I managed to get my elbows over the rain gutter just as the pipe broke off and tipped to the ground. It landed softly in the dirt below but would be impossible to miss even in the dark.
I swung a leg up, grateful that the gutter was so solidly attached. Reaching out for a plumbing vent pipe that stuck out of the sloped roof, I got my lower body up just as the guards returned.
I heard them talking as they came upon the fallen pipe. I moved to the peak of the roof and flattened myself on it. The men would have to back up several yards to get the right angle to see me, but I’d shift my position as they moved to make sure I wasn’t discovered.
For a moment I just lay there, my chest heaving from the effort of climbing and my heart tapping rapidly. About four feet away, there was a skylight glowing with very faint light from within. Staying as flat as I could, I military-crawled over to the window and peered over the edge. The glass was scratched and clouded, the frame holding it to the roof rusted even worse than the drainpipe I’d used to climb up. I probably could have pulled the whole thing off with a little effort.
Below was a room with a row of toilet stalls along one wall and a row of sinks lining the opposite wall. The bathroom itself was dark. The illumination was coming from an adjacent room, which I couldn’t see into. To my right, over the peak of the roof on the other slanted face, was a somewhat brighter skylight.
The guards below were still examining the fallen pipe, but with no easy way to climb up, they seemed to be debating whether to ignore it or get a ladder to investigate further. While they argued, I scooted over to the brighter skylight.
The window revealed the sleeping part of the bunkhouse, with several bunkbeds in view. One was pushed into a corner. On the top bunk, a young woman sat with her back tucked against the right angle formed by two walls. Her knees were pulled up against her chest, and her arms were wrapped around her shins, as if she were trying to make herself as tiny as possible. She wore jeans and a sweater, and her hair was pulled up into a bun that had started to sag.
It was Nicole. I wasn’t sure how I could be so positive without even seeing her face, but in my gut, I was sure.
I tapped a nail softly on the glass, and she looked up, her eyes wide with alarm. It was definitely her. I put the side of my index finger against my lips, warning her to be quiet. Like the other skylight, this one was also in disrepair. I pulled my karambit knife from its pocket on my scabbard strap and worked the point of it under the shingles that overlapped the skylight frame. Working quickly, I popped the shingles off one end of the frame and then pried up the edge of it a couple of inches.
I put my mouth next to the open space. “Nicole?” I whispered.
Her alarm morphed into confusion. “Yes?”
“I’m here to bust you out,” I whispered. “My name’s Petra Maguire.”
The fear returned, this time mixed with suspicion. “You’re one of them, aren’t you? The Fae? You’re all crazy. It’s like I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole.”
I could understand her confusion, but I didn’t have time to convince her that it was all real, that she was, in fact, a New Garg changeling kidnapped by a Duergar Fae king and whisked away to Faerie.
“Be that as it may, I’m trying to save you. Maybe we could just focus on that for now?” I was working my knife around, prying more shingles off the skylight’s frame. “You didn’t swear fealty to Periclase, did you?”
“What? No! I’ve never sworn fealty to anyone in my life,” she said it as if it was something I’d made up.
“Good.”
“How do I know you’re not just going to kidnap me, too?” she demanded.
I grunted as I pushed at the frame, forcing the opening wider. “You don’t.”
“Someone’s coming,” Nichole hissed. “And I’m going to tell them you’re up there.”
She scrambled to the edge of the bed and dropped her legs over the side, poised to jump down to the floor.
“Nicole, wait, don’t do that!” I hissed back. “I’m your sister. Our father sent me.”
Her mouth dropped open. She squinted at me.
“Give me your hand!” I shoved the skylight higher and leaned over, reaching through as far as I dared without falling into the bunkhouse.
She gave me a hard stare for a split second, and for the briefest of moments, I thought she’d refuse. But then her eyes widened almost imperceptibly, and she rose to her feet on the mattress of the top bunk. On her tiptoes, she grasped my hand with both of hers. I planted my feet and hauled back for all I was worth, dragging my long-lost changeling twin up into the night with me.
Chapter 18
NICOLE WAS LIGHT for a New Gargoyle, seemingly with none of my muscled density. She probably had about three inches on me, and by the way her form-fitting clothes looked, she was toned but slim. Runner, I guessed, as my mind processed about a dozen things at once.
There was some unavoidable noise as she scrambled through the skylight. I jumped back just as guards entered the room below, but I didn’t have time to get the skylight back into place. They’d notice it any second.
“C’mon,” I said to Nicole and then carefully ran across the roof to the end where I’d come up.
No easy way to climb down, with the drainpipe laying on the ground below.
“Hang off the edge to shorten the drop,” I said hurriedly. “Watch what I do.”
I swung my body off the roof, hanging briefly with my fingers curled over the edge of the gutter, and then let go. It was a fall that would have likely injured a human, but I landed in a crouch and then sprang up, ready to steady Nicole.
She sailed to the dirt and landed hard, touching down with both hands to catch herself, but thankfully she hadn’t seemed to injure anything. Probably her latent New Garg blood that gave her bones extra strength. We ran for the cover of the forest, but by the shouts behind us, we’d been seen.
I zagged through the trees with Nicole on my heels, heading away from the bunkhouse. Suddenly something solid and very tall loomed ahead. A wall.
“Oh, damn,” I ground out. I hadn’t realized the palace grounds were walled on this side. I could already hear guards crashing through the forest to the left, cutting off the route back to the doorway I’d used to come here. “Okay, new plan.”
I veered to the right. The doorway I’d come in through was way too far away. We were going to have to head back toward the palace. Keeping to the forest, we crashed through the brush. We were loud, but the guards were louder. I scanned the area ahead and picked the darkest point along the palace wall to aim for and then hoped to Oberon we’d find an unlocked door to slip through. Even clomping along behind us as they were, the guards would be able to tell which way we’d gone by the footprints and broken twigs we left behind.