The Room Under the Oven

The oven fire had sunk to a red seam when the first wounded man began shivering again.

He was wrapped in two coats and a blanket, yet his teeth clicked hard enough to wake the others. Oren crouched beside him, then looked toward the bakehouse door. Beyond it, the street offered only black stone, drifted snow, and occupied houses whose owners had already given up shutters and doors for firewood.

“There’s no empty roof left,” Oren said. “And the rear room can’t take another person. The floor’s gone.”

Kaelen looked at the man’s shaking hands. The oven’s warmth reached the room in uneven waves. It would not reach the street. “Where’s the cellar hatch?”

Oren’s gaze shifted to the flour bins. “Under those. It’s full.”

“Then we empty it.”

The bins were heavy, and the bakehouse was crowded with wounded people, their blankets, and the helpers trying not to step on them. Kaelen sent the able-bodied to clear a path between the oven and the back wall. Elora moved before he could ask, threading between bedrolls with his gloves pulled over her sleeves. They covered her hands twice over.

“Take the tins first,” he told her. “Keep the lids on.”

She nodded and gathered them against her chest.

Oren was already lifting one of the flour bins. Kaelen took the other end. Its bottom scraped the stone, scattering a pale line across the floor. They shifted it clear, then another. The hatch emerged beneath them, made of thick boards swollen against its frame.

A man near the oven coughed. Someone fed the fire a splinter from a broken stool. The flame caught, then settled low again.

Kaelen wedged his fingers beneath the hatch ring and pulled. The wood held fast. He set his shoulder to it. A sharp crack came from the frame, and the hatch lifted a handspan before stopping against something below.

“Wait,” Oren said. He lowered himself, peered through the gap, and swore under his breath. “A barrel tipped over. It’s jammed against the stairs.”

The stairs were narrow. Kaelen went down first, testing each tread with his weight. The air smelled of damp stone and old flour. At the bottom, a barrel lay on its side across the passage, its broken hoop caught against the wall. He braced it with both hands and pushed. It rolled a fraction, then settled back against the steps.

“Need a lever,” he called.

Oren passed him a length of iron from the bakehouse tools. Kaelen worked its end beneath the barrel’s rim. The stone under his boots was slick. He shifted his stance, leaned his weight into the bar, and forced the barrel to roll far enough for him to wedge it against the wall.