"This doesn't make any sense!" Alec exclaimed in frustration. "We must have missed something."
"We found exactly what we were meant to find," Seregil muttered, heading back up the stairs.
"It's another diversion, too obvious and too dangerous. It does prove one thing, though; this tower is in perfect repair. They're hiding something here for certain."
Toiling back up the stairs, they came out again on the rampart.
"We have to work fast now," Seregil warned, glancing up at the stars, which had wheeled noticeably to the west already.
"What if the real way in isn't here?"
"That's a distinct possibility." Seregil ran a hand back through his hair. "Still, everything we've found so far tells me that this is the place. Look around, check every stone. You start there, at that corner. I'll begin here. Look for uneven stones, listen for hollow spots, anything. We're running out of time."
Shielding his light, Alec crossed back to the ruined wall while Seregil remained in the shadows near the door.
Despite Seregil's confidence, Alec renewed his search with little expectation of success. The mortar was sound, the stones solidly set together. Crossing back and forth, he checked and double-checked his section without finding anything new, and all the while the moon sank lower.
He was crossing to the northern parapet when his bare foot struck a slight declivity he hadn't noticed before. If he'd had his boots on he'd have missed it entirely, but the loose grittiness beneath his chilled toes felt distinctly different from the surrounding flagstones. Dropping to his knees, he found what
appeared to be a patch of sand slightly larger than the palm of his hand.
"Seregil, come here, quick!"
With Seregil hunkered down beside him, Alec scooped out the sand and uncovered a square niche sunk into the stone. At the bottom lay a large bronze ring fastened loosely to a staple. It was large enough for him to get a good grip and he pulled up hard, expecting the resistance of a heavy slab. Instead, an irregular section of thin flags lifted easily, revealing the square wooden trap door fastened to their underside. Holding their lights down, they found a square shaft, with a wooden ladder leading down to yet another door.
"Well done!" Seregil whispered. Descending the ladder, they pulled the door closed over them.
The door at the base of the ladder had no lock, just a curved latch, green with age. In his excitement, Alec reached for it but Seregil caught his hand before he could touch it.
"Wait!" Seregil hissed. Pulling a bit of twine from his pouch, he tied a noose in the end of it and looped it over the handle, then stood back and pulled. As the handle lifted, there was an audible click.
Four long needles sprang out, spaced so that at least one would be certain to pierce the hand of an unwary trespasser. Their tips were darkened with a resinous substance. As the door swung open Seregil released the handle, and the needles retracted like the claws of a cat.
"Never trust anything that looks easy," Seregil warned, giving Alec a reproving look.
From here, a steep wooden staircase followed the square shape of the tower walls down in a series of landings and right— angle turns.
"Of course! A double staircase," muttered Seregil, taking the lead again with dagger drawn. "One would have been for the servants, this one a secret escape route for the nobles in case of attack."
"Then we can get out this way, without having to go back through the keep again?"
"We'll see," Seregil replied doubtfully.
"It may have been blocked off to keep anyone from wandering in from outside."
Unlike the other stairways, this one was wooden, constructed of thick oak that probably dated from the original construction of the keep. Seregil tested each step as he put his weight on it, yet they seemed sound enough.
There were no trip wires here, no blades. Knowing better than to let their guard down, however, they grew increasingly vigilant, anticipating something more devious in the offing.
This stairway had been used recently and often. The dust that had settled over everything was much thinner at the center of each step and showed footprints on the landings. The tallow candles in the wall sconces smelled of recent burning. There were also spots of finer wax on the stairs, which spoke of someone carrying a taper with them as they descended. Some of the spots were dull with dust, others still shiny and fragrant of beeswax.
"How far down do you think we are?" asked Alec, pausing for a moment to catch his breath. They'd
been going up and down stairs for hours, and his legs were feeling the strain.
"We must be past the second floor by now, maybe near the first," replied Seregil, coming to yet another landing. "This is all taking a lot longer than I'd—"
Suddenly the landing floor seemed to fly up in Alec's face. Frozen on the stairs, he watched in helpless amazement as the wooden platform pivoted on diagonally opposing corners, its underside now standing vertically in front of him to reveal a sheer— sided pit of some kind below. A loose board fell free, tumbling into the blackness without a sound.
O Illior, Seregil!
The words hammered in Alec's throat as he stared, horrorstruck, into the gaping shaft at his feet. But no sound came out. It had all happened too quickly. His whole body went numb and cold.
First the avalanche and now—
" Alec! " The hoarse, panicky cry came from somewhere beyond the uptilted floor.
"Seregil! You didn't fall!"
"But I'm about to. Do something, anything!
Hurry!"
A sickening sense of futility engulfed Alec.
The upper corner of the platform was several feet beyond his reach. If he jumped at it, it would tilt back and crush him against the side of the shaft, probably shaking Seregil loose from whatever precarious hold he had managed on his side. If only he had a rope— something long enough to snag the upper corner and pull it down—
"Alec!"
Ripping off his cloak, Alec gathered the hem of it in one hand and tossed the other end at the upthrust corner, hoping to catch it with the hood. It fell mere inches short of the mark.
"Damn it to hell!" Alec could hear Seregil's labored breathing a few short, impossible yards away. Looking wildly around, his eye fell on the rusty sconce set into the wall above the lowermost step.
Without a second thought he grasped it with his right hand and leaned as far out over the pit as his reach allowed, cloak ready in his left for another cast.
He was already overbalanced beyond recovery when the sconce gave beneath his hand. He heard the evil grate of metal against stone as he lurched forward a few inches more over the edge.
He hung a moment, breath dead in his throat, waiting for the final pin or screw or brace to pull free.
It didn't.
It might, if he moved.
Or it might not. He wouldn't know until he tried.
His choices were pretty limited; make a move now or wait to fall when his grip gave out.
"Alec—?"
With sweat pouring down his face and sides, he willed himself to make one last, crucial try with the cloak. Tossing it up with his left hand, he caught the upper corner of the platform with the edge of the hood and felt it hold. Miraculously, the iron sconce held, too, at least for the moment.
Pulling down on the cloak, he dragged the corner of the platform down with every ounce of strength he could muster. Its weight, together with Seregil's-still clinging somehow to its other side—" almost more than he could manage, but slowly, slowly, it tilted back toward level. As it came down he managed to move his left hand up, gripping the fabric in his teeth as he transferred his hold. This process gave him enough leverage to gradually pull himself backward and out of the way of the descending edge. At last he was able to grasp the platform and push.