“Just a moment,” he called, scrambling to fold the page he’d torn from the back of Skye’s book and hide his partially drawn map in the narrow space between the wardrobe-press and the stone wall.
Hurrying, he pulled open the door. “Sk—” His greeting froze in his throat.
A bent and weary-looking woman of indeterminate age, obviously from the kitchens, held out a heavily laden tray. “To break your fast, sir.”
He took it quickly, one hand still on the door, and wondered how she’d managed to carry it this far. The last thing he wanted was food, but his days here had taught him his guard would greedily accept anything Noah didn’t want. And the gaunt man looked as if he needed it. A poor choice for a guard if anyone cared for his opinion, but perhaps they’d simply sent the most expendable of them.
In that instant, he devised a plan. With a simple twist of his wrist, he let the tray and its contents tumble to the floor. While he managed to look shocked and regretful, the expression on the guard’s face was one of near agony, and the gasp from the woman revealed her devastation at the prospect of having to not only clean up the mess but prepare the meal all over again.
“Forgive me!” Noah cried, pasting the most remorseful look he could manage on his face. “That was inexcusably clumsy of me.”
“N-no,” the woman muttered, close to tears as she gazed at the splattered porridge, congealing eggs and scattered bacon and biscuits. “The fault is mine. I’ll get something to clean this up right away and then prepare a fresh tray.”
The guard’s eyes were fixed on the two strips of bacon lying closest to his boot.
“Let’s see if we can fix this entire incident as simply as possible,” Noah soothed. “I’ll follow you back to the kitchen and while you’re preparing something fresh, we’ll send someone back to help this good soldier clean things up.” He winked at his guard, knowing full well he’d opt for the bacon and biscuits rather than voice any protest. “No need for you, madam, totrudge all the way back here. I’m perfectly happy to partake of my breakfast there.”
With the guard content to forgo guard duty for food, Noah followed the woman through the corridors to the kitchens, praying he wouldn’t run into The Keeper, Austin, or even Skye. He needed time alone to explore.
Once they’d reached the central area next to the kitchens, Noah stopped to address the woman. “I’ve a notion to have my breakfast on the west terrace. I’ll wait out there while you prepare a fresh tray. I’d enjoy eating it beneath the morning sun.”
He smiled charmingly to soften her anxiety while he scrambled for a way to keep her longer in the kitchen while he searched the adjacent corridors he’d seen when Skye brought him here. “And I’ve a request if you don’t mind.” He added another smile for good measure. “I’d like a glass of milk with my meal, please.”
The woman looked stricken. “Milk, sir?”
“Yes. I confess I’ve developed an abnormal fondness for the stuff.” He gave her an exaggerated shrug. “But if it’s too much trouble…” he paused, waiting for her reply. When she merely blinked at him, he continued. “…to find cow’s milk, goat’s milk would suffice.”
“Goat’s milk,” she murmured under her breath, as if the words were foreign.
They probably were, he guessed. To her, at least. All the better. “I’d prefer you delay cooking my meal until you’ve procured the milk, so I might enjoy the two together. Take your time. I’m in no hurry this morning.”
With her forehead creased in bewilderment, she finally managed a quick bob acknowledging his wishes and fled through the arch to the kitchens. None too soon Noah groaned, estimating he had no more than an hour before she returnedwith news of her failed quest. Or before his guard, or even Skye came looking for him.
He glanced at the openings to several corridors, knowing he didn’t have time to explore them all. But he couldn’t waste time wondering.
Taking the one to his left, he traveled past well-spaced torches down a gentle slope that grew colder with each step. Parts of the stone walls wept with moisture, and soon he caught the metallic scent of blood and the smell of preserved meat. His suspicions were confirmed when the passage opened into a natural cave used for cold storage. Sides of venison, hogs, and whole birds hung from iron hooks driven into the rock ceiling, their surfaces glistening with frost. Wheels of cheese sat on wooden shelves braced against the stone walls.
Noah cursed under his breath. A dead end, and not the kind he was looking for.
He retraced his steps quickly, keenly aware of time slipping away. The kitchen woman would eventually return with his impossible milk request, and questions would be asked.
He grabbed a torch from the central hall before he entered the second corridor. It angled upward, its walls lined with doors that opened onto storage rooms filled with grain sacks, barrels of oil, and crates of preserved goods. Some familiar. Some not. Useful to know for future reference, but again, not what he sought.
By the time he backtracked and entered the third, more obscure passage, he battled disappointment and desperation with every step. Sweat beaded his forehead despite the cool air as he slowed and studied his surroundings more intently with his torchlight. This corridor felt different from the moment he stepped inside. The walls were rougher, more ancient, as if they predated the rest of the fortress. The floor sloped downward intodarkness, and the air carried a strange quality, not stale, but moving, as if it led somewhere vast.
Noah’s pulse quickened as he pressed forward. The worked stone of the fortress gave way to natural rock, and soon he was walking through what could only be described as a tunnel. The walls showed signs of recent instability. Large chunks of stone littered the floor, and fresh cracks fractured the ceiling. But amid the debris, he could see clear signs of passage: boulders pushed aside to create a narrow path, footprints in the rock dust, and most telling of all, torch brackets hammered into the walls at regular intervals. The soot stains above them spoke of long-term use.
His pulse leaped. This had to lead somewhere important.
Picking his way carefully through the fallen rocks, Noah followed the winding path deeper into the mountain. The tunnel curved left, then right, always descending. The air grew warmer, and he thought he caught a strange shimmer in the darkness ahead, like heat rising from sunbaked stone.
Something else caught his eye, something partially tucked beneath a fallen boulder. He moved closer, bending with his torch to get a clear view before reaching out to touch it. A scrap of fabric. As he rubbed it between his fingers, his blood ran cold. This wasn’t just any fabric. It wasblue denim.
Paige had repurposed what she’d called a pair of denim jeans into a smaller pair of trousers for Brody. When Noah asked about the strange but sturdy fabric, hoping for a pair for himself, she’d explained she’d been wearing the jeans-trousers when she time-traveled to Havenwood with Taran. They came from her own time, and there was no more like them to be had in this world.
This material, caught beneath a boulder, though worn and faded, was unmistakably the same kind. Unmistakablynotfrom this time period. Noah dug beneath the boulder and tugged thescrap free with trembling fingers, his mind racing. This could only have come from someone like Paige, someone from a time far beyond this medieval world.
Someone who had traveled through a portal.
