During my lunch break, I stand nervously outside a servant's entrance to the manor. I attempt a casual lean on the wall to avoid looking suspicious.

I'm pretty sure I only look more uncomfortable.

Frustrated, I push off the wall and pace. Then I come to a stop and run a hand down my face. Pacing doesn't make me look any more innocent.

Innocent? I haven't done anything wrong.

Yet.

A frustrated noise escapes me. I need to calm down.

The door opens, and I jump, giving a startled yelp.

The out-of-breath Leavi peeking from the door shoots me a glare. "What was that?" she hisses.

"Shut up. Do you have it?"

"Yes." She digs a key from her dress's pocket. "Hurry, though. I still have to take it back, and I almost got caught nicking it."

"That's not my fault!" I take it. "Why do I have to pay for the mistake?"

An exasperated look fills her face. "Just hurry."

I nod, steadying my breathing, and walk back toward the stables, key in my pocket.

Pulling a fence gate closed, Master Heizer rumbles, "What're you doin' back so soon?"

Blazes. I need an excuse and quick. I can't afford him forcing me back to work. Leavi still needs this key.

"Um, forgot..." I point vaguely. "Something."

He raises an eyebrow at me but thankfully doesn't question it. "Well, get movin'."

I nod once, grateful, and hurry behind the stable. I scoop up a shovel and head for a small pile of horse feces that I left out here. Using the shovel, I move an even smaller amount to a patch of sunlight and flatten it into a thick circle. I toss the shovel aside and kneel.

Cringing, I gently press the key into the muck, trying to keep it as even as possible. The key comes level with the surface of the circle, and I let go. From my pocket, I take a pair of tweezers and extract the key from the mold. A bit of the manure clings to the key, and I wash it off in a nearby water pail.

Now I just have to hope that Heizer doesn't see the mold and destroy it.

I tuck the key into my pocket and hurry back to Leavi. She's anxiously tapping her foot. "Why did that take so long?"

"It didn't. Now go away." I pass her the key. "Get that back where it came from. We'll have to wait for the mold to dry."

She takes a deep breath and disappears through the door.

Tense at the situation and yet relieved my part is done, I quickly eat lunch and walk back to the stables. When work is over, I hurry around back to retrieve the mold. Kneeling, I gently test the edge to see if it's hardened and sturdy enough to survive the trip to the inn.

It doesn't give, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

Carefully, I pick the disk up. If I break it, there's no way I can make another in time for our plan.

Holding the mold beside my leg in hopes of blocking it from people's view, I head over to where I'll meet Leavi. She's already standing by the gate when I reach it. Rather than say anything, I nod at her and start off.

Once we've reached the forest, she says, "So have you got the key?"

"I've got the mold for the key."

She stops me. "Why in skies' name didn't you make it back there? We don't want Marcí noticing—"

"She won't. I'll be in my room. But it takes too long to set to do it there."

She pulls her hair down from its bun, nervously combing out the tangles. "Alright."

When we get to the inn, I go straight to my room and set the disk on the bedside table. Out of my bag come two test tubes and a stir stick. Retrieving a cup of water from the pitcher downstairs and bit of white powder from one of my pockets, I begin the process of mixing together the two parts of what will go into the mold.

I sprinkle some of the powder into the bottom of the mold. The water is thankfully still cold, and I pour a small amount into one of the tubes. Into the other goes a larger amount, and that I hold with one hand over a candle flame. My other hand stirs almost all the rest of the powder into the cold tube. Once the water is boiling, I carefully pour both test tubes' contents into the mold.

When the hot water meets the mixture, they swirl together and congeal, the extra powder at the bottom catalyzing and insulating the process. With all the water inside the mold, I sprinkle the last bit of the powder over it. It fuses together, creating a shell around the gel within.

Now just to wait. Once it sets overnight, we'll have a hard, cloudy-colored key.

I smile. Maybe this won't be so bad.

* * *

Only ten minutes before the manor closes for the night, we slip around the back of the building. Snap! I freeze, wincing.

Leavi's head whips around toward me. She glares, the shadow cast by the manor intensifying her features. "Can you be any louder?"

"I could be yelling."

Her murmur darkens. "That's the sixth twig you've stepped on."

"It's only the fifth," I whisper. "And it's the groundskeeper's fault, really. There shouldn't be any twigs for me to step on."

"If there was anyone watching out here," she hisses, "you would have already been caught ten times over!"

"Then it's a good thing there isn't. Do you want my help or not? Let's go."

I move to push past her, but she grabs my sleeve. "You are not leading." She lets go. "Step where I step."

Irritation buzzes in my head. When we planned this, she thought I was too incompetent to sneak back to the servant's entrance by myself—even though I made it here fine yesterday—so she left the manor earlier to fetch me from the stables and is leading me along like I'm some kid who can't find the way on his own. She's been tense all day, though. Now, only hours before we intend to commit our local crime, she's keyed-up ten times worse. We're bad at staying out of the places we're told not to go, aren't we?

My fingers drum against my leg.

Beside the building now, we continue walking as quietly as possible. The fading light throws the building's shadow out across the ground, grotesquely stretched out. Leavi disappears into a door, and I slide in behind her. She slips up a stairwell. In the gathering darkness, her form is only visible when she moves. She reaches the top and glances left and right. In the distance, servants' voices echo as they leave for the day.

They're coming closer.

Leavi grabs my wrist, yanking me into the shadowy hallway and pulling me a few steps toward the far end. Ducking into a crouch, she tugs me down beside her.

"Wha—"

Her hand flies over my mouth, fingers warm and firm against my skin.

The voices rise as the group turns onto the hall. The candle they hold barely penetrates the darkness, and in the enclosed hallway, my eyes sense their movements more than see them.

"Why do they always keep these halls so dark?" one girl whines.

"Oh, Kala. Stop being such a baby," another girl says. "Someone's got to lock up these side entrances, and it's worth getting out of cleanup a few minutes early to do it. Come on."

They make their way toward the doorway we just left, passing so close by, I could reach out and grab one of the girl's ankles. Don't look down, I beg. I hold my breath, the speed of my silent tapping fingers increasing proportionally to my anxiety. Don't look down.

They tip-tap down the stairs. Below, the door bangs closed, and the silence is so thick that even the click of the lock so far away climbs to my ears. Leavi's fingers peel away from my face.

"So in all your planning," I whisper, "did you bother considering that we could get locked in here?"

She shakes her head. "The key you copied was the head maid's master, Sean."

Silence fills the air, broken only by the occasional closed door and distant footstep. We wait in the dark, pressed against the wall, minutes turning into hours. The manor falls quiet, but still we wait. We want the place to be nice and dead when we go skulking through its corridors. My fingers tap against my leg.

Hours later, when the silence is so thick it rings in my ears, Leavi rises. We turn a couple of dark halls, but navigating these straight, level passages is easy compared to the High Valley tunnels. Then, up ahead, there's a flicker of a torch, and she heads for it, taking us down what looks like a more well-traveled hall. She never hesitates, and I'm pleasantly surprised, even though she said she knew the path. I'm glad she wasn't mistaken.

She flattens me into a shadow.

"Ow!" I hiss.

"Shut up!"

Voices carry from around the corner. "... can't believe Veradeaux has us down here on night shift," a man complains. "I mean, I've got a bed and a bottle to get to."

My jaw clenches in disgust.

"Maybe if you didn't have quite so many bottles," another guy points out, "you wouldn't have to take two shifts."

"Oh, shut it. Already hear enough of that from my wife. I don't need it from you, t—" He breaks off in a curse.

"What's the matter?"

"Left my truncheon back home."

"Again?"

Intense itching suddenly rises in my throat, and dread spikes through me. I'm going to sneeze. Right now. Fifteen feet from two guards, with nothing but a thin shadow as cover. My hand flies to my nose, and Leavi shoots me a look. I pull in a deep breath, desperately attempting to smother this. I don't have high hopes.

The second man sighs. I must have missed a bit of their conversation. "Fine. I'll come with you." A smothered, spittle-filled noise escapes, and Leavi looks like she wants to murder me.

Before they do, that is.

A pause in the footsteps. "Did you hear something?"

One steps forward. In the tense silence, I look at Leavi. This is it. Two academics against two backwater night guards. We'll give them a blaze of a fight, and we'll lose, and then we'll be in a cell too or—

I ball my hands into fists. We'll give them a blaze of a fight.

Someone takes another couple searching steps toward us. Leavi's fingernails skitter across the ground, and I glare at her. But strangely, the steps stop.

"Ack. Just the rats again." Leavi just saved our lives. "Come on. Let's get there and back before we're any later." The steps recede.

To my right, Leavi releases a pent-up breath. Then she whirls on me, face strained and pale. "Are you trying to get us killed?"

"In case you weren't aware," I bite, "sneezing is involuntary." Rattled, my fingers jitter at my side. I wonder if she gets as vexed with other people as she does with me. If so, that's pretty impressive because right now she looks like she's about to explode. I've often thought she was going to kill me; I just didn't think it would be because I let her drag me to the people who were going to do the deed. Unable to even manage words, lest she set off her internal blast, she snatches my wrist and drags me through the hallways. I quietly protest, but she ignores me. We turn off the main hall, and she lets go.

I rub my wrist pointedly, shooting her a look. She gestures to a turn at the end of the hall. "That's it," she whispers. "That's the entrance to the hall they're keeping him on."

"Well, why are we just standing here?" I begin to creep that way, pulling out the copied key, and glance around the corner.

Two guards stand in front of a barred door, and I jerk back. Leavi opens her mouth to speak, but I raise an insistent finger to my lips. Please don't say anything, Leavi, and please don't have noticed me, guards.

I wait, heart pounding. Nothing happens. Relieved, I nod and drag Leavi back down the hall. "You said there wouldn't be any guards at his door," I hiss.

"There shouldn't be. There wasn't the day before yesterday." Apprehension suddenly shines in her eyes.

"Well, there is now. Two of them."

She blows out a breath, eyes closed. "Lady Veradeaux got her security in place."

"Hold on. You knew this was going to happen?"

"I knew it might, but I was hoping we would get him out before—"

"You didn't bother telling me?"

"Would you have helped me if I had?"

Doubtfully. But that's no reason not to warn someone. Her desperate eyes pin me.

Probably. My lips turn.

"Look," she says, "we're in this far. Let's finish what we came here for."

"How, Leavi? You expect me to take on two guards with this?" I flip out my pocket knife.

"No. I—" She huffs. "Come on, Sean! We're scientists. Problem-solvers. There's got to be a way to distract them. We just need to think."

"This is a really bad situation."

"I'm not just giving up—"

"I didn't say you were giving up! Just—just give me a second." Distraction, a distraction... I pace. How do you get two people that aren't supposed to move to completely abandon their post?

A torch pops, catching my attention. My eyes narrow.

"Hey, Riveirre? They have any lye around here?"

"In the cleaning closet. Why?"

"Show me."

"Why, Sean?"

A smile slips across my face. "Because I've got an idea."