Commander Crayn opened the door promptly, but the Magister beckoned for Estie without entering. The fear that she had sensed in him earlier smoldered behind his familiar glower.

With Crayn, the Queen left her rooms to accompany the mute Magister.

He took her along an unfamiliar route. At first, he seemed to guide her into the depths where the servants lived. At the top of the last stairway, however, he turned to an unmarked door. It admitted the Queen and Crayn to a long corridor indistinguishable from many others. They passed a series of doors until Magister Rummage selected one apparently at random and pushed it open. Beyond it stretched a featureless passage full of gloom.

At its end, it became a small balcony at the head of a steep stairway.

Here there were torches in cressets. From the balcony, the stair led down to a round chamber about the size of Estie’s bedroom. At first glance, it appeared to have no exit. But then she noticed a gap on one side cut at a sharp angle away from the stairs.

As Magister Rummage started downward, he took Estie’s hand. For reasons of his own, he tapped:

—A choke-point.

The air was getting colder. Her breathing left gusts of vapor. Trails of moisture streaked the walls. Ice puddled on the floor.

At the foot of the stairway, she found a passage barely wide enough for three people to walk together. It was dim, lit by only three torches set far apart. It ran through the rock for several hundred paces, then ended in darkness.

With Magister Rummage holding her hand and Commander Crayn at her back, Queen Estie walked shivering along the passage until she came to a heavy door. It was made of thick timbers bound with iron and secured by three bolts.

The hunchback paused to write:

—This is your escape, Queen. The enemy cannot know that it is here. If you find yourself threatened, you can retreat here and bolt the door. It will hold while you summon help and flee.

Without waiting for a reply, he turned to the door.

It looked too heavy to move, but when he shot the bolts and pushed, it opened easily.

At once, a blast of cold air and sleet struck her. She shielded her eyes while Magister Rummage tugged her outside.

Erratic winds brought spurts of rain, stinging bursts of sleet. Small hailstones bit at her face, her shaded eyes. For a moment, she saw nothing except the dirt under her boots. Then she looked up.

She was in a place like a niche, a little patch among standing boulders. At first, she thought that she was completely enclosed by rock. But then she saw a sliver of space that she could have slipped through on her left, the southwest. The boulder there leaned slightly away from the raw hillside.

Fighting sleet, hail, and rain like flung pebbles, she examined her covert.