Free The Lost Heiress #2 by Catherine Fisher Page B

around the last corner, she stared into dimness, astonished. It was a dead end.
    But Harnor had vanished.
    Carefully Carys walked down after him.
    The corridor ended abruptly; a stone wall with rainwater running down it in green seams. It was solid and firm, and so were the walls on each side; she ran her fingers along the greasy stones in amazement.
    So where had he gone?
    Suddenly she knew with a shiver of joy that this was important, this was what she had been searching for. Feverishly she pushed and prodded each stone, knelt and ran her hands around the joints and edges of the wall. And she felt a draft.
    It was slight, but cold. Putting her fingers to it, she touched a wide crack lost in the blackness of one corner and found a small raised circle, smooth and warm. She knew it was Maker-work; there had been panels like this in the House of Trees. She took a deep breath, and pressed it.
    Silently, with a smoothness that amazed her, a section of wall melted. A small doorway stood there, and beyond it a room was pale with light.
    Carefully she lifted the crossbow and stepped inside.

10

    Promotion must be earned. Be ruthless; there are many who will be passed over.
    Rule of the Watch
    S HE WAS STANDING IN A DIM HALL. Light filtered through one window high up in a wall; the rest seemed shuttered or blocked.
    The hall was crammed full of objects, piled high, and someone was moving down in the shadows among them. She heard steps, creaks, the bang of something closing.
    Creeping nearer carefully, she found she was moving between huge towers of dusty boxes, ledgers, astrolabes, collections of skulls, hanging maps that brushed her face with soft, cobwebby edges. Ahead was a patch of light, oddly unflickering. Silently Carys crouched behind a wooden crate and peered cautiously around.
    Harnor was sitting at a tall desk, in a pool of light from a lamp—a Maker-lamp, which lit his gray head and hunched shoulders with amazing clarity. He was reading a great volume of thick pages that turned with small, stiff crackles. There was no other sound at all. The hurrying lines and crowds of the tower seemed an eternity away.
    Carys looked around, noting everything. Galen might know what some of these things were—she had no idea. There were boxes, panels, piles of broken wiring, bizarre devices with screens and buttons and dials that she knew were relics, ancient things collected by the Emperors. There were priceless books, marble statues, charts of trees, and the complete skeleton of some small, unknown animal, as well as a globe showing Anara’s continents, even the Unfinished ones, strange pieces of paper pinned all over it.
    Harnor turned another page.
    In the silence Carys scratched her cheek thoughtfully. Then she stood up and walked forward into the light.
    He was so engrossed that for a moment he didn’t even notice her. When he did, his whole body jerked with terror; he leaped up, knocking the stool away with a smack that was deafening in the silence.
    “You!” His eyes flickered over her shoulder, wide with fear. He seemed too choked to say anything clearly. “How . . . did you . . . ?”
    “I followed you.” She perched on the edge of a table, the crossbow loose in her hands. “You needn’t worry. There’s no one else with me.”
    As soon as she’d said it, she realized she might have made a mistake. But he was terrified. He swallowed, rubbing his face feverishly, then took a step toward her. She raised the bow, but he’d stopped already, gripping the desk as if to hold himself up.
    “For God’s sake,” he said hoarsely, “for pity’s sake, don’t tell them!”
    “I’m not surprised you’re worried.”
    “Don’t play with me!” It broke from him like a cry of agony. “I’ve got a wife, two children! What will happen to them! Think about them, please!”
    “I’m not going to tell anyone.”
    “But you’re a spy. You work for Braylwin and if he—”
    “If he knew, you’d be in chains so fast you