The convulsion passed, leaving Heth Ash limp across the damp straw pallet, her breath coming in tiny, shallow whistles that barely disturbed the red foam on her chin. Bram knelt beside the bed, his broad hands hovering over her trembling shoulders, afraid to touch her, afraid that the weight of his wool coat would crush the leftover breath from her ribs.
Ivara Quill didn’t waste motion. She set her canvas land-mapper’s satchel on the bedside stool. She unbuckled the leather flap with her single hand. Her gray eyes swept the room—the frost-whitened floorboards, the unlit ceiling lanterns. The dark casement windows along the eastern wall where the shadow of the courtyard wall was creeping toward the glass.
“We have twenty minutes,” Ivara said. Her voice was flat, rhythmic, and cold as river ice. “The heat in this ward has dropped past twenty-four degrees. In fifteen minutes, the air will hit freezing. When the floorboards freeze, the heat differential between the sub-basement chimney pipes and this room will open an emergence route through the unhooded drain in the corner. If we’re still in this building at noon, we won’t be arguing with Pell’s clerks. We’ll be fighting whatever crawled out of the sump.”
