There was the sound of splintering glass breaking the night, then silence.
The university's personal shurta rushed towards the tower at the end of the science block. Torches were lit, and some guards dashed up the honeycomb staircase, past door after door of private labs to the room at the top. One of them unlocked the door and threw it open.
Starlight twinkled on the marble floor. They perused the room, the table scattered with Ayah Davan's research equipment, checked the integrity of the safe, even her notes on the cream - coloured paper. Nothing had been taken.
Sergeant Vidir, a stoic man in his mid - fifties who had guarded the university grounds ever since he was fifteen, strode past the windows, glancing at each one, checking for cracks. Of course there were none. These windows were strengthened with Busnum from mines in the north of Aviserey, unbreakable once combined with glass when it was molten.
'Let's go, boys', he said, marching out of the room, mournfully thinking about how cold his plate of succulent kebabs would be once he returned to the dining hall of Mamun College
The door was locked; the guards returned to their posts. The night plodded on in the slow way it does when the summer begins to die, crisp breeze marking its way between the stars.
The figure crouched on the tower's domed roof lifted a hatch hidden between the blue - grey tiles, then dropped down into the lab.
A short while later it emerged, gently closed the hatch, and disappeared from the dome.
The night went on.
YOU ARE READING
Draped in Shadow
FantasyWhen Ayah Davan was assigned by the University of Kizdir to experiment on one of the most expensive minerals in the world - casibe, she didn't expect to discover a science both deadly and magical. Framed for setting fire to a peace summit and causin...
