Blackbird Crowned (The Witch King's Crown #3) - Keri Arthur Page 0,45
her touch, a comet tail of energy I now suspected was caused by her connection to the earth, rather than all the old protection spells that crisscrossed the entrance.
There was a soft click, followed by a soft rumble. The air shimmered, and the layers of protecting spells parted to reveal a slowly opening and very narrow stone door. Steep stairs descended into a deeper darkness, and they were just as wet and slimy-looking as they’d been the first time we’d come here.
I glanced up and down Luc’s tall frame. “Are you going to fit in there?”
Devilment momentarily danced in his eyes. “I’ve been in tighter places.”
“Oh, I just bet you have,” Mo murmured.
I gave her the look—the one that said behave—but she merely grinned and motioned me into the lead. I dug out my phone and flicked on the flashlight, holding it in front of me as I squeezed sideways through the door then carefully moved down the steps until I reached the bottom. The air was rank and smelled of disuse, while the tunnel walls were wet with moisture and decorated with long strands of slimy green moss. The tunnel floor was little better than the walls, making any sort of speed impossible.
It was, to put it bluntly, a fucking horrible place to be in.
Our footsteps echoed hollowly in the otherwise dank silence, but this time, at least, there was no tightening in the air or any other indication of trouble waiting up ahead.
The tunnel did a long curve around to the left and ended in a solid wall of stone. It was an illusion—a very good illusion—rather than real.
I pressed on; the spell’s energy tingled across my skin, briefly resisting my presence, and then I was through into the main vault area. It was a large space that was these days used for storing whatever artifacts weren’t currently on show upstairs. The human members of staff who worked here took the space at face value and had no idea that there were, in fact, multiple magically protected areas leading off it. I knew of two—one held an extensive library that included the full birth records of all seven houses dating back since before the time of the Witch Kings. The other was another—decidedly more decrepit—tunnel that had not only led down to the old sea wall and port, but also an open gateway into Darkside. Luc had sealed that thing pretty damn fast, but that didn’t mean there weren’t other gates out there we didn’t know about.
I stopped and looked around. “Are there any other storerooms here we can’t see?”
“Two,” Mo said. “But neither of them lie underneath the chapel.”
“The response came from inside the chapel at ground level,” Luc said, “so unless there’s a hole in the floor maintenance is ignoring, it can’t be from a vault.”
Mo grunted, though whether that meant she agreed or not, I couldn’t say. She motioned me on.
I headed for the heavy wooden door that led into the unadorned stone corridor and ancient stairs that spiraled up to the ground floor. We climbed cautiously, making little sound even though the air gave no indication there was anyone else about.
I stepped over the rope barrier that stretched across the exit arch and padded across the foyer to the small, plain doorway that led into the chapel. It really wasn’t anything to write home about. Medievalists might admire the oak beams that supported the ceiling or the decorative arcading that still lined the walls—and which had probably at one point held vibrant images—but as Mo had already said, everything else had been stripped away.
I stopped to one side of the doorway and studied the walls. After a moment, I spotted what looked to be an air vent near the base of the external wall. I knelt in front of it, the shield clanging loudly as it hit the stone with a little more force than I’d intended, and shone the phone’s flashlight in. There was no mesh covering either end of the vent, which—considering the hole was big enough for squirrels or other very large rodents to crawl through—was rather odd. “There’s nothing magical here.”
Nothing other than old cobwebs and dead grass that had probably accumulated over the years of mowers going past, anyway.
“I doubt the beam would have emanated from within the vent itself.” Mo stopped several feet away, her hands on her hips as she studied the floor. “Raise the shield and see what happens.”