Page 12 of Paladin's Hope

“Anyway,” Piper was saying, “when the war started, the Archon had it bricked up in a couple of places, just in case there was something on the other side. Apparently there wasn’t. Eventually they opened the far end again, because it bothered people to see the body wagons coming through the administrative areas.” He stared into the dregs of the tea. “Or it bothered them to see the grave-gnoles, take your pick.”

Galen gave a humorless huff of laughter. Grave-gnoles, the lowest caste of gnolekind, were swathed from head to toe in old burial shrouds, and tended to unsettle both humans and other gnoles. That didn’t stop either species from employing them to dig graves and move the dead, of course.

“Have you seen the door?” asked Galen.

Piper didn’t meet his eyes.

“You have, haven’t you?”

Piper looked around guiltily. “Look, once I found out what was past the bricks, I had to at least look. And they didn’t do a very good job with the mortar anyway. I left it better than I found it when I bricked it up again.”

Galen leaned forward. “And?”

Piper sighed. “And it’s a door, all right. Set flat into the wall. You can see the seams, but they’re barely a hairsbreadth. You can’t get a knife blade in. I broke two scalpels on it and stopped. They’re too expensive to waste on a bit of idle curiosity.”

“What do you think is behind it?”

“Water,” said Piper unexpectedly. He looked up as a grim-faced servitor dropped two stacks of toast on the table, drowning in egg yolk and, in Galen’s case, bits of blackened meat. “Ah, thank you.”

“Water?” asked Galen, helping himself to toast.

“It’s well below the level of the river. High water marks on the walls, and there’s about six inches worth of standing water down there. I’m surprised the tunnel isn’t filled, but I suspect that whatever structure is behind the door may be blocking off the worst of it.” Piper shrugged.

“And nobody’s broken it open looking for treasure,” murmured Galen. “Surprising.”

“I don’t think the ancients actually left very many treasures.” Piper gazed at the toast like a man approaching the gallows. “Sure, everybody with a blanket of junk will try and sell you one, but have you ever heard of a real one? Something that wasn’t a wonder engine, or a bit of mysterious wall?”

“Once.”

Piper looked up from his toast, startled.

“We escorted two dedicates of the Many-Armed God from where they had been excavating back to their temple. What they found looked like a carved lizard with one white eye. About as long as your thumb. The mouth opened and if you pressed the eye, a little flame would come out.” He spread his hands. “The dedicates were more excited about the scraps of fabric it was wrapped in than they were about the carving. One said that it was a finer weave than anything we could make. And I’ll tell you one odd thing about it…”

It was Piper’s turn to lean forward. Galen was pleased to see that he’d eaten most of a piece of toast, almost without noticing.

“Part of it was melted.”

“Melted?”

“The fabric. One corner of it had been singed, and it didn’t burn, it melted like wax.”

“…Huh.”

“I know, right? But I grant you, that’s the only treasure I’ve ever seen that I believed was real. The people from the temple were thrilled by what looks like bits of trash from the same site. I could believe they’d pay money for them, but it’s not the kind of thing someone trying to make a quick coin would recognize.”

Piper nodded. “If there was any trash around the door, it’s long gone, particularly given that the tunnel has been flooded before. I suspect it was more prone to that before the city got built up around it. There’s a decent neighborhood by the entrance now, with actual storm drains. Figure that the door was underwater for most of its history, and once it dried out, the only people who knew or cared were my predecessor and the Archon’s people. There’s probably things like that all over the place. How long was Anuket City around before somebody dug up their damn wonder engine?”

“Fair enough.” Galen took the last slice of toast and finished it off. Piper finally noticed that he’d been eating his and gazed at it with dismay.

“Glad you’re feeling better,” Galen said. “For a moment there, when you were feeling around in that wound, I thought you were going to faint.”

Piper grunted, staring down at his toast. “Just a hangover,” he said after a moment. “My head was pounding.”

“Mmm.” Galen nudged a fresh mug of tea toward him, and thought that the interesting thing about having watched Piper lie to Mallory was how easy it was to tell that he was lying now.

Seven

It was only a day later that there was a knock. It came from low on the door, and Piper, who had been half-expecting it, knew to look down when he opened the door.

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