Read Chapter 17: A Journey in the Dark

Old Micah’s workshop stank of sawdust and tallow, the air thick enough to chew. Thomas pressed his back against the cold plaster of the wall, listening to the bootsteps fade down the lane. The guards had come and gone twice now, each time kicking over crates and splintering a few of Micah’s precious boards for spite. The carpenter sat in the corner now, his hands shaking as he tried to whittle a peg from a scrap of oak. He hadn’t met Thomas’s eyes since the guards left.

The widow—Margery—stood by the shuttered window, peering through a crack. Her face was hard, but her fingers worried the edge of her shawl.

“They’ve taken to patrolling the east lane now,” she said. “There’s a torch post every hundred paces.”

“Then we don’t use the east lane.” Thomas pulled the scrap of wood from inside his tunic. Micah’s etchings were crude but legible—a route that curved through the western woods, crossed a stream, and approached the lodge from its blind side. He traced the line with his thumb. “The mouth of the cellar is here, behind the brush pile. You’ve seen it?”

Micah didn’t answer at first. He set the peg down and rubbed his hands on his apron. “Seen it,” he said. “Built it. Doesn’t mean I can walk back into that devil’s yard and pretend I’m there to fix a hinge.”

“You won’t have to pretend,” Thomas said. “You’ll be coming with me.”

Micah’s head snapped up, and for the first time, fear flickered into something sharper. “I’ve given you the map. I’ve put my neck on the block already. What more do you want from me?”

“I want you to be a man.” Margery’s voice was quiet, but it cut through the room like a blade. She turned from the window, and there was no softness left in her face. “My husband is in that pen, Micah. The apothecary’s girl is in that pen. You built the cages they’re rotting in. You don’t get to whittle pegs and pretend you’ve done your part.”

Micah’s jaw tightened. For a long moment, the only sound was the wind rattling the shutters. “I’m not a fighter,” he said finally. “I’m a man of wood and measure. I don’t know how to storm a fortified lodge.”

“We’re not storming,” Thomas said. “We’re slipping. You know the layout of that cellar better than anyone. You know which way the doors swing, where the weak points are. You said the hasp on the holding pen is rotten.”

“It is. I built it to look sturdy, but I used green timber. In this damp, it’ll have swelled and cracked. A good kick will break it.” Micah swallowed. “But the guard. There’s always a guard on the main floor, and the stairs creak. He’ll hear you before you reach the bottom.”

“Then we give him something else to hear.” Thomas knelt beside the carpenter, lowering his voice. “You don’t have to fight, Micah. You have to make noise. A crash in the treeline, an animal in the brush. Something that pulls him off his post for half a minute. That’s all I need.”

Micah studied him, and Thomas could see the calculations shifting behind his eyes—fear, duty, shame. Finally, the carpenter let out a long breath. “If I do this, they’ll know. They’ll burn my shop. They’ll hang me from the oak by the mill.”

“They’ll hang us all if we do nothing,” Margery said. “Richard’s already making room in the marsh for new barrels.”

The words lay heavy in the air. Micah picked up his whittling knife again, but this time he didn’t set it down. “The full moon. The night after next,” he said. “They’ll move the ones who’re alive at dusk. If we’re not at the lodge before they start loading the carts, we’ll lose them.”

“Then we move tomorrow night,” Thomas said. “Under cover of dark, before they’re expecting anyone. We hide in the brush pile until the guard passes, then we break in.”

Margery nodded. “I know a path through the hedgerows. It’s slow—an hour of crawling on your belly—but it avoids the torch posts.”

“Good.” Thomas folded the scrap of wood and tucked it back into his tunic. “We need supplies. Rope, a lantern, something to cut binding with. And food—if the captives are weakened, they’ll need strength for the journey out.”

Micah gestured toward a locked chest in the corner. “I’ve got a coil of hemp rope and a good knife. You can take them.”

“I’ll need more than that.” Thomas stood, rolling his shoulders. He’d been sleeping rough for days, and his body ached with it. “There’s an old storehouse at the edge of the village. The pox guard posts are thinnest there—just one man on a bottle, if the tavern talk is true.”

Margery’s eyes widened. “You’re going back into the village? After everything? The guard you fought in the square has been looking for you since."

"They’re looking for a beggar, or a physician. They’ll see what they expect to see.” He pulled his hood low over his face. “I’ll be back before the third bell.”

Micah shook his head. “You’ve a recklessness that’ll get us all killed.”

“I’ve a recklessness that got me out of a chain and an oath to pull it off.” But as his hand found the door latch, something stayed him. He turned back to Micah, studying the carpenter’s face in the dim light. “You said there was a mark on the map. A cross by the eastern edge of the woods—not part of the route.”

Micah went still. His fingers tightened on the whittling knife.

“What’s there?” Thomas asked.

“Nothing,” Micah said too quickly. “A landmark. A tree with a split trunk. It helps with bearings.”

Thomas didn’t believe him, but he didn’t push. He tucked the lie away with the rest of the carpenter’s secrets and slipped out into the night.

The village was a skeleton of itself. Shutters barred, doors bolted, and the only movement came from the rats that scurried through the gutter-runoff. Thomas kept to the shadows, his stolen labourer’s clothes blending with the mud-dark buildings. The smell of smoke and decay clung to everything, a film he could almost taste.

He reached the storehouse without incident—a low stone building with a sagging roof, used for keeping grain and tools against the threat of winter. The guard was exactly where the tavern talk promised: leaning against the doorpost, a clay bottle dangling from one hand. His head lolled, and the snore that came from him was almost a comfort.

Thomas circled wide, coming at the building from the back where a loose shutter had rotted off its hinges. He eased himself through the gap, landing soft on packed earth. Inside, the air was dry and mealy. He found rope in a coil by the wall, a lantern with a cracked glass that would still hold a flame, and a loaf of hard bread wrapped in oilcloth. He tucked it all into a sack and was reaching for a second loaf when the door swung open.

Light spilled in from a torch, and a voice—thick with drink, but sharp with recognition—cut through the darkness.

“You. You’re the one. The physician.”

Thomas didn’t wait. He launched himself toward the back window, but the guard was fast, lunging and catching his ankle. Thomas went down hard, the sack spilling, bread and rope scattering across the floor. He twisted, drove his boot into the man’s wrist, and felt bones give with a sickening crunch. The guard screamed.

Thomas scrambled through the window, landing in mud, and ran. Behind him, he heard the guard staggering to his feet, the scream turning into a ragged cry: “He’s here! The physician’s here! Sound the bell!”

The night erupted. Bell-tone split the air, and torches flared across the village as men poured from doorways. Thomas plunged into the hedgerows, thorns tearing at his arms and face, the sound of pursuit crashing behind him. He didn’t dare look back. He ran until his lungs burned, until the torches were pinpricks in the distance, until he collapsed in the roots of an oak at the edge of the woods.

For a long time, he lay there, chest heaving, the taste of blood in his mouth. His fingers found the cold shape of the knife in his boot—the one Micah had given him. Still there. But the rope was gone. The lantern was gone. The bread was scattered on the floor of the storehouse.

And the guard who’d seen his face was still alive, his fingers broken, but his mouth working fine.

By morning, Sir Richard would know. Not just that Thomas was alive, but that he was still in the village. Still hunting.

Thomas pushed himself to his feet, swaying. He had nothing left but the map on the scrap of wood and two days until the full moon.

He took a step toward the carpenter’s shop, then stopped. If Richard knew he was alive, the first place they would search was Micah’s workshop. The man’s fear was too fresh, his loyalty too thin.

Thomas turned instead toward the churchyard, toward Margery’s grave. There were only a few hours left before dawn, and he had no other allies left.