Free Destiny: Child Of Sky by Elizabeth Haydon Page B

Rhapsody commented from behind the broken wall where they had set up their observation. "Do you think it's a foundry run by ghosts?"
    Achmed waved her to silence, trying to follow the pattern of the tainted heartbeat within the brick-and-mortar building. Though he could only feel it intermittently, he could sense that it was slowing somewhat, as if preparing for sleep.
    The sky was dark now in the grip of winter; the wind had grown cold with the coming of night. Rhapsody pulled the edges of her ghodin closer to keep them from flapping in the high breeze.
    Smoke from the fires still rolled heavily in the air, but now dispersed somewhat, chased by the insistent wind. The cloud-covered sky reflected the light of the fire which flickered now in distant inner windows.
    Achmed rose from his crouch and unslung the cwellan. “Stay here. I'm going to scout around. Remain watchful." He waited until Rhapsody nodded her understanding, then disappeared into the nickering shadows.
    The anterior wing of the building was dark and silent. Achmed edged his way along the southeastern wall, the side of the foundry that did not abut the longer wings. Slatted windows whose use was solely ventilation were the only openings in the long mudbrick wall.
    There was a small service door on the other side of the building, closer to the long wings. Achmed eased through it quietly and closed it quickly behind him.
    The anteroom of the foundry was unoccupied. Two large kilns stood, open and cold, with racks of fired bisque pots and bowls. Long tables, thick with ceramic dust, bore other pottery in various stages of completion. Vats of paint and covered barrels of lacquer filled the room with an unhealthy stench. Achmed could tell without difficulty that the wares in the room could not possibly be the sole output from the constantly burning furnaces.
    Carefully he skirted the heavy tables, being vigilant not to leave footprints in the dust that covered the floor, and sidled up to the heavy brass-bound door he had seen in the shadows at the back of the anteroom. The door was solidly closed; Achmed rested his hand on the roughhewn wood and felt heat beyond it. Light flickered in the space beneath it.
    Achmed took off one of his gloves. His fingers studied the heavy iron hinges in the dark and found them corroded and heavy with rust. They will undoubtedly groan upon opening, he thought. He leaned against the door and exhaled.
    The path lore he had gained crawling within the bowels of the Earth had given him a second sight of sorts, a disorienting vision of the given direction he was seeking.
    He had not made the attempt to use it to track a heartbeat until now.
    Achmed closed his eyes and loosed his second sight. The room around him appeared in his mind's eye, the tables covered with greenware and fired bisque, the pots of paint gleaming dully in the dark.
    The heartbeat of the demon-spawn swelled in his ears and throbbed in his skin. His stomach clenched, nauseated, preparing for the jolt as his vision sped away, turning from the room, and through the door, tilting at a strange angle as it did. The search did not take long.
    His inner sight blazed into the room beyond the door, a cavernous chamber, obviously a firing room, with three enormous ovens, burning low and steady, before which rested numerous wire racks, empty now. A sizable cast-iron bell was attached to the wall past the open door. With a shuddering lurch the vision stopped.
    Achmed inhaled shakily, trying to hang on to the vision. The shadows from the open kilns spun crazily around and about, flickering over the landscape of the room. The floor beyond the doorway was littered with pails and poles with hooks, coils of rope, molds and various tools. The vast room held five enormous vats of thick liquid, each suspended between stone columns and bubbling over piles of firecoals, next to which were mounds of red dirt. Near the vats were three cots, on which, under blankets, lay three bodies, spent in