The lower magazine behind the foundation cistern was so dry the air tasted of ancient lime dust and desiccated pine pitch.
Hobb led the way down the narrow stone stairs, holding a tallow candle high. Behind him came Tessa with an iron crowbar across her shoulder, and Sergeant Berr, whose borrowed bone boots clicked against the worn flagstones in steady, rhythmic cadences.
At the far end of the vault, half-buried under thirty years of fallen mortar and cobwebs thick as grey felt, sat a row of eight squat, iron-hooped oak casks.
Sergeant Berr stopped before them, raising his lantern. The flickering yellow beam caught the faded black-stenciled lettering on the cask heads:
THIRD MARCH BORDER REGIMENT. RATION BEANS, DRIED. PRESERVED IN LARD AND ROCK SALT. ROYAL STORES COMMISSION, YEAR FORTY-TWO.
“Thirty years,” Hobb muttered, blowing a cloud of grey dust from the top hoop. “Thirty years since the King’s men packed these barrels. The hoops are rusted halfway through, but the oak staves look tight.”
Tessa wedged the tip of her crowbar under the bung of the first barrel. With a grunt of effort, she leaned her weight onto the iron bar. The wood squealed, yielding with a sharp, dry pop that released a smell like an old leather boot stored in an attic bin.
