Ferra shouldered through the gear room door as the gear house shuddered and chains began climbing out of the channel.
"Raise it full!" Captain Brann Keld's voice boomed down a speaking tube from the tower above the wall.
The roof worker pulled the door shut behind her and dropped the bar, then flattened himself against the ladder.
'Twenty breaths before that leaf clears the sill, maybe fewer, so move your ass.'
Four guards hauled on the spoked wheel where the captives stood yesterday, and their leader barked from the stair landing. The big gear above them bit tooth after tooth, dragging the gate leaf upward one screaming notch at a time.
Ferra tore a locking bracket from her satchel, one of the dozen she forged in the Sixth's yard before departure.
"Not today, you rotten pile of scrap," she snarled, swinging herself onto the frame.
Three Wings snapped open for balance as she rammed the bracket into the working track between two climbing teeth.
