Ivara remained kneeling on the wet granite of the quay. Her single hand held the buckram field notebook steady against her thigh. Meanwhile, her ears tracked the footsteps on the timber deck above.
The sound paused directly above the second bridge arch. The river water below surged against the stone support pillars with that heavy, hollow clunk-shudder of the forty-two-second pump cycle, throwing greasy spray against the hem of her woolen coat.
“Did you hear that?” Nessa whispered, her sounding bar lifting six inches off the stones.
“Stay down by the hatch,” Ivara ordered in a low murmur. She closed the brass petcock on the pressure gauge with a swift twist of her wrench, unscrewed the instrument. Then she slipped the glass tube into its felt-lined copper case. “Keep the lamp shutter slit to a crack. Don’t show a face above the low roof wall.”
Through the sulfur fog hanging over the river, a whistle cut through the damp air. Two short, sharp notes, a half-second pause, and a long, rising third note that ended in a clean, clipped stop.
The sound went through Ivara like an electric shock.
It was the Tern Road courier call. The exact field signal Len Vey had used when approaching the kitchen door after curfew, the call his father had taught him on the northern timber routes. The pitch was precise, carried on the raw mountain rhythm that belonged to the postal stations beyond the boundary canopy.
