Fate's Edge

door—three locks; no wonder it took her a second—and locked it from the inside. They pressed against the door, barely breathing.
    Nothing.
    No heavy breathing, no testing of the locks, nothing. They were in.
    In front of them, a short hallway led to a large vault door. Kaldar tapped the bird and pointed toward the vault. The bird took off to scout the way, then returned to perch on his arm.
    It didn’t seem alarmed. If he worked with George again, they would have to establish some sort of signal system. Wings open—the way is clear. Wings closed—run for your life. Or something like that.
    They started down the corridor. The vault lay at the very end, a huge round door, thick and heavy. Audrey knelt by it. “Five locks. This is the most I’ve ever seen. This will take time.”
    He sat by her. “Anything I can do to help?”
    “No. The more I can do by hand, the easier it is. Lifting a two-inch tumbler by magic is like trying to carry a hundred-pound rock.” Audrey extracted a leather bundle from her pack and opened it. Thin metal lock-picking tools lay inside. The tools and the bundle looked suspiciously familiar.
    Kaldar peered at the tools. “Where did you get this?”
    “In your bags. You’ve been holding out.”
    Heh.
    “They are mine now.” She stuck the tip of her tongue out at him. “Stealers, keepers.”
    He reached into his pocket and pulled out her hair band with a pale metal flower on it.
    “Kaldar! I’ve been looking for it everywhere.”
    She reached for it, and he yanked it back. “Stealers, keepers.”
    Audrey shook her head and probed the first lock with a narrow picklock. “There is a lock-picking competition in St. Louis. No electronics, no magnifying glasses, nothing but your fingers. I always wanted to enter. My dad never let me.” She slid the second picklock into the lock next to the first.
    “You’d kill it,” he told her.
    She grinned.
    “So why not enter after you left the family?”
    “I don’t know. I guess subconsciously I always knew I’d go back to the life of crime. I didn’t need that kind of visibility.” Audrey frowned. “Now that’s interesting. De Braose is left-handed, isn’t he?”
    “Yes.”
    She held her hand to the keyhole. A thin tendril of magic slipped from it, licked the inside of the keyhole, and vanished. “Hey, baby, can you move a bit?”
    He rose and backed away.
    “More. More. Keep going. Okay, that’s probably good.” Audrey stepped close to the door, standing on the right of the lock. Her long elegant fingers clasped the picklocks and twisted.
    Razor-thin blades shot out of the floor and the wall, slicing the space where he’d stood a moment ago. On the left, a wide circular blade severed the air less than six inches from Audrey before vanishing into the wall. If she had stood on the left of the keyhole, as a right-handed person would, he would be cradling the bloody pieces of her body.
    “Morell is a fun guy,” Audrey said. “One down, four to go.
     
    TWENTY minutes later, the fourth lock was down. Audrey stretched on the floor. The cold stones felt good under her back. The previous lock resisted the pick. She had to use her magic, and the five minutes of straining and gritting her teeth against the pain it took to open it had sapped her dry. The pain receded now, slowly. It was so nice not to hurt anymore.
    “Are you okay?” Kaldar asked.
    “Mhhm. I just need a small break. Do we have time?”
    “Thirty minutes.”
    Audrey sighed.
    “I can take the last one,” Kaldar said.
    “No, let me do it. Equal division of labor: you pickpocket, I open locks.” She closed her eyes. “What will happen once we get out of here? Out of the castle, I mean?”
    “Well, we’ll take the boys back. Hopefully, Declan will be understanding. Then I will take you to meet my family. You will be expected to eat too much and carry on conversations with people whose names you probably won’t remember right away.”
    His lips touched hers. He kissed her, and she smiled into the kiss.
    “My grandmother will want to pry your entire story out of you. You have to be careful with Memaw. She is very good with sharp objects. Like swords.”
    “Is there anyone in your family who isn’t a deadly swordsman?”
    “My stepsister Catherine. She knits with superhuman speed and poisons people.”
    Audrey laughed. “The Mar family: everyone you see can kill you.”
    “Something like that. Then we’ll go to my house.”
    Her eyes snapped open.