“Risky,” I say. “We’d be out in the open for anyone to see.”
“We’ve got to take the chance. It’s the only way to the vault.”
I don’t argue. We practically tiptoe back toward the end of the hallway. In the distance, we hear some kind ofthud, as if something large and heavy hit the floor. “What was that?” Gin whispers.
I don’t respond. We stand still, and listen for more, but nothing happens after that, so we continue on. At the opening to the room, we peer out over the shrouded shapes littering the space. “More automatons?”
Gin nods. “Looks like it.”
Some of the objects tower over us; others are short and square. All are covered in cloth. We creep around, using the ghostly figures as shields to hide behind in case someone walks into the room.
Just when I think we’ll make it to the exit without incident, there’s anotherthud, and then footsteps. Neither of us speak. The steps are headed in our direction. Without another word, we duck beneath one of the draped covers. As it settles around us, heavy footsteps enter the room. I wish the fabric would stop fluttering, giving our location away. The heavy steps march closer to us. I hold my breath.
The steps stop. I’m not sure how much longer I can hold my breath. I’ll have to let it out slowly.Don’t move. Don’t move.
Footsteps begin again. Closer. Straight for us.
I prepare to fight. I can take out the guard without a weapon. It’s quieter that way anyway.
The footsteps are right in front of where we’re hiding. We huddle closer to the giant hunk of metal gears, a half-finished creature of some kind—it’s hard to tell, but it does have some kind of skeletal torso and arms, made up of steel and bolts—and both of us hold our breath. Footsteps circling us now. I could reach out and grab the guard if I wanted. But I don’t have to; the guard passes us by.
We wait until the steps recede.
“I think he went down the passageway,” I whisper.
“He did,” she affirms. We don’t need to say the rest—if we’d waited another minute or two, we would’ve been stuck in the passage without any cover to face the guard. Not that the two of us couldn’t handle one Blackcoat. We just can’t afford to draw that kind of attention.
“We need to get out of here before he comes back.”
Gin nods. “And we need to find a way downstairs.”
We leave the room full of half-finished automatons and sneak through another hall of locked doors, and finally find ourselves in the laundry. The air is thick with the smell of lye, and there’s gray film over everything. Huge tubs of sudsy water, large enough for multiple people to swim in, lie stagnant, abandoned when the fire broke out. Drying lines covered with linens hang from the ceiling.
We tiptoe around, ducking behind the wooden tubs. Though the room is empty, anyone could be concealed by the linens, lying in wait.
There are two ways out of the room—a large, swinging double door, and a smaller door on the east side of the room. “Which one?” I ask Gin.
She considers them both. “Tadhana isn’t sure. But I think that one must lead to the service rooms,” she says, pointing to the double door. “And from there, private quarters. The opposite of what we want.” Then she motions to the other. “So let’s try that one first.”
It has a dead bolt, but the knob turns. “They left so quickly, they didn’t have time to lock it,” Gin says as she opens the door.
But our anticipation turns to disappointment. It’s a walk-in supply closet, covered floor to ceiling with shelves. “Guess we’re taking the other way,” I say.
“Not so fast.” Gin steps into the closet and peers around.
“What is it?”
“I’m not sure.” Gin seems to think something is there. I try, but I don’t see or feel anything other than stringent cleansers and a vaguely damp, mildewy scent. Gin looks through items on the shelf, moving them out of the way, checking behind them. She shoves a stack of mops out of the corner and begins feeling the wall, running her hands down the wood slats. Finding nothing there, she moves on to the next shelf, and then the next, getting more frantic with each. She pushes supplies away. A small metal bucket falls and clatters on the ground.
“Careful!”
She doesn’t seem to hear me. Her hands reach behind the shelves, pushing. She stops and holds both her hands to the spot. “I knew it!”
Then she begins tugging on the shelves themselves. I help her.
The shelves begin to pull away from the wall. Then the entire wall comes away with them, and I realize there’s actually a secret door, or a false wall, hidden in the back of the supply closet.
One more big heave backward and the entire thing opens up to reveal a dark hole in the wall. We peer in. There’s a stone staircase heading down into the pitch black.
