“What she taught me,” she went on, fastening her collar again, “is that only polite burglars pick locks.” She slipped the thin end of the wedge between the door and jamb, just in front of where it latched, wiggling it back and forth with wooden splintering sounds until it was solidly stuck in place. Raesinia let go of it and stepped back, leaving the metal bar sticking out at a forty-five-degree angle to the door. “Pull on that, please. As hard as you can.”

Marcus paused, looking over his shoulder, but the old caretaker’s footsteps were no longer audible. He took hold of the bar with both hands and set his feet. When he pulled, leverage worked its magic, and the wood holding the latch in place on the other side of the door gave way with a crunch. The door swung inward.

Raesinia collected her pry-bar and threaded it carefully back past her collar into its hiding spot. Marcus examined the doorjamb, frowning.

“Someone may notice that,” he said.

“We’ll be long gone by then. It doesn’t look like these rooms have gotten much use lately.” Dust lay heavy on the stacks of ledgers in the room, piled haphazardly in twine-wrapped piles. “You take that side, I’ll take this.”

“What am I looking for?”

“Anything that says Halverson.”

He nodded, and they began their search. The dust was thick enough that Raesinia had to run her finger along the spines of some of ledgers to see the names penciled there. There were more ledgers than she’d initially anticipated, but they were tied up and grouped together, so she made relatively quick progress. She was nearing the back of the room when a sound from outside made her stand up straight.

“Think I’ve got it,” Marcus said. “There’s a whole stack that says Halverson, anyway—”

“Shh.” Raesinia raised a hand. The distant footsteps were getting closer. “Someone’s coming.”

“Should I try looking stuck-up again?”

“That would have worked better before I broke the door open.”

“Maybe you should learn to be a polite burglar.”

Raesinia couldn’t help grinning at that. Marcus could be witty, when he forgot he was talking to the queen. It felt a little like working beside Sothe, with her dry, dark humor.

The footsteps came closer still. Raesina crept up to the doorway and risked a peek. Just turning the corner was a young man in a three-cornered hat and a blue-on-black sash, looking from door to door as though he was searching for something.

“Patriot Guard,” she whispered. “I think he’s come to find us.”

Marcus pressed himself against the open door on the other side of the doorway. “Any ideas?”

“When he comes in here, I’ll get his attention, and you jump him.”

“Any good ideas?” Marcus said, but the footsteps were close now. He waved frantically to Raesinia, not daring to speak.