
The toilet was admirably quiet, the plumbing good-natured. No one came to investigate, so I ventured onward.
The bedroom matched its bathroom, except that it was carpeted and didn’t take it so easy on the gold damask hangings. The bedroom door was closed, the walk-in closet full of bespoke suits and dresses, the vanity aptly named, the chaise lounge more elegant than comfortable. As hiding spaces went, none of these appealed to me, but I didn’t want to stay in the secret passage. Sooner or later, checking it would occur to Silvertip.
That left the bed.
I lay on the carpet and scooted under the giant bed until I was completely concealed, taking care to keep my ripped knees out of staining range. Then I probed until I found the edge of the gauzy material protecting the base of the box springs.
There are three types of box springs commonly available in Carina. The type with actual springs is hopeless unless you have wire cutters, which I didn’t. The type with regular metal bars every ten or twelve inches, running horizontally, would do in a pinch, and would pinch a great deal. But though it’d be horribly uncomfortable, I was small enough to make it work.
Silvertip’s box spring was the type I’d been expecting and hoping for: a foundation. More box than springs, it was basically a frame with a couple of crossbeams underneath and a great many wooden slats on top. Like most expensive foundations, it was extra tall to allow the bed to tower.
I grinned through the hole I’d torn. I’ve played a lot of games of hide-and-seek in my life, and no one ever checks inside of box springs.
I left the underside of the bed only once, to use Silvertip’s golden toilet and drink from his golden faucet. Aside from that, I slept and dreamed of black beans, burgers, and coffee.
Morning brightened into afternoon and faded into evening. The last dregs of sunlight had long been washed down the drain when the bedroom door swung open and Silvertip said, “Be thorough. I don’t want to be gutted in my sleep.”
“Oh, Otto,” sighed a deep female voice, “do you have to say such things?”
“You didn’t see what she did to Dinez. It’ll be months before he can walk again.”
“Yes,” said the woman, whom I tentatively identified as Silvertip’s wife, Signe, “but I have to be able to sleep tonight. And you said she found the—”
Silvertip cleared his throat loudly. “We can rely on Pius here. He’ll check in the closet and under the bed for monsters.”
Signe sniffed. “You don’t have to make fun of me. You’re the one who said she was dangerous. I was willing to believe she’d escaped, but now you’ve made me think she might be hiding in the bathroom or outside the window.”
“Don’t worry, my lady,” Pius said. “If she is, I’ll find her.”
There was a significant pause, and then Silvertip said gallantly, “You stick to the bedroom, Pius
. I’ll check the bathroom myself. Can’t be too careful!”
I heard the bathroom door click closed, and could guess what Silvertip was checking. I was sure I hadn’t left any traces—I’d double- and triple-checked—but I held my breath anyway.
Just as well: material shushed as Pius lifted the bed skirt. I’d pinched the torn corner of the box spring gauze and run it taut over a nail head, but it didn’t look exactly the same as before.
“Clear,” Pius announced, standing. “Do you need any help in there, my lord?”
“Thank you, no,” Silvertip said, emerging from the bathroom. “No one under the sink; no one in the tub. I locked the window.”
“Lock these too,” Signe urged. “Ooh, I hate the thought of that woman creeping about while we’re asleep. Tell me again that she’s long gone, that you’re only being paranoid.”
“She’s long gone, and I’m only taking reasonable precautions,” Silvertip assured her.
“Please make sure you lock the door after me,” Pius said, once the windows were double-checked and locked and the closet cleared. “I’ll have someone stationed outside it all night and knights patrolling the rings. No one will get past us.”
“Thank you,” Silvertip said. “Dinez will be pleased with your diligence. You may go.”
“Yes, my lord.”
A few more seconds, a few more soft sounds, and the door clicked closed. Keys jangled, a drawer opened, and then a set of unpleasantly familiar sounds: a gun slide pulled back far enough to check for a chambered round, a magazine dropped and then slammed back.
“Is that necessary?” Silvertip asked quietly. “I told you—”
“Do shut up, Otto. Or try being a man for once in your life.”
“What do you call what I’ve been doing?” Silvertip protested. “Give me that.” Scuffing sounds, then a gun clacked down on the bedside table. “I’ll deal with her if she comes. I almost shot her once already today. I thought I had shot her.”
Bargaining Power Page 18