Chapter 57: RELLAN HAS COLLAPSED

DIANA’S POV

The second report made the first one sound optimistic.

Raigoro emerged from Command Terrace twenty minutes later with Daric and one man Diana did not know.

The stranger wore the dark working coat of Blackharrow’s senior mining engineers.

Raigoro stopped beside Diana.

"The second report confirms three deep sections collapsed."

She waited.

"The main access remains usable to the middle station. Two lower routes are blocked. The ventilation line serving the deepest galleries is damaged."

Diana wrote: HOW MANY?

"Thirty-one currently listed below the blocked sections."

Currently.

Better than pretending the number had become certain merely because someone wrote it down.

ALIVE?

"Some."

Some.

"Rellan’s rescue crews have heard knocking from one blocked section. No response yet from the deepest gallery."

Raigoro indicated the man beside him.

"Master Engineer Pellan Var. He will lead the structural reinforcement team from Blackharrow."

Master Var inclined his head.

"Foreman Tomas Rusk remains at Rellan directing the local crews. The report you’re reading is his."

Diana fixed both names in memory. Rusk and Var were easier to think about than another pair of titles inside an emergency report.

Master Var held a copied section of the mine plan.

"Rusk’s crews have already entered as far as the middle station. They are reinforcing the central approach and trying to establish ventilation toward the first blocked gallery."

Raigoro asked, "Your concern?"

"The extent of secondary movement. Their local engineers are working from what they can inspect, but they want another structural team before opening anything deeper."

Good.

Raigoro had not been summoned because nobody at Rellan knew how to rescue miners.

The people who understood the mine had already begun.

Blackharrow was sending them more of what they needed.

Diana raised her slate.

I CAN WORK ABOVE GROUND.

Then: AT RELLAN.

Raigoro looked toward Master Var.

"Can you guarantee a surface area that will remain outside any revised collapse boundary?"

"No," Master Var said. "Not from the reports we have."

Raigoro looked back at Diana.

"Then no."

She hated the answer because Raigoro had not refused her as his wife or protected her rank. Master Var, the man who understood the structural danger, had said the surface itself could not be guaranteed safe.

Diana could argue with Raigoro. She had considerably less success arguing with an unstable mountain.

Diana looked once more at Master Var.

I WOULD STAY ABOVE GROUND.

"I understand."

THEN WHY DOES THAT NOT HELP?

Master Var unfolded the copied mine plan far enough to show the surface works.

"Because above ground is part of the rescue site."

He marked the mine mouth, the equipment yard, and two outer approaches.

"If the failure widens, we may have to move the medical station, timber crews, animals, wagons, and everyone waiting near the entrance. I cannot tell you yet which ground remains safe."

Diana looked at the marks.

Master Var continued, "Every person there needs to be able to move when the site engineer gives the order. Anyone who requires additional guards or protection changes what the rescue team has to account for."

Her two Household Guards stood several paces behind her.

That was irritatingly specific.

Diana wrote:

I CAN OBEY AN EVACUATION ORDER.

"I believe you," Master Var said. "I still cannot promise there will be useful work for you that justifies adding another person to an unstable site."

Master Var had not mentioned her title, her marriage, or what would happen politically if the Grand Duchess were injured. To him, she was one more untrained person asking to enter an unstable rescue site.

Diana had very little useful argument against that.

Diana wrote: THEN WHAT CAN I DO HERE?

Raigoro read the question.

"The families."

Diana frowned.

"Relatives already in Blackharrow have begun asking for information. Others will remain closer to Rellan and receive verified reports through territorial offices."

He glanced toward Daric.

"Rellan cannot manage rescue operations and every family inquiry at the same time."

Daric nodded.

"We’ll establish a secure report point beside the infirmary administration. Territorial offices receive the same verified updates we do."

Raigoro looked back at Diana.

"People will arrive here before we have answers for them."

Diana thought of Blackharrow’s infirmary waiting room.

Benches near the draft.

Children sleeping against adults.

A mother holding bread because there was nowhere else to put it.

The space had bothered her on the first tour.

Now an emergency would test it properly.

Diana wrote: HOW MANY ROOMS?

Mistress Hale would know.

She turned toward Alma.

Alma understood immediately.

"I’ll find her."

Raigoro said, "Use whatever household rooms you need within ordinary authority."

There was no ceremonial permission or invented assignment. A problem existed inside the work Diana already had the right to do.

That was better.

A departure horn sounded below.

Master Var checked the time.

"We need to leave."

Raigoro pulled on his gloves.

Raigoro usually left Blackharrow for danger wearing armor.

Today he wore a heavy riding coat over ordinary command clothes because steel could do very little against a collapsing mountain.

Diana disliked the difference. Battle at least came with an enemy people could see.

There would be no enemy line to read.

No terrain deliberately shaped.

A mountain had fallen on people.

Diana wrote: DO NOT GO UNDERGROUND IF THE ENGINEERS SAY NO.

Raigoro looked at the slate.

Master Var made a quiet sound that might have been amusement.

Raigoro answered, "I was planning to obey the people who understand the mine."

GOOD.

"Thank you for the instruction."

Diana narrowed her eyes.

He almost smiled.

Then the moment disappeared.

Raigoro turned toward Daric.

"You stay."

Daric nodded.

"Routine field packets at the morning and evening relay windows," Raigoro said. "Immediate dispatch for a changed trapped count, structural failure, lost rescue route, major casualty, or command emergency."

Daric nodded.

"Anything else waits for the scheduled packet."

"Yes."

Raigoro looked at Diana one last time.

"Do not mistake remaining here for doing nothing."

She held his gaze.

He left.

Diana watched from the lower court as Master Var led the fastest specialist party through the Citadel gates.

The party included structural engineers, ventilation specialists, additional medical staff, and rope crews. They would change horses through the territorial relay posts rather than wait for the slower equipment train.

Raigoro followed shortly afterward with a smaller command party. Heavy bracing timber and excavation wagons would travel behind them at the fastest pace the road allowed.

Engineers rode where soldiers usually would have. Ventilation specialists and rope crews followed them, while the heavy wagons carried timber instead of weapons.

Rellan needed a different kind of force.

The gate closed.

Diana turned before the last sound of hooves disappeared.

Mistress Hale was already approaching with three household clerks.

"How many rooms, Your Grace?"

Diana opened her slate.

By the time the first Rellan families reached Blackharrow, she intended to have an answer.