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Emiel paused, the key in his hand, then slowly turned and looked toward Ragnar. "Where indeed." he said. "He must have kept on going. He couldn't know that we would stop for the horses."
Ragnar shrugged, Emiel knew Ted and he did not. It sounded like a reasonable guess, and what else was there to do.
The lock clicked and the door opened wide. They ran past and toward the rough-plank, stable door, pushed that aside and, much to their relief, found the horses fine and better for their rest.
* * *
Outside, the late morning sun was casting a dark line of shadow across the far bank of the stream. The horses had proved tractable enough, but skittish, perhaps because of the urgent pressure of their handlers.
The front gate had been latched, and they'd set the heavy crossbeam in place. Emiel and Ragnar had worked in silence, but, once safely beyond the corridor, they faced the fact that Ted had not come this way.
"He must have run down one of the others passages in the map room." Ragnar stated the obvious.
"Yes, and now we have to find him." Emiel spat into the stream in disgust.
"We find Ted, and I get my Cat back!" Ragnar laughed.
* * *
They led the horses across the stream at a place where the banks were lower and allowed an easy crossing. There was no way to hide them, but Ragnar concealed them as best he could in the very short time allowed. Emiel was anxious to begin the search.
The slope was lightly wooded with a thick layer of dead leaves and debris, but little vegetation. Ragnar had found a small concavity where a tree had been uprooted. A wall of dirt-encrusted roots blocked line of sight from the pathway across the stream, but the ditch was shallow and the root stump small. It would not hide the horses well.
"Right, that's the best I can do." Ragnar told Emiel. He'd strung horseblankets along each side and hung cut branches irregularly across them. He stepped back and grimaced at the rough work.
"It will have to do." Emiel agreed with Ragnar's poor opinion. "We will go back in the way I did at first. I do not think the front door is safe anymore."
Ragnar thumbed the sharp edge of his axeblade with regret."And I was looking forward to cutting my way through. Oh well, lead on!"
* * *
The key that Emiel wore round his neck unlocked a round iron hatch, rust red but with hinges clean and freshly oiled. It opened smoothly, without a sound, and swung full back against the leafy oerth.
"You first." said Emiel. "I want to lock this once we are inside."
"It's awfully small." Ragnar sounded doubtful as he leaned over and looked down the dark passageway.
"You will fit. I can always jump on your shoulders and force you through." Emiel replied straightfaced but jokingly.
Ragnar's shoulder scraped across the hatches metal rim, but he arched his back pressing shoulder blades together, and wedged himself down the narrow shaft. His footsteps clanged, loud and echoing as he dropped from rung to rung.
Emiel hissed from above "Stop banging about. Do you have to make such noise!"
"Yes I do!" Ragnar called back up to him then with great care lowered his foot and gently placed it down upon another rung.
"Speed it up! What is taking you so long!" Emiel shouted back.
"Arggh!" Ragnar growled. "To a frozen hell with this."
* * *
"Crawl!" Ragnar bellowed. "Through there!" He stood, finally, at the bottom of the shaft. Instead of the entrance he had expected there was only a low stone tunnel, even smaller than the way that he'd just descended.
"You're too fat." Emiel told him. He bent and with two hands made a quick measure of the tunnel walls. "You'll fit, barely."
"I could have chopped my way through those stumbling bags of bone. With a little room to use my axe..."
"You'd still be dead." Emiel interrupted. "Now come on." He dropped and, in a crouch, set off at a good pace.
"I'd have chopped them up like stew-meat!" Ragnar yelled down the tunnel at Emiel's disappearing form. "Oh fine then." He mumbled to himself, then bent into a crouch as well. He still didn't fit, but dropped onto his belly and crawled. The tunnel went straight for a little while but turned a sudden righthand angle, and at that curve it narrowed just a tad.
"I'm stuck." He screamed, wedged firmly between the tunnel walls. "Emiel, I mean it. I can't move!"
Emiel had gone quite far ahead but he heard the barbarians shout. He stopped and muttered a mild curse, then turned around. He had to haul at Ragnar's arms, bracing his feet against the walls, and with a straining heave he pulled the large northman free with sparks flying between stone and steel-chain shirt.
Ragnar gulped for air in company with Emiel own gasps, and in a breathless voice he spoke. "not... fat, just... big boned."
And Emiel Laughed.
* * *
(To Be Continued)