We’d hardly made it fifteen seconds before a close call. How could we possibly make it out of here unnoticed? We’d be caught, and when the tree man turned me over to Koerlyn to save his own hide, the consequences—
Stop.
My chest heaved as I battled with anxiety. Spiraling into panic wouldn’t help us. I needed every ounce of composure and thought I owned to make it out of here. Aside from the tension in his grip, the tree man appeared calm, as though he’d expected hiccups like this. It was some comfort.
The moment the footsteps disappeared, we were out in the hallway again, slinking around corners and dashing through straightaways.
We were in the middle of one such straightaway when voices drifted down the corridor. There were no doors beside us to open. This hallway was strictly for travel. We could backtrack, but we might not make it before the owners of those voices saw us. The only form of cover came in the decorative protrusions that occasionally jutted out from the walls.
The tree man must have realized the same, because he yanked me to the wall and pressed me against one of the stone columns, his body flush against mine. It was hardly wide enough to hide his shoulders.
A heartbeat later, those voices were in the hallway, coming toward us from behind our hiding place. A palm came over my mouth andnose as the distance closed.
Oh, skies, this is it.
I closed my eyes, unwilling to witness the moment we were found.
“I told them the kitchen door…of course…came to the inn’s entrance, the twats.”
“Rude, uncaring bastards, all of them. Why bother asking our preferences?”
The air shifted as two women passed us.
“You know they’ll fight about coming around, now that they’re already at the front. I swear…”
They hadn’t seen us. By some miracle, they hadn’t turned and seen us crowded in the corner—
The man spun me around the column, plastering me to the other side. He was grinning. We’d nearly been caught, and he wasgrinning.As if he’d just been gifted a fat cow. “Those are the only two kitchen workers on shift, and they’re leaving the kitchen. Luck’s on your side.”
Two more hallways, and we made it to the kitchen without ceremony, the door still open from the women’s exit. The tree man began to search for something, and I headed straight for a table of fresh bread, breaking pieces away and stuffing them in my pockets. There were pieces of meat baked within them. I jammed some in my mouth just as he came over, dropping an oversized cloak over my shoulders and pulling the hood up. It must have belonged to one of the workers.
Again, he grabbed hold of my hand, dragging me to the exit like a dimwitted child who was too clueless to follow. Not that I was about to critique him. I wasn’t in any position to complain about his escape tactics.
Cold air engulfed us as we scuttled from the building to a nearby cart, crouching and assessing. Small homes with thatched roofs linedthe dark path that ran before us. The stone inn behind us was the only quality structure I could see, which meant we could very well be in a smaller city than Carmen.
Something even further from Koerlyn’s city center than I’d thought.
Somethingfarcloser to Harthon’s Territory.
Guards stood at either end of the inn, but both faced away from us, scanning opposite ends of the path. Clearly, they weren’t expecting to guard against anyone leaving the kitchen.
“Better make this quiet,” the tree man warned, legs bunching to run.
I grabbed his arm, tugging him back down. “What’s your name?”
His nostrils flared in agitation. “That’s what you care about right now?”
I just wanted to stop calling himtree manin my head. “Tell me.”
“Kenrick. Now, can we go, or would you like to chat with one of these lovely guards about the weather tonight?”
“How’d you guess?” I shot back.
He shook his head, muttering unkind words beneath his breath, and then we were off. With the moon smothered by clouds, it was a small effort to slink along homes, weaving through them as we melted into the night. A number of soldiers milled about, but we avoided them easily. Almosttooeasily, as if Kenrick knew exactly where each man was stationed and had pre-planned his route around them.
We came to a stop at the corner of a cottage, only paces from the stone border walls that extended well into the sky. Kenrick pointed toward a section along the base of the masonry, where the dirt seemed to cave in. “That’s your way out. The rest is on you.”
It was a hole. A tunnel under the wall he must have dug earlier in the day. Who knew how many guards could be on the other side of it? And if I did manage to evade them, how would I even know whereto go?
