The voice in the shaft asked them to stop knocking. Dust came through each time the grille moved, and somebody below was having trouble breathing.
The scout took her hand away. Bram crouched beside her, the lamp hooded against the courtyard. He could make out individual words now: water, door, mother. He could not tell whether the last belonged to the speaker or was someone calling farther inside.
“How many are with you?” the captain asked.
The answer came in two parts, separated by a cough. She repeated the count until the voice confirmed it. Bram wrote it on the back of the delivery slip. The people downstairs had counted themselves more than once. They knew who belonged in the room and who had come in after the market emptied.
“Is anyone trapped under something?”
“No. Door won’t move. We tried.”
“Anyone injured?”
A different voice answered. Someone had fallen on the steps. Someone else needed equipment whose battery would not last forever. The captain asked them to stop trying the door until the rescuers could see what held it.
