I was in the walls. Again.
Clement kept pushing me forward, his shoulders stooped, his breath panting against my neck. “We’ll go out through the sewers. The spirits can’t leave the castle. If we keep moving, they may not catch us.”
“May?”
He barked a laugh and shoved me harder. “I’ll get you out, I promise.”
“And you?”
I slammed into a wall, Clement colliding with me. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “This way.” We moved to an opening on the left, treading more carefully as the ground levelled out. The temperature dropped with every step.
“I can’t smell sewage. Are you sure this is the right way?”
“These old tunnels don’t work anymore. The prince keeps them open so he can sneak in and out of the castle. They spit out just inside the boundary, underneath those large gargoyles. It’s barely ten yards to the street from there.”
So, that’s how he’d snuck up on me. “I hope Lilyanna’s okay.” The guards would have surrounded the prince, and the Queens’ Guard protected his mothers, but who would be with her? I’d spent weeks caring for her and now abandoned her to whatever Fate had laid out for her. “Maybe the prince doesn’t know what happened. We could still try and leave the normal way.”
“The spirits would have told him. The castle is going to lock down any second. Keep moving.”
The prince’s voice echoed through the tunnels in a distorted whisper. “Tamara. Oh, what a scene you’ve caused at my wedding. You can’t run, you know. You can’t hide from me in my own home.”
“Keep going,” Clement urged.
A puddle of moonlight swirled gray in the darkness shone up ahead. He pushed me forward, his hand never leaving the small of my back. As my toes touched the light, a metal gate slammed down. Clement piled into me again, crushing me against the rusted bars. The earth shook. Dank mud and dust and cobwebs rained down from the ceiling.
The prince’s laughter echoed around us.
“Ignore him.” Clement gently moved me aside, then grabbed the bars and shook, achieving nothing except an eerie rattle. “Damn it!” He took my hand and spun down a smaller tributary. “This fucking way then.”
Up ahead another gate slammed down. He cursed again and dragged me back the way we’d come. He paused at a fork, frustrated breaths loud and raspy in the stillness. The middle was the way we’d come, the right sloped gently upward in the vague direction of the new castle, and the left plunged downward into pitch black.
“We go up,” I said. “We need to get out.”
“No.” He strode toward the left tunnel. “The deeper we go, the less control the castle has. Then we need to head south to reach the gates. Where’s that compass he gave you?”
I tugged up the hem of my dress, revealing the slim holster that I’d turned inward so the bulge wouldn’t be present against the sheer fabric. I’d have much preferred to have worn my knife, but as the prince made me wear this revealing dress, I wouldn’t have been able to hide it, so I’d made do with the solid metal compass thinking I could bludgeon someone with it.
I flipped open the gold lid and rapped it against the stone wall. The needle quivered, emanating with a slight phosphorescence. It spun clearly toward the small engraved ‘south’ and Clement’s dark, miserable tunnel that went further down.
I planted my feet and folded my arms, but he’d seen the result.
“Please.” He gripped my shoulders, lowering his face to mine. “Trust me. I promised I’d get you out, and I will. That’s the best way.” He kissed me gently, his manipulative tactics rewarded when my body softened.
He tugged my arm, and I grudgingly fell into step behind him, one hand fisted in the back of his tunic. He waved his arms in front of him, sleeves swishing in the darkness. I crept after him, picking my feet up high, my spare hand trailing along the hewn dirt wall.
The tunnel rapidly closed in on us. Clement’s shirt stretched in my grip as he doubled over, squeezing himself forward. Musty droplets sprung from the ceiling and oozed onto my skin whenever I brushed against the walls.
How easy it would be for the castle to squash us right now. To bury us down here amid tons of rubble. Would it mean our spirits would be trapped too, or would it be enough of a burial to allow us passage onward?
In answer, the castle groaned behind us. The floor trembled and the walls inched closer. Rocks and earth sprung loose, pelting us, before tumbling downward into the never-ending pit.
I flung my arm over my head, closing my eyes as dust stung my corneas, tears streaming down my cheeks. Clement barreled onward, tugging me out of the tunnel and into a circular vestibule.
Slivers of moonlight pierced the darkness, fogging as it hit my breath. The rusted rungs of a ladder scaled the wall in front. Behind us, the rocks ground to a halt, carefully layering themselves in an impenetrable barrier like maggots feasting on an open wound, leaving no skin untouched, blocking our retreat.
I stepped backward, away from the ladder and a blinding pain seared through my skull. Crushing pressure slammed into my temples, my vision darkening. I stumbled forward again, and the tightness vanished.
Tentatively, I eased backward. The pressure returned, but this time, it morphed into dozens of voices. The words merged into an incoherent chant. I focused on the rhythm, opening my senses, allowing my mind to accept the intrusion.
