She grumbled as we moved back into the corridor, guests making their way to whatever it was they were looking for, wherever their clue would lead.Analleia ripped the paper from my hands.
“In a hurry, are we?”I asked.
“Yes.”
She read over the writing several times before looking to me for clarification.
I frowned as I spoke the words aloud.“‘Seventy degrees west and fifty steps up, no one can get in and no one can climb up.The light that will guide you is hidden in stone, this task is not one you can do on your own.’”I let out a chuckle.“Well, I’m glad I decided to do this with a partner.”
“I’m not.”Analleia glanced around as if looking for someone.
I found myself wondering who.
“What do you make of this?”she asked.
I read it again.“We need to go up.It doesn’t sound like an easy place to access, and it will take two of us to accomplish it.”
She rolled her eyes, something flickering behind them.Annoyance?
“Seventy degrees west, and fifty steps up...”She swung her head around.“That’s the west tower.It would be seventy degrees to the rest of the building, wouldn’t it?”
“And fifty steps up...”I tucked the paper into my breast pocket.“Let’s go.”
We made our way through the palace, passing guests who threw us suspicious glances in fear we would steal their clue or beat them to the prize.Why the west tower?It was abandoned with nothing of importance in there.
“What’s in the west tower?”
I frowned, her inner thoughts seeming to connect with mine.It felt like I was repeating myself after just having the thought go through my head.
“Nothing.It’s abandoned.”
Which made it the perfect place to stash a prize.
Analleia glanced behind us before peering at me.“No bodyguard?”
Howland was nowhere in sight.That wasn’t like him.Had I lost him in the ballroom?
I shook my head, stuffing away my unease.
He would catch up.
We reached the other end of the palace, and I opened the door to the tower, ushering her inside.
“Fifty steps up.”She didn’t count aloud, but I watched the concentration on her face, the way her eyebrows scrunched together as we circled our way around the tower center.
“Forty-eight, forty-nine.”She looked up on the fiftieth step, focusing on the door that waited.
I grasped the handle, but it wouldn’t budge.I tested shoving my shoulder into it, but it was reinforced with steel and most likely barred from the inside.
“No one can get in, and no one can climb up, but the question is, how do they get out?”
Footsteps pounded up the tower from below us, and I guided Analleia up the stairs.“There might be an entrance in one of the other rooms.”
I reached for the next door and it swung open beneath my touch.We slid inside and Analleia set about the room looking for any hatches or openings.Four solid walls and a dirty floor surrounded us.No one had been in here for ages.
“This is a dead end,” she whispered, moving to leave.
The lock on the door clicked before she reached it.She froze, looking back at me with worry.
