The Night Hawk

Chapter 2: The Service Passage

I fired once at the man with the rifle, not to hit him but to make him duck. He disappeared behind a marble column. The ministers were screaming now. I heard furniture scrape and glass break as people searched for cover.

Julian grabbed my wrist.

"Don't shoot," he said. "There are guests."

"I know."

I had trained in crowded rooms. I had never trained for a coup among people I was supposed to protect while wearing a clerk's name tag.

I crouched beside him. "The west stairwell is blocked. We're taking the archive route."

"How do you know?"

"Because I checked."

The answer came out before I could dress it up. Julian stared at me, but a burst of gunfire cut off his next question.

I pulled him behind the table and toward the service screen. A man in a black suit stumbled past us, one hand pressed to his side. I caught his elbow and pushed him toward a group of guests hiding behind a bench.

"Stay low," I told him. "Wait for the palace medic."

I had no time to see if he listened.

Julian followed me through the screen. The hidden door clicked shut behind us. I took the lead down the stairs, pistol raised, while he moved close enough that I could feel his breath at my back.

The passage split in two. Left led to the archive. Right led to the old chapel and a door into the courtyard. I chose left. My mother was there, and I was not leaving her behind.

"You're not a clerk," Julian said.

"Not right now."

"That isn't an answer."

"It's the only one you're getting until we're somewhere safer."

His shoes hit the stone behind me. "You've been lying to me."

I reached the archive door and pressed my ear against it. Silence. I knocked twice, paused, then knocked once more.

My mother opened the door with a heavy brass letter opener in her hand. She took one look at my pistol and Julian's face.

"Is this the alarm?" she asked.

"Yes."

She looked past us toward the dark passage. "They've locked the lower doors."

"Can you get out through the loading bay?"

"I can. The question is whether you can."

"We're going to the old chapel."

My mother stepped aside. The archive was lined with cabinets, stacked boxes, and shelves of old records. On her desk lay the correspondence she had been sorting. A half-finished cup of tea sat beside a letter from the hospital where my father had died.

"You need to come with us," I said.

"I'm not leaving the archive open. Those records include the names of people who trusted the Crown."

"They'll be here when this is over."

"Will they?" Her eyes held mine. "You've spent years telling me your work is harmless."

I had told her I managed schedules and restricted correspondence. That was true in the way a locked door was still a door.

I lowered my voice. "I'll explain when I can."

She closed the archive cabinet and pocketed the key. "You'd better."

We crossed the room. Julian stayed close, silent now. I knew he was cataloging the g*n, my stance, the fact that I had gone straight to a hidden door. I wished he would ask his questions later. I wished my mother had never learned to read the fear in my face.

At the end of the corridor, we reached the chapel entrance. I opened it a fraction and checked the small courtyard beyond.

A guard stood with his back to us.

The uniform was correct this time. His name was on the brass tag: Bell.

I stepped out with my pistol lowered. "Officer Bell, we're moving the prince."

He turned. "There's no movement order."

"There is now."

His hand went to his holster.

Julian came through the door behind me. Bell looked at him, then at me. His fingers stopped.

I saw the uncertainty in his face. It was the first honest thing I had seen in the palace since the alarm started.

"Rusk ordered the courtyard sealed," Bell said.

"Rusk isn't in charge of this detail."

"He said the prince was to be taken to the east wing."

"That's where they'll look."

Bell's eyes moved to the g*n. Then he stepped aside.

I took my mother and Julian through the courtyard. We had nearly reached the chapel's far exit when the first bullet struck the stone above my shoulder.

The shot came from inside the building.

Bell dropped. Julian grabbed my arm. I dragged both of them behind the carved stone fountain as another shot chipped the doorframe.

From the ground, I saw a figure in a security jacket at the chapel entrance. He raised his rifle toward Julian.

I fired twice.

The figure stumbled back into the doorway. I did not know if I had hit him. I could not stop to find out.

My mother's hand closed around mine. "Mara."

"I'm here."

"Your arm is bleeding."

I looked down. A thin cut crossed my sleeve. Not serious.

Julian was staring at the pistol in my hand.

"Who are you?" he asked again.

I looked at the locked exit ahead of us.

"Your protection detail," I said. "And I'm getting you out."