Bram drew the old maintenance tunnel on the back of a spoiled stock list. The cellar’s owner supplied the paper after making certain he did not need to tear a clean sheet from her account book. His first line reached beneath the workshop; his second ended where the old drainage branch joined it. He held the pencil above the meeting of the two.
“I haven’t used this since the interior wall was repaired.”
“Before or after security began using the building?” Eli asked.
“Before.”
Juno set a cup on the paper to keep it flat. “Then we start with the assumption that someone else knows it.”
They had no way to inspect the whole route without taking most of the interval in which retrieval might still be possible. The instrument could already be disconnected. It could be moved while they were underground. Bram said both things before describing the access grate. Eli appreciated hearing the reasons against a route from the person who knew it best. Familiarity had killed people when it dressed itself as safety.
Tessa arrived while they were discussing the grate. She had handed the witness contact packet to its agreed carrier and stayed until the carrier could repeat the limits attached to each entry. The receiving settlement had not yet accepted the entire group. Individual refuge contacts were holding people for short intervals. There was no great hidden convoy waiting for Eli to lead it, only several vulnerable journeys that could still become one if they…
