" As I watched, two equerries in Renselaeus livery strode along the path, overtook the man, and addressed him. I watched with my heart thumping like a drum as the man spoke at some length, brushed his fingers against his face--the scratches from the trees!--and then gestured in the direction I had gone.
Expecting the two equerries to immediately take off after me, I braced for a run. Why had I babbled so much? I thought, annoyed with myself. Why didn’t I just say “No” and leave?
But the equerries both turned and walked swiftly back in the direction they’d come, and the old man continued on his way.
What does that mean?
And the answer was not long in coming: They were going back to report.
Which meant a whole lot of them searching. And soon.
Yes, I’d really widened my perimeter, I thought furiously, cursing the Baron, music, inns, resorts, food, and the Baron again, throwing in Galdran Merindar and the Marquis of Shevraeth for good measure. I slipped back through the garden to the street. Spotting an alley behind a row of houses, I ducked into that.
And when I heard the thunder of approaching horses’ hooves, I dove toward the first door, which was miraculously open. Slipping inside, a sickly smile on my face, I concocted a wild story about deliveries and the wrong address as I looked about for inhabitants angered at my intrusion.
But my luck had turned a little: The hallway was empty. Behind me was a stairway leading upward, and next to it one leading to a basement. For a moment I wanted to fling myself down that, to hide in the dark, but I restrained myself: There was generally only one way out of a basement.
At my right a plain door-tapestry opened onto a storeroom of some sort. I peeked inside. There were two windows with clouded glass, and a jumble of dishes, small pieces of furniture, trays, and a row of hooks with aprons and caps on them. That outer door was the servants’ entrance, I realized, and this room was their storeroom.
Colors flickering in the clouded glass brought my attention around. Moving right up next to the window, I listened, and heard the slow clopping of hooves. The rhythm broke, then stopped; from another direction came more hooves, which swiftly got closer.
The house I was in was a corner house, the first in a row. Two search parties met right outside my window, where the alley conjoined with the street.
“Nothing this way, my lord,” someone said.
A horse sidled; another whickered.
Then a familiar voice said, not ten paces from me: “Search the houses. "
― Sherwood Smith , Crown Duel (Crown & Court, #1)
