A lone ruteia scrabbled at something in the corner of the pitch dark room, its small claws scratching methodically at the stone floor. The creature was startled by a sudden grinding noise, and froze, its eyes becoming twin globes of red in the rectangle of light that had unexpectedly opened high on the far wall.

The ruteia scurried away into a distant dark hole as Tahlia jumped down to the floor and shone her hand-light around, revealing a low room, divided by empty wooden shelves that stretched away into darkness. Her brother jumped down beside her, then Dak climbed carefully down after them.

Tahlia made a shushing motion, then led them along the shelves towards a wide doorway.

"What is this place?" asked Grifford.

"I do not know," said Tahlia as she turned the heavy handle of the door. "But we can get all the way round to the central-courtyard through here."

She opened the door and went through to the wide curving tunnel beyond, which led away in both directions. It was lined, at intervals, with similar looking doors. She turned right and set off.

"These are the siege supply rooms," said Dak from behind her. "Food and equipment is being stored here when the fortress is under attack, but they will not have been put into use for over a hundred years."

"Well they will be put to use soon enough if our brother is not found," said Grifford. They walked on in silence, passing several wide stairways leading upwards, and more doors on either side. "Why do we not go up?"

"Because we need to go this way," Tahlia replied.

"But what is this way?"

"It comes out at the supply-depot."

"Wait!"

Grifford grabbed her arm and she span to a stop.

"Are you taking us to find this Jarrus person?"

"You mean Jerrus? Well, we have to go through the depot to get to the keep. I suppose we could see if he is there if you think it a good idea, brother, but I thought you wanted to go straight to Master Hepskil..."

"Do not twist my words, sister! You have brought us this way on purpose!"

"No! This is the only way out I know!"

That was almost the truth, but it seemed her brother was not fooled.

"You are lying."

"On our brother's life, I am not!"

Grifford let go of her arm.

"You are always lying."

Tahlia sighed at her brother's thick headedness and carried on walking.

"Look, we are here now. We cannot go back, so we might as well see if we can see Jerrus while we are passing through. Maybe he can tell us what his business with that Vlambra character was all about."

"Fine," said Grifford. "But we had better not take too long."

"Of course," replied Tahlia, and she rewarded her brother with an approving smile.

The corridor ended in a high double door, which was heavily barred and bolted. Grifford went to pull back one of the bolts.

"No; through here," said Tahlia, indicating a smaller door set into the larger. It too had a heavy bolt, but the socket was broken from the frame. Jerrus had obviously still not got around to having it fixed, though now Tahlia suspected that his inaction might have been something more than an oversight.

She turned the handle, the door opened silently on the high space of the supply-depot, and they crept through into the darkness beyond. The depot, however, was not unlit. The glow-lights on the curved roof above were all bright, and it was only the packing crates stacked in front of the doors that hid them in shadow. There were echoing noises in the unseen space beyond, and Grifford crept silently to a gap in the piles of crates and peered round the edge of one, before quickly pulling his head back.

"Soldiers?" asked Tahlia.

Grifford nodded his head.

"Going into the lift."

Tahlia went to his side, and as they crouched there listening, she heard doors clatter closed and a whir as the lift began to descend. Grifford peered around the crate again.

"They have gone," he said. "But there are more outside!"

"Let me see," said Tahlia, and pushed past him to peer around the side of the crate.

The supply-depot's gates had been fully raised, and the central-courtyard beyond was filled with soldiers. She looked for a while, then pulled her head back.

"What are they doing?" asked Dak, who was also crouching in the crates' shadow.

"Let us go and find out," said Tahlia, and she ran across the gap between their hiding place and another wall of crates, which were stacked near to the counter and doorway set in the depot's wall, where Jerrus' offices were.

The door was closed, and the shutter pulled down over the counter, but Tahlia could see a bright light shining from between its metal slats. She crouched at the edge of the crates, her ears straining for any sounds from the room, above the noise of the soldiers outside. She was leaning out from behind the crates when the office door was abruptly pulled open, and she tucked herself swiftly back into the shadows.

"This is unacceptable!" said an abrupt voice.

"I am sorry your search has been delayed," said another voice. "I do not know where Senior-clerk Jerrus is."

"He has doubtless stuffed himself senseless and is sleeping his gluttony off under a table somewhere."

Tahlia pressed her cheek against the rough wood of the crate, and carefully peered around its side.

The man standing in the doorway was familiar; he was one of Jerrus' junior clerks.

"I have opened the supply-depot to you, sir," said the clerk. "If there is anything else I can do for you..."

"What's in all these crates?" said the other man, who wore the uniform of an Executive-officer.

Tahlia ducked back out of the way.

"They are empty, sir. Awaiting distribution back to the farms."

"Open them," said the Executive-officer.

"But, sir!" protested the clerk. "Why are you searching here?"

"I have my orders, clerk. Do as I ask."

Their voices faded as the clerk began to protest again, and were quickly lost in the clamour of the courtyard beyond the depot's open doors.

"What was that about?" asked Grifford, who had appeared at her shoulder.

"Jerrus is not here," said Tahlia. "It seems he is missing."

She peered once more around the side of the crates, watching the activity in the courtyard. There were a great deal of soldiers out there, but they all seemed to be quite busy, most of them forming up in their Sections.

"We should go out," said Grifford. "Find the most senior officer we can and insist they take us to Master Hepskil. This Jerrus person is not here, and I have had enough of sneaking around."

Tahlia was still surveying the courtyard.

Maybe if they just ran they could make it to the stairs to the pemtagrin door without anyone noticing, or maybe it would be better if they just walked as though they belonged there. There had been many times where simply looking as though she belonged somewhere had let her pass by unquestioned. She could see some more empty crates outside the depot's gate, and she decided they would give her a better vantage point from which she could make her decision.

Without a word to the others, she ran.

She had barely left the shadow of her hiding place when the stomp of marching feet announced the arrival of another unit of soldiers, appearing from behind the very stack of crates she had been heading for. In the space of a single breath, she dodged away and in through the open doorway to Jerrus' offices, where she ducked behind the door. The other two piled in behind her, Grifford dodging to his right beneath the counter and dragging Dak unceremoniously in after him. Tahlia peered carefully from behind the door, and when she saw the soldiers march by without stopping she slowly and carefully pushed it closed.

"I wish that for once in your life you would listen to someone apart from yourself," said Grifford from beneath the counter, where he sat with his arms folded and his brow lowered in an angry frown.

"We may have no choice but to do what you suggest and hand ourselves over to the soldiers," admitted Tahlia. "But I do not like being forced to things."

"Submitting to authority is not in the nature of Tahlia Layne," said Dak from where she crouched.

"Exactly!"

Tahlia got to her feet and clambered up onto one of the high stools beside the counter. She knocked it as she climbed, sending it scraping over the floor to thud into something beneath. She heard her brother curse, then he got to his feet beside her, rubbing his shoulder.

"So what do you suggest we do?" he asked. "I am not simply going to hide in here!"

"Hmmm?" said Tahlia.

She was looking at something lying on the counter's surface and not really listening. It was a paper bag, with two untouched velusberry cakes lying in the bottom of it. Beside the bag sat an open hand-ledger, and she pulled it towards her and studied the top most sheet of paper.

"It is not like Jerrus to leave things lying around," she muttered as she read.

"What is that?" asked Grifford.

"Delivery dockets," said Tahlia, then she sat up eagerly. "A merchant's cart made a delivery last night! Well, this morning."

"Let me see!" said Grifford, pulling the ledger from his her grip.

"Hey!"

Grifford frowned as he studied the book.

"It says here that the goods belonged to a Merchant Mouser."

"Probably not even a real name. I am sure it belonged to Dres, and I am equally certain that it is the same cart our father is currently pursuing."

"So that is how they got our brother out of the fortress without being seen."

"Hmm, maybe," said Tahlia, sliding the ledger back towards her.

"What do you mean, maybe? It is fairly clear what happened. A cart came with goods and left with our brother!"

"Fairly clear is not the same as completely clear, brother. It still does not explain how he was taken from our mother's chamber and brought all the way down here unseen."

"What does that matter! We know who took him, and we know where they are!"

"Oh, you idiot boy..!"

"Father is in pursuit..."

"Yes, but..."

"I have heard enough of your buts..!"

* * *

Dak was not listening to Grifford and Tahlia's argument.

She had pulled herself out from under the counter, and was wiping the dirt of the floor from her hands, when her eyes spotted a detail of significance at the far end of the room. She walked halfway along one of the lines of ledger weighted shelves, and frowned. She did not hear the argument behind her stumble to silence.

"What have you seen, Dak?"

Tahlia's sudden voice gave her a start.

She turned around guiltily.

"It could be being nothing," she said.

Tahlia jumped down from the stool.

"What could be nothing?"

Dak pointed to the end of the aisle of neatly stacked ledgers, to where a tapestry hung on the room's far wall. Its weave exalted the harvest time of first summer, and it showed a pastoral scene of the open plains with their karabok herds, and the surrounding farms with men, women and children busy in the fields. Masdon carts, piled high with the gathered crops, crossed the scene, and boats, similarly loaded, sailed down the rivers, through kernik orchards and past high banks of pahr grass.

"What do you see?" asked Tahlia.

Dak did not reply. She went to the tapestry, which had been hung from a metal rail suspended between the two sets of shelves. The tapestry hung from the rail by loops of cloth, and it had been pulled back like a curtain to leave a half metre of metal wall showing. On the wall she could see part of a familiar design. She reached out and pulled the heavy tapestry back.

Tahlia followed her.

"What is it?"

Dak did not reply at first, because she could see the future her answer would bring, and she did not relish the dilemma to her conscience that it held.

"I have seen these before," said Tahlia. "All over the place, but they are always hidden away in store rooms or behind things like this. What is it?"

"It is a moon lock,"sighed Dak. "It will open a door."