Page 106 of Counting on a Countess
But she didn’t make the turn in the direction of his chamber. Instead, glancing around cautiously, she hurried toward the stairs leading to the lower level.
He crept quickly down the stairs, always keeping her in his line of sight. Yet she didn’t go outside, choosing instead to go through a doorway that led to the basement. He’d discovered that door in his exploration of the house. Always curious, he’d gone into the basement but found it containing only the detritus and discards of a house. Nothing of note. He glided down the steps leading to the basement, then paused as she pulled a key from her pocket, fitting it into the lock on an old door. Kit had found that same door, but hadn’t been able to open it. Thinking it led to more storage beneath the house, he’d dismissed it and moved on.
She opened it now and passed through into the darkness beyond, then shut and locked the door behind her.
Kit slid forward and took a penknife from his coat. He worked the knife in the lock until it gave a barely audible click. After waiting a moment to see if she came back to investigate, he followed, making certain to close the door.
He found himself plunged into a shadowy and twisting maze of corridors, bits of hay and stone dotting the rough floor. He wound his way from one passage to the next, always keeping Tamsyn in his sight. She moved purposefully, familiar with her route.
Nerves skittered along his skin. He squeezed his hands into fists, using the sensation of tightening muscle over bone to ground him.
She turned a corner and he paused so that she wouldn’t be aware of him. She stopped, too. The sounds of scraping stone reverberated in the passageway and a rasping, as if another door opened. Then her footsteps faded away.
He moved around the corner. But all he found was silent darkness.
Without the light of her candle, he couldn’t see anything. Feeling around on the ground, he collected a few pieces of straw. Then, grateful that the War had trained him to keep knives and flints on his person, regardless of where he was, he took a flint from his pocket and set the straw to burning.
When it blazed to life, he started in surprise. The corridor came to a rubble-covered dead end, as though it had caved in long ago.
He turned in a slow circle. Where the hell had she gone? People didn’t simply vanish.
Or maybe she was a changeling, after all... He shuddered.
Making himself still, he felt a slight, damp breeze coming from the wall to his right. He studied it. The wall looked to be made of plaster over wood, most likely with earth and stone behind it. Yet there was a small gap between the floor and the wall. A few stones were piled up nearby, as though they had been moved aside—revealing the gap. Putting his hand close to the space, the breeze pushed lightly against his palm.
He took a coin from his waistcoat pocket and nudged it through the gap. It clinked, as if falling down a step. The clinking continued until it faded away.
More stairs lay beyond this door. Stairs leading down to.... He calculated how far he and Tamsyn had traveled underneath the house, and inhaled the scent of the breeze. It carried the rich brine of the sea.
He frowned in surprise as he realized the stairs led down to the cove. Down to the very inlet that Tamsyn had avoided on her tour of the area, claiming it too rocky for anyone to traverse.
His spine tightened.
He straightened and felt along the wall to find a latch or lever that would open the door. Frustration sizzled when he could discover nothing. He had to get down to that beach.
There was only one other way to get there. Moving quickly, he sped back the way they had come, arriving back in the basement, and then ascending until he was in the house itself. He crushed the burning straw beneath his boot heel, and moved as noiselessly as possible through the manor.
In a moment, he was outside. There wasn’t time to saddle a horse, so he ran at full speed toward the village.
Dark landscape swam around him as he passed fields and cottages. It was a waking nightmare—the shadowy landscapes rose up like those in the midst of dreams.
I’m awake, damn it.He clung to this thought as he ran.
He gave thanks for his good night vision, which had kept him alive on the Peninsula and now guided him to the village.
Everything in the small town was shuttered and quiet. Not a soul roamed the high street, all the citizens clearly in their beds. Out in the harbor, the boats moved with the motion of the water, but no one was about.
Kit hastened past the pier, making a sharp turn to get onto the beach. Running on sand made his legs burn, yet he kept going, speeding from one cove to the next. At last, he reached the edge of the inlet on her family’s estate.
Crouching low, he scanned the scene.
His heart climbed into his throat at what he saw. The village had been empty because most of its inhabitants milled around in the sandy cove.
A woman walked among them, her movements sure and purposeful. She lifted a lantern shaped like a watering can, and light from the spout fell across her face.
Kit bit back a curse.
The woman was Tamsyn.
