“Hey!”
It was Sophia, her cry carrying over the melody in the courtyard and reaching Birdie as she struggled against Friedrich’s grasp.
She didn’t dare yell back and risk alerting everyone that intruders had entered the fortress grounds undetected. She listened, but heard no other sound.
Friedrich didn’t notice Sophia’s cry, or, if he did, he didn’t seem to care.
Birdie barely got her feet under her again before they reached the guard at the dungeon’s arched entrance. She stopped fighting Friedrich and stared.
The guard was gigantic and in desperate need of a shave as he lounged with his legs spread wide beneath his leather tunic. The helmet’s nosepiece cocked sideways and his giant nose appeared broken, or at least badly mended.
In that instant, Birdie realized Friedrich had accomplished his actual goal, and it wasn’t to pass her off as a visitor. He’d given the guard the impression he was dragging her toward the dungeon for some imagined crime.
“Was ist das?” The guard’s deep, scratchy voice did nothing to soften his appearance as he looked lazily from Birdie to Friedrich.
Friedrich said something that Birdie didn’t understand. The guard responded, and back and forth they went, continuing their discussion as if she were not even there.
It was infuriating. She wanted more than anything to lash out, to tell them both where they could go. But she was smart enough to know this was not the time, that any action on her part would get her strung up next to Marielle in the courtyard in the morning. So she stayed silent, waiting and, after a few more moments of conversation, the guard handed Friedrich a torch and waved them through.
“You can let me go now,” Birdie said through her teeth as they passed under the arch.
Friedrich leaned into her ear. “Not a chance.”
They crept along, moving deeper into the dark dungeon, drowning in the moans and cries of the prisoners further down the passageway. A middle-aged guard joined them, until Friedrich offered some words that appeared to ease his mind.
They continued on, ignoring the taunts from men trapped in cages, and the occasional screams of such anguish that Birdie’s stomach clenched. She was grateful she didn’t understand the words, as the emotions jarred her bones.
A song of sorrow rose around them, and the stench of unwashed humanity was so putrid that Birdie thought she might pass out before they reached Marielle. She used her free hand to cover her nose and mouth, but it did little good.
Poor Marielle and Peter in this place.
That thought alone pushed her to keep moving.
When they reached the end of the passageway, a guard pointed to a series of wooden grates that covered pits in the floor. Friedrich peered into each one with the light of the torch, pausing each time to search the dirty faces of the prisoners huddled below. At the third grate, he stopped and addressed the guard. “Hier.”
The guard bent and shoved a huge key into a large iron lock and turned it. He slid the lock and unlatched the grate.
Birdie peered into the pit, her heart racing.
Marielle started, then stepped away, shaking her head back and forth. “Nein.”
The lady’s maid, who’d been so perfectly uniformed when she’d rushed into the storeroom, was now filthy, and her dress hung in tatters beneath the sack. Her hair, once neatly braided and hidden under a snow-white wrap, fell long and wild down her back.
Friedrich called to Marielle, and asked her a question in a commanding tone, as if he really were a guard of the fortress. She glanced at Birdie, who nodded ever so slightly. Marielle met Friedrich’s gaze. She answered his question, hope mixing with the tears that filled her blue eyes.
Friedrich turned to the guard, who sneered at Birdie. Without another word, Friedrich placed his hand on the center of her back and shoved her into the pit.
Birdie screamed as Friedrich and the guard laughed.
Marielle did her best to break her fall, to catch her, but the shove had been so unexpected that they both collapsed backwards, hard, landing in what Birdie could only hope was mud on the dirty stone floor.
Friedrich snickered as the guard bent and re-latched the grate. He leered at them and Birdie could see the dark gaps in his mouth where teeth used to be.
“Friedrich!” she cried, no longer caring who heard her. “You cannot leave me here!”
She scrambled to her feet and peered up through the grate.
“Friedrich! You jerk! Get me out of here!”
Marielle slapped her slender hand over Birdie’s mouth, her eyes wide as she motioned for her to be silent.
But it was too late. The guards must have realized something was not right with the new German guard, and a commotion broke out.
Friedrich shouted, and while Birdie couldn’t understand him, she could feel the complete and total desperation in his voice.
Good. She nodded to Marielle, who dropped her hand from Birdie’s mouth.
Although she could no longer see Friedrich or the guard, she could hear the fighting, the smacks and punches, the yelling.
And then she heard something else. Something that made her jump and her heart leap at the same time.
The whistle.
It blew, long and loud and desperate. Again and again, echoing against the chamber walls, until there were no longer walls to catch the sound.
Marielle faded, the salty impression of her hand still tingling on Birdie’s mouth.
And then they were alone, in the dark, Birdie at the bottom of what was now a steep stone ramp and Friedrich far from her, near the ruined entrance, clutching a burning torch, the whistle pressed between his lips.
“What happened?” Rich was out of breath as he reached them, the other campers close behind.
“You jerk!” Birdie clambered up the ramp. She brushed herself off and marched toward him, her legs aching from the fall. “You freaking jerk! Do you know what that means? How do you say it in German, Louisa?”
“What happened?” Louisa joined Rich on the dark pathway.
“What happened? What happened is he threw me into that pit,” she pointed to the ramp behind her, “like a common criminal!” She held up her skirts. “I’m filthy!”
“It was the only way.” Friedrich shrugged and tucked the whistle under his shirt.
“It was not the only way.” Birdie shrugged animatedly and deepened her tone to imitate him. “Give me back the aventurine. You’re the criminal. You’re a thief!”
“Friedrich?” Louisa asked. “You took the glass?”
A white light blinded them all. “Sie! Was machen sie da?”
Birdie jumped at the booming voice and spotlight, and it took a moment to realize it was not the burly guard, but the night watchman.
They clung together and stared at him. He dropped the beam of light to the ground and continued to speak, addressing Friedrich.
“What’s he saying?” Birdie whispered.
“We’re in trouble.” Louisa kept her voice low. “He thinks Friedrich took the torch from the museum.”
Friedrich extinguished the torch on the sandstone path and handed it to the night watchman.
The well-groomed man inspected it and then shook it at Friedrich as he spoke. Friedrich responded in German, and then waved for them to follow the night watchman back to the storeroom.
“Did you at least get to talk to Marielle?” Sophia whispered as they trudged down the path.
Birdie nodded.
“And?”
“And I don’t understand German. Friedrich spoke to her and she may have told him where the pieces are, but I can’t be sure.”
Raina came up behind them. “Man, you smell awful.”
The night watchman resecured them in the storeroom and left, latching the door with final-sounding authority. Everyone turned to Birdie and Friedrich.
“Don’t look at me,” she said. “I was a prop in this whole expedition, apparently.”
“She didn’t expect you to throw her into a pit, Friedrich.” Louisa stood tall and folded her arms. “Was that necessary?”
“Yes.” Raw satisfaction deepened his voice as he locked eyes on Birdie. “What were you thinking? Screaming in perfect English. You are a fool.”
“Do you know where the pieces are?” Rich pulled Friedrich’s attention away from her.
“Marielle told me. Yes. But only Louisa and I can get them. The night watchman was clear that he did not want to see any campers out again tonight, or we will be reported and fired.”
“You mean you won’t tell us where they are?” Raina plopped down on her cot. “So much for being in this together.”
“She’s right. Why only Louisa?” Ryan asked.
“I do not want to get fired. Besides, do you speak German?” Friedrich waved his hand at each of them. “Do any of you? You haven’t even tried to speak a word of German to us since you’ve been here. Not even a bitte or danke!”
Raina looked at Rich.
“Please and thank you,” he translated. She nodded and laid down.
“No, we haven’t,” Ryan admitted.
“Well, Louisa does,” Friedrich said. “If you came along, you fools would get us killed.”
“But if you shimmer, we’ll all go too,” Ryan said. “And be trapped in here.”
“We won’t use the glass until we’re far away,” Friedrich said.
“How far?” Rich asked. “How long will you be gone? And what will you do when you find the pieces?”
“Open the chest and return the chess piece to Elisabeth’s father,” Friedrich replied. “Then this will all be over.”
“No way,” Kayla said. “The chest stays here with us. I don’t trust you.”
“I’m going to sleep.” Raina closed her eyes. “Birdie, get out of those clothes and burn them or something, will you? The whole place reeks now.”
“Sorry, Raina. It’s not by choice. Louisa, will you help me change?”
She followed Birdie into the tunnel.
“Be careful,” Birdie said, when they were out of earshot. “Friedrich is acting very strange. And I need the aventurine back. He still has it.”
Louisa nodded. “I will be careful.”