Page 54 of Conflicted Fate
“It’s insane,” he said. “If they fire up that particular furnace while we’re descending …”
I frowned. “Weren’t you the one who said that insane isn’t the same as impossible?”
He clenched his jaw at having his own words used against him. “Yes, I was,” he admitted. “But that’s when I knew the plan would work. This …”
“We’re short on time. Leaving the city and hiking up the mountain out of sight, then getting into one of the chimney shafts will take a lot of time. We can either continue arguing,” I said. “Or we can go for it. Because we aren’t getting through the guards. Besides, this gives us our exit as well. Just go back up the way we came.”
That won him over. I could see it in his eyes, the way the blue flickered between icy objection and frosty determination before settling eventually on the latter.
“Let’s go,” he said, pushing off the stone wall and leading us back down through the city.
We gathered the ore cart we’d intended to abandon, took our payment after selling the smelted metals, and left through the front gate. The guards paid us little attention. They weren’t concerned with anyone leaving. Only newcomers.
The instant we could abandon the stolen cart where it wouldn’t be discovered for several days, we did, pausing just long enough to free the horse. Then we shifted and ran, pushing ourselves hard to circle the mountain until the city was out of sight. That was when we began our ascent, moving carefully. Though there were few patrols in the upper reaches of the mountain, there was also less space to hide.
We stumbled upon a cold chimney exit by sheer happenstance. Without smoke billowing from them, they were all but impossible to find. It was our first bit of true fortune in quite some time.
“Got it,” Kiel announced as he worked the corner free to lift the cover enough for us to enter. “It’ll be heavy, but we should be able to lift it on our way out. I don’t want to leave it up in case patrols are tasked with checking them.”
“Sounds good,” I said, scrambling through the opening.
I wasn’t expecting us to care. The odds of surviving our little act of sabotage were slim. If we did get that far on the way back, we could worry about the grate then.
With my shoulders against one side of the chimney and my feet braced on the other, I started to shimmy downward, step by careful step. The soot on the walls was slippery, and one wrong move would send me plummeting down to my death. In minutes, I was covered in sweat from the exertion, muscles aching.
Climbing back up would be a nightmare.
Neither of us spoke as we descended. The sounds of our feet and shoulders on the rocky walls were loud enough. We didn’t want our voices to tip off anyone below.
Just stay dark,I prayed, hoping the blacksmiths below wouldn’t need that particular chimney.
What felt like hours passed as we made our way down. My entire body was trembling with every shuffle of my feet and slide of my shoulders. Although we weren’t incinerated, the temperature was increasing with every foot. I could only imagine what it would be like in the forge itself.
Then, unexpectedly, my foot hit ground. Adjusting my brace, I tapped around with the foot to make sure it wasn’t just a protrusion. Then I reached down with a hand.
Bottom.
Carefully, I eased myself out of the furnace, slowly peeking around as sweat poured from my face as I was fully immersed in the roiling center of the works that formed the Grand Forge.
Although I could hear the sound of metal smashing against metal in the distance, a sort of oddly deepclunkthat sounded with rhythmic consistency, there were no sounds of life from nearby.
The forge’s interior was lit mostly by fires flickering in metal containers, waiting to be used. Wall torches could be found here and there, but the entire place was full of shadows and darkness.
“Now, what?” I whispered into Kiel’s ear as we crouched in the semi-darkness.
“Now, we start destroying it,” he said, grabbing a discarded heavy forge hammer from where it lay against a nearby wall. “Just smash and break. Leave nothing intact for them to use.”
“I want one of those,” I said, pointing at his weapon of choice.
He smiled, looked around, then pointed at another one lying against the giant rectangular box of another smelting furnace. I started creeping toward it, peering around the corner of the furnace we’d descended through—
Only to freeze as I found myself staring directly at a familiar but extremely unexpected figure.
What the fuck was Lycaonus doing down there? That wasn’t part of our plan!
My first panicked thought was that somehow the alpha was waiting for us, that he knew we were there, and the trap was about to be sprung. It was over.
Until he started speaking to someone I couldn’t see.
