Empire of Ashes

Chapter XLIX - Cultured Cruelty

The tunnel faced east, so we were blinded as the sun rose. It was impossible to sleep in the glare — or even pretend to — but we couldn't start work because we had to wait to be unchained. So the hour after dawn was a time for talking.

"You tried to kill him?" he asked for the second time. We weren't bothering to whisper anymore. None of our fellow slaves had shown the slightest bit of interest.

"Well, yes, I suppose."

"But now you're friends?" Tommas made a face, but I nodded. "And what's his name, again?"

"Temris," I said, sighing. It felt strange to be having this discussion with Tom, of all people. My life in the village and my life with the northerners had always felt so separate, and now the lines were blurring.

"Right. Anyone else I should know about?"

Most of the warriors would be self-explanatory, I reckoned. As for the rest ... I sorted through the list, and — oh. "There's Melia. She's Lord Ulric's daughter. We get along quite well."

"Our liege-lord's daughter," Tommas mouthed slowly. "Abyss, Lyra."

I shrugged. It all sounded normal now. It was my new, distorted reality. Someone had shaken the world and turned it on its head. Soon it would right itself, and kings would fall and peasant girls might find themselves elevated beyond their wildest dreams.

It took longer than I expected, introducing Tommas to that new reality. After an hour, when I had explained everything I could bear to, he was still having trouble believing any of it. He didn't say so, of course, but I could feel the pulsing scepticism lurking just below the surface. One slip and the whole story would collapse.

And then the man arrived to unlock everyone's chains, and I had to slip into a side tunnel and lie there in the darkness, silent as the grave. By the time it was safe to return, the morning's work had begun. The music of pickaxes on rock echoed through the tunnel, rendering every other noise insignificant.

Since there was nothing else to do, no spare dram to pull, I gathered scraps of rock and helped the other girls fill their drams. It took a good deal of buttering up before any of them were willing to talk to me, the strange infiltrator. Ghost, they called me when they thought I wasn't listening. Having appeared from the darkness, pale, bruised and bloodied, I could see their point.

"I could take over, if you like," I offered. "You could rest for a few hours."

My reply was a dozen vigorous head shakes. The drams were their responsibility, and they feared punishment for surrendering them. But the only way to come into contact with the children outside was to bring them a dram, and the only way to get a dram was trust, and building trust took time, so I had to wait. Even though Emri could have been a dozen paces away.

"I can try talking to them," Tommas said silently. He must have seen my unrequited efforts to make friends.

"Please," I implored.

He motioned for me to wait, handed me his pickaxe and then slipped past me. He had to talk aloud to the girls, and I watched them straining to understand every distortion and slip of the tongue.

"Lyra is a friend," he began hesitantly. "From years and years ago..."

He went on to explain about Emri, about how I had only come here to look for her, and he asserted frequently that I was flesh and blood, not a ghost. The first time around, none of them looked convinced, but by the third or fourth repetition, they were coming around.

"Is this all true?" one of them asked me, ever so cautiously.

"Yes." I snapped the word, and I had to remind myself to play nicely. "What would you do for your sister?"