Eugene catches him by the elbow, then slings the minister’s arm over his shoulders, keeping his voice low. “I didn’t hear the door lock. If we wait, you might recover in time to help surprise them when they come back, but I think we’re better off trying to sneak out while we have the chance.”
“Agreed.” Cressien doesn’t sound thrilled—when does he ever?—but at least he stays ambulatory as Eugene maneuvers them to the door.
Eugene frees a hand to ease the door open and peers through the crack. The light fixtures in the empty hall ring a chord in his memory, but he doesn’t spend time trying to place them, instead hunting for signs of life. Very,veryfaint voices are murmuring behind a closed door halfway down the passage.
“I think we can make it,” Eugene whispers. “We just have to keep quiet.”
“You know where you’re going?” Cressien asks.
“Counted the steps last time. Ready?” At Cressien’s nod, Eugene steps out, the minister staggering beside him. Eugene pulls the door shut and then sets off down the long, long hall, trying not to wince at every scuff and shuffle. The voices behind the door don’t waver as they pass; Eugene can even pick out Solena’s words.
“…barely seen my brother. Or half of his fleet. Thatcan’tbe coincidence.”
“But why go to the effort of bringing the princesshere?” That’s Stranger. “It makes no sense. And do we think it’s coincidence he brought Andreas and Marietta’s son?”
“Yes,”Solena says firmly. “Ruvon, I left you behind for years to be sure that boy was out of Enver’s reach.”
“Apparently he became a common thief, so perhaps you ought to have stayed longer,” Torch sneers.
Cressien makes an odd noise in his throat as they wobble out of earshot. Eugene just shakes his head. He’s sure there’s a well-intentionedYou have a fresh start; if you work hard enough you too can be a productive member of societyconsolation speech in the minister’s arsenal, but it can wait.
They’ve just reached the first right turn when he hears the clack of a sliding bolt. Voices and footfalls spill into the hall behind them. Eugene hurries them around the corner and hisses, “Get ready to run.”
“Er,” Cressien says.
Eugene hauls him along at an expedited hobble, counting each step.Nineteen. Twenty.There’s the corridor opening he was waiting for on the right.
Shouts rise at their backs. They’ve found the empty room.
He shoves Cressien into the corridor and orders, “First right, then head straight for the stairs!”
Cressien stumbles onward. Eugene looks around for anything he can use to slow the People’s Dagger and finds odd,low little pipes running on either side of the walkway. He grabs the rope from his satchel and ties a quick trip line, then follows Cressien. The minister’s made it halfway to the stairs, steadying himself against the wall as he wobbles along as fast as he can.
Eugene hooks his arm through Cressien’s and hurries on. “We’ll go left at the top of the steps.”
“You really—memorized the—whole way out?” Cressien puffs between breaths.
“What kind of amateur do you take me for?” Eugene stumbles to the landing. “No—don’t answer that.”
Behind them, there’s a thud and a flurry of swearing. On the plus side, the trip line worked. On the downside:
“They went this way!”
Cressien’s finally able to jog on his own. He follows Eugene through the last few turns, but they’re not fast enough. Footsteps pound closer as they hurtle through a door and into the open air. Eugene finds a cramped little alleyway with no one in sight but him and Cressien. He runs for the nearest end before their pursuers can join them.
Light, prismed and honeycombed, shifts and warps over the cobblestones ahead, sweeping closer. Eugene looks up, confused—
And finds the crystal-lattice sail of a sunmill rotating overhead, refracting the daylight.
That’swhy he recognized the light fixtures—they were just like the palace sunmill’s.
Eugene stores that fact for later dissection as he and Cressiencareen into another alleyway, similarly narrow and inconveniently devoid of possible kidnapping-deterring witnesses. Two masked figures race into view after them, and Cressien says a very rude word Eugene didn’t expect him to know.
Luckily, this time there’s a rubbish bin at the end of the lane. Eugene flings it at the knees of the two lackeys on their trail, who jump back to avoid a spray of garbage and mysterious green-brown juice.
“We need to lose them somewhere,” Cressien ekes out, breathing hard.
Instead of answering, Eugene racks his brains. The lane opens up to a plaza beyond this block—if they can reach that, they might lose their pursuers in the crowd, but theyhaveto break the line of sight somehow—
