The concrete channel was an underground turnpike, straight as a land-mapper’s sightline, stretching into the warm darkness beneath the foundation blocks of the heavy-duty quarter.
Len and Bram pushed the two-wheeled laundry handcart along the center of the smooth floor slab. The iron-rimmed wheels rolled without a sound, their tires cushioned by a thin film of dry peat dust and powdered soapstone that had settled over the concrete during eight years of upkeep traffic. There were no frozen ruts, no jagged cobbles, and no black ice to jolt the axles. The cart glided forward at a brisk, steady trot, propelled by the long, rhythmic stride of two men who had spent their lives moving freight.
Inside the wicker basket, Heth Ash slept.
The dry seventy-degree heat streaming from the heavy spark cables had worked a quiet, body miracle upon her lung membranes. The violent, rattling whistle that had choked her throat on the surface was gone, replaced by a soft, rhythmic breathing that barely disturbed the wool blankets tucked beneath her chin. The bright blood crimson on her lips had dried into a thin, dark line that her father had gently wiped away with a wet linen scrap, and for the first time in three days, a faint trace of healthy color was returning to the hollows of her cheeks.
