Chapter 17: The Cellar

The keeper met us at the Hall's side door with a lamp already lit.

She was a tall woman with ink on her cuffs, and she did not seem surprised.

"The cellar belongs to the Hall," she said. "The key belongs to whoever an elder gives it to."

"An elder gave it to me," I said.

"Then I have no cause to stop you."

She looked past me at the two captains, the red-bearded one and the broad one, and at Nessa and Joss, who stood close behind me.

"Six is enough," she said. "Anyone more and I'll have the Hall's doors shut."

Behind us, on the steps, someone said, "Seven."

Rafe stood at the bottom of the stairs on his crutches.

The sleet had plastered his hair to his forehead, and his face was set.

"I'm coming," he said.

"You can barely walk," Nessa said, with great force.

"I can walk down a stair."

I looked at him for a moment.

"Then you'll read it with us," I said. "You won't read it alone afterward, and nobody will carry you."

"Agreed."

He came down after us one step at a time.

Behind him, last of all, came Maud.

I had not heard her follow.

She stood in the doorway with her shawl over her head, and she did not say a word.

The door behind the keeper's chair was low and black with age.

The little brass key turned in it at once.

We went down twenty-two steps into the dark.

The cellar smelled of cold stone and old paper.

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