Skate moved to the bookcase and put a hand on the false book that acted as the lever. She pulled the lever and pressed the bookcase with all her weight, keeping it from banging open upon being released. This also had the added benefit of keeping that release mechanism from making any noise. She waited a few seconds, fearing the sound of curious flapping wings, but the quiet sound of Rattle’s floating came no nearer, and she heard a page turn. Undiscovered, she made her way down to the cellar, which was still lit up from the last time she’d been down there without permission or anyone else’s knowledge.
With practiced silence, she moved to the locked door, ignoring the instruments and bottles stacked along the walls and cabinets. She pulled her wire out and began her work. This, too, was both familiar and quiet, with only an occasional and almost imperceptible click accompanying her efforts. Seconds turned into minutes as she explored the tumblers of the lock that kept the door shut, blindly shifting them where they needed to be by the feeling and sounds of the clicks.
Skate felt the last tumbler fall into place, and the door swung open from the latch in its frame. She caught the door and continued to open it slowly, careful to keep it from squeaking. The light from the lab poured into the unexplored room and cast bizarre-looking shadows on its walls. She stepped in.
Belamy had called this a storage closet, and to his credit, it did appear he had been using it for that exact purpose. Unused cleaning tools were piled in one corner, and a large, scratched chalkboard sat discarded on one wall. There were cracked and burnt alchemical tools on a worn-looking cabinet. Why not throw those out or fix them? She didn’t have time to consider the question too deeply before her eyes were drawn to the center of the room.
There was a large glass display case that would have dominated the room in better lighting. Within, a mannequin stood on a single metal leg draped in one of the most intricately decorated pieces of clothing she had ever seen. It was a robe, a rich red robe bedecked with blue stones along the hem and cuffs. Red rubies peppered the chest and waist. All around these stones swirled interweaving and precise lines of gold. She tried to follow the path of a single line of the golden thread, but she soon got lost and had to abandon the attempt. In the process, another detail of the fabric caught her eye: the red fabric was also inlaid with swirling patterns of a deeper red color. Staring too hard at the design made her dizzy, so she backed away from it.
At the latch of the collar, which looked unyielding, Skate saw the royal seal on either side of the metal clasp: the scepter, helm, and blades of Old King Rajian. “The war robes,” she muttered to herself. She realized she was looking at the extravagant gift from King Hilan to Belamy for his military service. She reached out a hand to rest on the glass. It felt cold.
She frowned, working out what to do with this new information. Is this the thing he tied his soul to? If Petre was to be believed, it was certainly valuable enough. Did it matter that much to Belamy, though? He had taken the care to enshrine it here in the room but did not seem interested in watching over it too closely. He was using the room for garbage, after all.
Skate stepped back from the glass. She couldn’t know for sure if it was the focus of her search or not, so she couldn’t make any decision yet. As she turned back to the open door, a glint caught her eye. She moved in that direction, taking care not to trip on any of the clutter on the ground. The glint was curved, as if shining off of something round and smooth. When she reached it, she recognized it for what it was, and her breath caught in her throat. It was the statuette from the mantle of the fireplace.
She picked it up and held it in her hands. It was weightier than it looked. It was carved out of some dark gray stone and was a figure of a woman in the midst of performing some kind of dance. One of her arms was outstretched toward the ground, holding an intricately carved wand or rod, while the other hand was lifted in a flourish, her flowing dress sweeping around her in a graceful arc. The stone lady’s face was pensive, as if in deep concentration on her task. A multifaceted blue gemstone was set in the tip of the wand in her outswept hand. Even though the scant illumination barely managed to reach this corner, the stony figurine managed to catch the light and reflect it beautifully, especially the precisely cut blue stone.
This could work, Skate thought. It looked valuable enough in its own right, and who could say what sentimental value the old man placed on it? Plus, she reminded herself, he took the trouble of taking this out of the room and keeping it away from me. That may have been enough to convince her that this was what she’d been searching for, except for a nagging voice that brought objections from the back of her mind. He didn’t show you the robes, either. And what about the gemstones in the cushioned case? It was true that there was more than one item he’d kept hidden from her (one of which he had specifically told her that first night not to touch), and she had no way to tell which was his most cherished possession. She racked her brain, trying to remember anything that Petre had told her that might hint one way or the other. He didn’t care very much about the robes when he received them. He has them deliberately displayed in a place he cares nothing about and hardly visits. On the other hand, she knew nothing about the statuette, not whom it might be depicting or what attachment Belamy had to it other than wanting it out of sight with a known thief in the house. And he put the statuette down here, too, she reminded herself. If he truly didn’t care about what went into this room, then neither of these objects was a likely candidate, otherwise valuable or not.
Getting this wrong would be disastrous; two unclear options was not really an option at all, much less three. She could take the robes and the statuette both, but what if neither of these was right? She would have blown her cover, and Belamy would remain out of the reach of the Ink forever. And there were still the red gemstones she was not allowed to touch, and which she had not found. The location of these gemstones was, she decided, worth waiting for.
The only other room that had not been open to her up to this point was Belamy’s own bedroom; the door had been, as far as she knew, closed and locked since her first night here.
What need did a lich have of sleep? He’s not alive, so the bedroom is probably storage, too.
Skate placed the statuette back into its place in the pile of rubbish where Belamy had chosen to store it, making sure that its position was no different than when she’d found it. The blue glint of the woman’s wand shone after Skate as she walked, as if winking at her. She caught herself looking back several times on the short trip to the door.
Skate stopped in front of the tall display case and looked over the magnificent red-and-gold robes again. It seemed a shame that this piece of uniquely beautiful clothing was relegated to such ignominy, that it was deliberately on display to no one. It was a piece of art—and powerful and magical besides, according to Petre. “Iron Wind,” she muttered, before turning back toward the lab. She watched as the stream of light into the room shrank to a beam that seemed to hesitate as it crossed the robes before it shut out altogether as the door clicked shut. She tried the handle to make sure the lock had reset. Finding the door unyielding once more, she left the “storage closet” behind, and chuckled to herself as she took the short spiral stair up. I’m probably one of the only living people around who can say they’ve seen that stuff.