Drifting Snow

Chapter 3: The Archive Register

The next morning, I went to the window before Elsie brought breakfast.

The guards had changed. The same two men stood on the terrace, but a third now waited near the garden gate. Their presence meant the palace had heard something it didn't like. I watched them trade places, then noted which one kept his eyes on the door instead of the window.

"Have you seen the newspapers?" I asked Elsie when she arrived.

She set down the tray. "They've printed the coronation photographs."

"And the harbor?"

"Nothing yet."

"Have you been allowed to go to the servants' hall?"

"I have."

"Then listen. Don't ask questions. If someone says my name, remember what they say."

She frowned. "That sounds like a dangerous game."

"It's only dangerous if you're caught playing."

"I am already in this room."

"Then don't make it worse for yourself."

She left with the tray and returned an hour later with a folded paper hidden inside her apron.

The afternoon edition of the Bellwether Chronicle reported that the new king had approved emergency repairs at the northern docks. The article described the deal as a "private royal initiative" and quoted an unnamed palace source who called it a "personal undertaking between His Majesty and a trusted adviser."

No name. No details. Just enough to make the story sound intimate and suspicious.

"They're setting it up," Elsie said.

"Yes."

"Is the king behind this?"

"I don't know."

She studied me. "You used to say he listened when you gave him the figures."

"I used to be useful to him."

"That's not what I asked."

I folded the paper along its crease. The public could accept a king making a bad contract. It would be harder to accept a king who had relied on a woman he then hid from view. If the story became a scandal, every figure I produced could be dismissed as revenge. Adrian might survive the damage. My name would be the cost.

"Can you get a message to the archives?" I asked.

"Not without someone noticing."

"Then I'll have to leave."

Elsie glanced at the door. "How?"

"I don't know yet."

For the next two days, I paid attention to the palace's routines. The guards changed every four hours. A laundry cart entered the west service corridor at six in the morning. The kitchen staff used the old dumbwaiter to carry linens to the upper floor, though it had been designed for trays and would not take a person.

The adjoining rooms had once belonged to a royal secretary. The servants' passage behind the dressing room had been walled over years ago, but the plaster near the wardrobe was newer than the rest. I found the seam by pressing along the wall.

It opened on the third try.

The passage was narrow, dark, and smelled of dust. I had to turn sideways to fit through, and the first step down was steep enough to make my hands shake. I waited until the guards passed the door. Then I went through, shutting it behind me.

I had no plan beyond reaching the service stairs. At the bottom, I found a corridor I recognized from my early months in the capital, before the palace remodel. The exit was near the archive wing.

I made it as far as the old registry room before a voice stopped me.

"Lady Vale."

Chancellor Voss stood between me and the doors.

I'd met him twice during Adrian's first year as heir. He had a neat beard and a habit of pausing before a question, as though he believed silence made other people confess.

"You're not allowed in this wing," he said.

"Neither are you," I replied. "The registry rooms are closed after five."

He smiled. "I'm the chancellor."

"And I'm looking for the harbor register."

"Which one?"

"The public one. The copy with the winter dock schedules."

He gave no sign that he knew what I meant, but his eyes moved briefly toward the door at his right.

I had found it.

"I'm sure the archives staff can help you," he said.

"I'm sure they can."

I walked past him, forcing myself not to hurry. The doors behind me led to the lower hall, and the lower hall led to the servants' courtyard. I'd be outside the palace walls in less than two minutes.

A guard stepped into my path.

"Your room is the other way," Voss said.

"My room is a prison."

"No," he said. "Your room is where the king has placed you for your protection."

"And who are you protecting me from?"

His smile disappeared. "You know, Lady Vale. We all do."

The guard took my arm. I pulled free, but another guard came up behind me. They did not strike me. They did not need to. The courtyard filled with eyes, and the palace had already given me the role of the king's hidden woman.

Voss leaned close enough that only I could hear him.

"Your evidence is in the register, isn't it?"

I didn't answer.

"Then you should hope you can reach it before my clerks do."

They took me back to Greyglass. This time, the key turned from the outside before I was even across the room.