The Night Raven (The Moonwind Mysteries) by Johan Rundberg

Author:Johan Rundberg [Rundberg, Johan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Amazon Crossing Kids
Published: 2023-10-31T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 16

Dusk descends quickly, and in the south of the city, the window shutters along Nya Gatan close one by one. Soot-black, rank-smelling smoke rises from the chimneys—the orphanage isn’t the only place running low on firewood. Mika and Valdemar cross Nytorget and continue along Stora Bondegatan. Next to the soap factory is an empty plot surrounded by a high temporary wall. Mika stops in front of a door in the wall and tries the handle, but finds it locked. Then she pushes the board nearest the frame, sticks her hand through the gap, and lifts the latch from the inside. Then she pushes the board back into place and opens the door.

“You didn’t mention anything about a break-in,” mutters Valdemar.

“Surely it doesn’t count if we don’t steal anything?” says Mika.

Valdemar sighs. “Yes, it still counts.”

“Fine, just hurry before someone sees us,” says Mika.

Valdemar peers suspiciously into the semidarkness on the other side of the door. He takes a step inside and immediately slips and slides on his butt down a small slope. Cursing, he gets back on his feet.

“You could have warned me,” he snorts and reshapes his flattened hat. “Who is it we’re meeting again?”

“A friend of mine,” Mika answers shortly and shuts the door behind her.

She isn’t actually sure whether Tekla still lives here. This was the last place they saw each other, but that was over half a year ago.

Tekla lived at the Public Children’s Home when Mika was little. But after a few thefts and scraps she was sent to the Educational Facility for Girls in Vita Bergen. That was a long time ago, and Tekla is grown now, seventeen years old. For the warmer half of the year she works on construction sites around the city, carrying bricks and mortar for the walls—an exhausting and dangerous job. In the colder half of the year, Tekla takes what she can get. The last time they met she had a job in a nitroglycerin factory in Vinterviken. But Mika knows that Tekla does other things as well. Things that would get her sent to jail if the police ever got their hands on her.

On the other end of the plot are a few large shacks. A thin stream of smoke is rising from one of them. Mika clenches her fist and knocks on the door—three hard knocks, a short pause, then two more. Then she presses the handle down.

“Stay behind me,” she says. “And watch your step.”

Valdemar scoffs. “You think I’m going to slip again?”

Mika doesn’t say what she thinks, but she knows Tekla. Valdemar will understand soon enough. She just hopes he survives long enough to find out.

The shack consists of one large, long room. Rusty horseshoes are scattered here and there on the floor, and at the far end is a fireplace with an anvil in front. This place was evidently used as a farrier’s forge once upon a time. There is a sharp odor coming from the old fireplace where the remains of railroad rubble are still smoldering.

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