Land of Smoke and Ashes

Sweet and Deadly

Natalie looked from the blond girl to the others, who were all staring open-mouthed. Even when there was another shuddering crash from the other side of the door, like someone had thrown something heavy against it, nobody looked away.

"Can someone please tell me what's going on?"

It was Jewels who finally explained, though she still looked completely shell shocked. "Natalie, meet Kira oldest daughter of the Sun King Helios, sovereign princess and heir to the throne of Brookland."

The blond girl, Kira, shuffled her feet. She looked sheepish. "I'd rather you didn't use all my titles, particularly not around here."

"Hence the name Sunshine. Very cute." Sam's voice was a low growl. "You've seriously been masquerading as a palace informer?"

"I'm not masquerading as anything." Kira looked indignant. "Who do you think is feeding information along this entire time? And I'll thank you not to look at me like that, I'm not a child."

"No, you're royalty, your highness. You shouldn't be anywhere near our group." He narrowed his eyes at her. "Does your father have any idea what you're doing?"

"Of course not." Kira' eyes flashed as she looked around at them defiantly. "And he's not going to hear about it either. If he did, he would lock me in the tallest tower and your source of information would dry up. He thinks I'm away at school in the mountains. I've got sources reporting to me in the palace, in her palace." She waved a hand at them. "Still not the time though, seriously. We have to find a way out of here."

"Right." Sam's face was grim, and he turned back toward the door again. The noise level from outside had gone down slightly, though there was still a great deal of crashing, and the sound of soldiers calling to one another. "They're searching the place. Shit. Is there a back way?"

"I don't know, I haven't come in that way."

Gwen was already stalking toward the back of the room. "There might be barrel passages back here somewhere. Help me look."

The others spread out, and Natalie followed Gwen toward the back where the barrels were stored on racks that took up the entire back wall. "What's a barrel passage?"

"Passages from one pub to another," Gwen said, she tugged at the heavy rack experimentally, shaking her head. "Certain substances were banned under King Helios, so they pubs arranged a way to get a hold of them anyways. There'd usually be one dealer who sold the illegal stuff, but if everyone came to him for barrels it would be too obvious. So he'd distribute them between a few pubs and have them sell them instead. Hence the barrel passages, to avoid anyone seeing what they were doing."

"Well that's smart."

"They're mostly abandoned now," Gwen grunted, leaning down to stare at the other end of the rack. "No one is monitoring what anyone drinks anymore. The king is far too busy trying to figure out how to stop Casius from destroying the entire country."

There was a shout from the other side of the room, and they all hurried over to where Jewels had pulled back a ragged velvet curtain beside a shelf of dusty glass mugs. "Found it!"

Beyond the curtain was an ominous looking hole in the wall. They weren't kidding when they'd called it a "barrel tunnel". It was almost shaped like a barrel, only a little larger. Natalie bit her lip uneasily. Just looking at the empty blackness sent a stab of panic through her.