Down inside the outer edge oil-sump trench of the underground lamp store, two hundred paces beneath the courtyard of Stonewake Citadel, Kezra Venn moved with careful, unrushed care. The dark baked flint-rock under her boots was dense, cool, and glass-slick, showing none of the white spar-stone dusting or sedimentary banding of the upper levels. She held her steel sounding rod vertically against the trench bed, its hardened tip resting in the cut groove where ancient stonemasons had channeled oil drainage.
Above her on the main floor of the vault, Paxa Sel kept the air-testing lamp set so its steady, golden beam lit up the inch-graduations on Kezra’s rod. Fellis Dain held the sixteen-pace measuring line at the northern rock baffle. His good right hand maintained a steady four pounds of tension. Meanwhile, his foot anchored the brass corner pin against the doorstep. The air inside the vault smelled faintly of ancient stone pitch, dried sheep fat. The sharp, flinty aroma of freshly fractured baked flint-rock.
“Baseline lined up due north, Kez,” Fellis called down softly, his voice deadened by the tough, non-ringing baked flint-rock walls. “Zero drift on the compass needle. The magnetic variation matches the upper courtyard baseline within half a degree. The four-pace grid points are marked on the flagged floor.”
