Revolt of Blood and Stone: A Stone War Chronicles Novella

Chapter 4 - Failure

"What's going on?" Sebastian asked the nearest worker as he walked into the main hall.

All he got in reply was a shrug.

The call to gather had rung through the entire mine, which meant the main hall was packed with people. Everywhere he looked, people sat on the ridges and scaffolding. Those who could not sit were forced to stand nearly shoulder to shoulder. In the middle of it all sat two men on their knees, hands tied together in their lap. Several guards surrounded them, forming a barrier to keep the other workers at a distance. The overseer paced back and forth, grimacing in anger.

Sebastian looked around but did not see any of his group. It seemed he was one of the last to arrive, which did not surprise him. It had taken a while for him to get there; his job that morning was in one of the deepest shafts.

Those remote areas did not suit everyone. It was a place of shadows, and some of the workers said the earth there spoke to them. But Sebastian had never heard any voices from deep down. He might even have liked it if the work was not so dangerous. Digging new tunnels, looking for the best rock to excavate; collapses like the one that nearly got him were not uncommon.

Sebastian had learned not to think about where he was. He had seen men go insane from the thought of the mountain weighing on top of them. And he had to admit, that was a lot of weight.

At last, he spotted Jarod and Shaun in the crowd and made his way over. As he came closer, they noticed him too.

"Seb, come here. Quickly," Shaun urged him.

"What's happening?" Sebastian asked Jarod.

"They got Ezac and Troy," answered Shaun.

"What? How?"

"Today was the day," said Jarod gloomily.

Sebastian's face turned white as the meaning of that set in. The two men had been part of a group of three recruited to make the breakout happen, all of them privileged to travel up to the palace for infrequent, special deliveries.

Normally, the soldiers were the only ones acting as messengers, but on rare occasions a guard would be too lazy to carry something himself and would command one of the slaves to do it. The overseer tolerated it to a point where only those he selected were allowed to go.

But not everyone vetted by the overseer had been approachable. Most were men of doubtful character; often doing the overseer's dirty work and providing him with information on what was going on in the mines. These were the men who kept the groups that formed naturally among the slaves in unbalance. Through harassment, threats or intimidation, they made sure nobody grouped together to overwhelm the guards—until now. Jarod, Svetka and the others had spent more than a year approaching the leaders of the separate groups. Secret meetings, staged fights to fake broken alliances and let conspirators move between loyalty groups. Sebastian had no idea how they kept it all hidden, but they had clearly succeeded. Had their conversations reached the overseer's pets, they would have put an end to their plans very quickly.

Ezac, Troy and...

What was the name of the third? Boas?

—Boas. Those three had been the exception. It had taken months to convince each of them to risk their life for an escape and just as long for them to get noticed by the overseer to work their way into position—and now they were caught.

Both men were in bad shape. They had cuts and bruises on their face. Trails of dried blood showed under their noses and on their chins. Ezac swayed softly on his knees, but Sebastian noticed Troy was aware enough that he surveyed those around him, perhaps looking for them.