The rusted iron bolt slid back with a soft, oiled click.
Kaelen stepped out of the boiler room, tying the frayed cloth sash of his bathrobe around his waist. He carried his hookless bamboo fishing rod lightly in his right hand, tapping its blunt ferrule against his slippered toes.
Across the warehouse, Princess Valeria looked up from the workbench, her eyes widening as she took in his attire.
“You’re going to infiltrate a military sub-furnace in a bathrobe?” Valeria asked, her voice cracking in disbelief.
“Bathrobes provide maximum hip mobility,” Kaelen replied smoothly, checking that his black silk blindfold was firmly knotted behind his ears. “Tight combat leathers compress the femoral meridians and cause numbness in the knees. If I have to crawl through a dirty coal chute, I prefer to do it with proper ventilation.”
Sera Thorne stepped forward without a word. She wore her blackened leather brigandine, Storm-Pike resting horizontally across her palms with a strip of dark wool wrapped around the star-iron spear tip.
Behind her, Mina Vance stood guard near the door, her hands glowing with faint glacial frost.
“Keep the warehouse barred, Mina,” Kaelen instructed. “Barnaby will keep the kettle hot. If anyone knocks while we are away, tell them Master Ash has taken his tea to the roof.”
