Chapter 7
7
A GHAST AT THE sight of bronze fingers latched on to his, Rhaif yanked his arm back—only to have the grip tighten and trap him. He tried again, but the more he pulled, the more those fingers squeezed. Fearing he might end up with a crushed hand, he relented.
“What do you want?” he gasped at the figure.
The bronze grip grew warmer, the metal going strangely softer.
He gulped and searched around. He stared at the door through which he had hoped to escape. It looked an impossible distance away, especially anchored down by a bronze statue. Still, he knew it wouldn’t be long before the gongs of discovery would be ringing. He had to be gone before they let loose the pack of thylassaurs.
“Let go,” he pleaded. “I have to escape.”
With a wince, he tugged again, expecting a crush of bone. But the grip remained the same—only the response was much worse.
The bronze figure stirred on the cart. The waist bent, lifting her upright, though it took two attempts, requiring her to prop her other arm under her. The head rolled atop its shoulder, as if stretching a kink, and the drape of filamentous hairs shivered, falling loose like any woman’s coif.
Then eyes, framed by long delicate lashes, opened.
He cringed back, expecting to see into the fires of damnation. But instead he found eyes not unlike his own staring back at him, only glassier, with pupils of azure blue that seemed to glow faintly—though the last could be his panicked imagination. That gaze found him, flicking from his trapped hand to his face.
Her head cocked in plain curiosity. Her lips parted, showing a glimpse of bone-white teeth. Her other hand rose and touched those lips, her bronze brow wrinkling, as if sculpted of tanned flesh.
Rhaif noted the fingers clasped to him felt soft and warm.
What manner of daemon has animated this statue?
As much as he should be horrified, he could not look away as she continued to wake. Had she been feigning earlier, perhaps sensing the ill intent of those gathered around her? He knew of many beasts that would pretend to be dead to ward off predators. Or had she simply been building her strength, stoking the alchymies into a mightier fire to rouse her fully?
He could not know—but down deep, he suspected her stirring was meant for him alone. Her eyes continued to stare at him, as if appraising him.
As she did, her hand shifted from her lips and gently combed fingers through her bronze locks, which had taken on a darker sheen as if tarnished. Then with an arch of her back, which lifted her small breasts higher, she swung her legs from the cart to the floor.
He backed to the length of their two joined arms.
She stood, shakily at first. He stared down at her toes, inscribed with fine nails. She began to lose her balance, teetering and leaning toward him.
He tried to steady her, but her weight came close to dropping him to his knees. Despite her animated appearance, she remained as heavy as a statue. Still, he caught her arm with his free hand and helped keep her upright. It took all the strength in his legs and back.
“I got you,” he whispered.
She finally straightened, finding her ease.
He studied her countenance. Ages ago, he had visited the Holy Kath’dral in Anvil. Adorning its main nave, a towering stained-glass window displayed the pantheon of the gods. While the Mother Below had been depicted with a loving expression, the Daughter’s face was as hard as the glass, resolute and unforgiving. She carried a bow in hand and a quiver of arrows across her back. She was sometimes also called the Huntress.
Rhaif stared at the bronze figure, naked and unashamed. From visage to shape, it was as if the Daughter herself had been given form on Urth.
As wondrous as this all was, Rhaif recognized the press of time. He swallowed and tried again. “I must go.”
He headed toward the smaller door at the rear of the chamber, while trying to free his hand. She refused to let go. Instead, she followed his steps, keeping abreast of him.
Rhaif exhaled in relief.
Good enough for now.
He continued across the chamber, fearing she might stop at any moment and anchor him in place again. He sensed he needed to keep her moving, like a boulder rolling down a hill. Still, he did not hurry, lest she lose her balance. As he led her, her gaze swept the room, her face hard and unreadable.
He reached the door and found it unlocked. He hauled it open and got them both through into a small anteroom. The reek of blood and bowel struck his nose. Even the bronze woman recoiled.
To the left was a stone table with shackles. Blood pooled around it. On the floor, as if tossed aside, was a square of bone, flesh, and skin. Rhaif pictured the poor girl, the bloodbaerne sacrifice.
The bronze woman stepped toward the bloody remains, but Rhaif restrained her—or, considering how much she weighed, at least discouraged her. “No, there’s nothing we can do.”
A glance to the other side revealed a pile of discarded clothes: worn leather sandals, a shapeless beige shift, and an overcloak that looked more patches than cloth.
Must’ve belonged to the sacrificed girl.
Rhaif urged the bronze woman over to the pile. “You need to dress. Can’t have you traipsing around bare-assed to the world.”
He certainly couldn’t sneak off with a walking bronze statue next to him.
She cocked her head, her expression quizzical.
Gods, woman, must I do everything?
He pantomimed with one hand, and with some guidance, he got the shift over her head. Slowly, she grew to understand his intent. She let go of his hand long enough to drape the dress to her knees. She then bent down to the cloak and frowned a moment. Before he could tell her anything, she began to don it.
“Sandals, too,” he warned.
No one went barefooted in the territories, not across the ember-hot sands that could blister a sole in two steps. It was one of the reasons the overseers kept the prisoners shoeless, all the better to keep them from running. He stared over at the woman. While he didn’t know if such bronze could be damaged by the heat, the oddity of a woman strolling without protection across the scorch would draw unwanted attention.
Then Rhaif finally realized the truth. He looked down at his empty hands.
I’m free.
He glanced to the tunnel that exited the antechamber. He stepped in that direction as the woman struggled with the overcloak. If he ran now, he might get away. Escaping unseen would be far easier without such a mystery in tow.
Still, he closed his eyes with an exasperated sigh, knowing he must stay.
You are such a swink.
He opened his eyes and turned to her as she managed to secure the overcloak. He crossed over and pulled the cloak’s hood over her head, doing his best to hide her unnaturalness. He stared into her eyes, which in the shadows of the hood did indeed glow faintly. Her expression—like her bronze form—softened.
An arm rose. He expected her to grip him again, but she only passed the back of her hand across his cheek. The warmth melted into him. Then she lowered her arm and bent down to the discarded sandals.
He helped her don them, then gave her a final inspection. He eyed her up and down as she stood. “As long as no one looks too closely…” he muttered, then silently added, What am I thinking?
He shrugged and headed toward the tunnel.
He reached it just as a distant ringing echoed. With each breath, it grew louder, spreading throughout the mine.
The gongs.
He glanced back to the bronze countenance.
We’re too late.
R HAIF GAVE NO heed to caution. He had no time for a studious assessment of his route. He simply ran, only checking every now and again to see if the woman followed him. She kept pace. Her eyes glowed back at him from the shadow of her cloak’s hood. He read no panic in that gaze, which greatly irritated him.
Gods be, I should already be gone.
The clanging gongs chased him down the tunnel. He stuck to what appeared to be the main passageway. Side tunnels cut away, but they appeared smaller, more likely to winnow away to dead ends. Other chambers stood open or were barred shut. He ignored them all—though he was thief enough to wonder what treasures might be buried down in these Shriven halls.
The only promising sign was that the glassy black rock returned to white chalk veined through with dark brimstan. He also felt the tunnel steadily rising. The pressure in his ears eased with every hundred steps. The air turned drier with each panted breath.
Finally, the passageway leveled out and ran for some straight distance. Hoping for the best, he fled faster. He found the end of the tunnel sealed with a door. He ran up to it, his heart choking him with its hammering.
He feared the overseers had already locked this way down, as they would all the exits from the mine once the gongs sounded. Still, he prayed he was in time. He reached the door and tried the latch. It would not give. He fought it some more, but to no avail.
Already barred…
He leaned his head against the studded wood, accepting his cursed fate.
Then a hand shoved him aside. The bronze woman placed both palms against the door and pinioned her legs behind her. She braced her limbs, put her shoulder against the frame, and strained harder. Her feet ripped clean out of the leather sandals and dug into the chalk, gouging deep.
Rhaif backed away.
Gods be…
Metal groaned—whether door or woman, he could not say. Then came a booming splintering, and the door crashed open. Sunlight blasted into the dark tunnel.
Rhaif lifted a forearm against it but was still blinded. He stumbled out of the tunnel. “Hurry,” he urged the woman who had freed him.
They were far from safe.
As he hobbled into the open, he blinked away the glare, needing to get his bearings. Shouts rang out all around. The braying of oxen rose to the right. The pounding of raw ore under hammers was everywhere. Not far off, sifters and washers sang brightly at their slurries and cribles.
Within a few steps, Rhaif’s sight returned to reveal the chaos of topside. Past the mine’s many pit mouths, a whole village spread. A mix of tents, wooden stables, smithies, foundries, and whorehouses were all set amidst towering hills of mine tailings and waste gob. Ox-driven wagons worked their way through a maze of roads, the paths long ago rutted into the stone by the passing centuries. All about men and women labored: pumpmen, smelters, sorters, carpenters. Others straddled horses or rode hardy Aglerolarpok ponies—a rare sight so far east and said to be worth their weight in silver.
Rhaif glanced behind him to the open door and shattered wood. The entrance was well to the side of the village, far from the nearest pit mouth. No one seemed to have noted their arrival or heard the splintering blast.
Clearly this entrance was meant to be far from prying eyes.
All the better.
“This way,” he urged his companion.
He set off on a path to skirt around the village of Chalk. He wanted to keep those hills of barren ore between him and any eyes looking this way. He hurried but did his best not to look rushed or suspicious. He had a goal in mind and intended to reach it.
To his side, the woman slowed. Her face craned to the cloud-scudded sky and the blaze of the sun. She finally stopped, lifting her palms to the same.
He stepped back to her and scolded her, “No time for gaping about.”
She ignored him, standing still, seemingly returned to a statue. He was ready to abandon her, but she had broken him out of the mine. He also noticed that the shade of her bronze face had lightened under the sun, same with her palms, as if the sunlight were polishing her brighter. Or maybe it was the Father blessing her, imbuing her with His vital essence.
Then in the distance he heard a familiar howl.
He stiffened and ducked.
Thylassaurs.
He searched back toward the village, squinting at the main pit mouth. He saw a pair of overseers each lead out a trio of leashed thylassaurs. Anyone near fled backward, opening the sight farther. The overseers unshackled two of their oil-furred charges, keeping hold of the third.
The released pair shot out into the village. Each was a quarter the height of a horse and twice as long. Their sinuous, striped bodies snaked through the tents and structures. Their long tails swept the path behind them, casting a musk that wiped away all other scents except one.
Blood.
One—then another—arched onto their hindlimbs. Nostrils were shoved high, flaring with a pink star of fleshy, sensitive feelers. They waggled the air, testing scents. A howl followed. Then another. And another.
Rhaif knew what that meant.
The beasts had caught a whiff of their prey.
He reached over and grabbed a fistful of the bronze woman’s cloak. He tugged hard. “Enough! We must go!”
Her face turned from the skies. Her gaze found him, and she gave the barest nod. Together, the two set off across the sand and rock. Rhaif led the way around a hillock of waste ore, pounded and sifted of anything of value ages ago.
The howls of the thylassaurs pursued them, sounding to his ear as if they were drawing ever closer. He searched ahead as they rounded the mountain of broken rock. His ears strained, listening for any warning.
Please, don’t have left already.
As he continued, a faint singing wafted over to him from ahead, easily carried across the desert plains that stretched to all the horizons. Then he heard a heavy grind of iron wheels.
No, no, no, no…
He increased his pace, though it was likely already futile. He finally rounded the hill and a wide sandy stretch opened. Ahead, some quarter reach away, stretched a chained caravan. A dozen iron-strapped wooden wagons—each filled to the top with brimstan, chalk, and other metalliferous rock—sat atop huge iron wheels fixed to steel rails. The tracks started in the salt mines far to the south and stretched a hundred leagues north, all the way to Anvil. With the day ended, the caravan would make the long sojourn to the trading port, returning the next morning to be filled again.
Rhaif watched the caravan roll along the outskirts of Chalk.
At the front, a pair of giant sandcrabs flanked the tracks, tethered by chains to the lead of the caravan. The black armored beasts were twice the size of the wagons they pulled. The creatures’ eight jointed legs ended in spikes that dug into sand and rock. The front pair normally bore scythe-like claws, but those pincers had been clipped long ago when the crabs had been captured in the broken wastes of the deep desert. The two beasts dragged the dozen wains of the caravan behind them. When truly moving, they could outrun the fastest horse across the desert. But for now, the pair started slow, fighting the stubborn wagons from their standstill. It would not take long before that changed.
Seated on the front wagon, the pair’s driver—who had been bonded to them long ago—sang them into motion, encouraging them, coaxing them. Unlike the imprisoned miners, they required no whips or cudgels to get them moving. Instead, the lilting strands of the driver’s song penetrated their armor and played across their brains. Rhaif did not understand, and he wagered few did. Such a talent was rare and growing even rarer. Such drivers could command a steep price for their service.
Despite the futility, Rhaif chased after the moving caravan. Maybe it might stop, maybe a load needed to be shifted and balanced better. But more than anything he ran as more howls rose along the trail behind him.
He dared not even look over his shoulder as he cleared the hillock and raced across the open sand.
Instead of slowing, the line of the caravan was gaining speed.
Still, he ran—then movement drew his eyes to the right. A lone thylassaur rounded the far side of the rock mound and raced to ambush him. Its sinuous form ran low, arrowing straight at him. From its frothing muzzle, a glint of fangs showed. It would not kill him—that would be too kind an end. Instead, the thylassaurs had been trained to bring down an escaped prisoner, often ripping the back tendons of their legs.
From there, it was straight to the spikes for such a crime, where death would come much more slowly. Many died not from the impalement, but from the flocks of carrion birds and blister-ants scavenging on them, picking them apart with razor-sharp beaks and fiery jaws, while the sufferer screamed and writhed in agony.
Despite the threat, Rhaif found his legs slowing, too exhausted and weak after so much time in the mines. Even terror-stoked fires eventually sputtered and died out.
Then a hard blow struck him across his back and knocked him forward.
Thylassaur…
He sprawled headfirst toward the sand, expecting to feel teeth rip into flesh. Instead, an arm hooked around his waist and kept him upright. It hadn’t been the thylassaur attacking him. He turned to the bronze woman. She hiked him up, until only his toes still touched, dragging across the sand.
“What’re you—”
Then she sped faster, her legs pounding, her toes digging deep. She fled across the sand like a storm-blown dustwhip across the desert. He found his legs trying to match her pace, his feet scrabbling uselessly as the ground flew underfoot.
She sped past the lone thylassaur, who tried to give chase but was swiftly left in the breath of her dust. It howled its frustration after them, echoed by the others.
Ahead, the last wagon of the caravan grew before them.
She chased after it, but even her considerable pace was not enough. With the last wagon only a few dozen steps away, the caravan gained more speed. The wain began to pull away.
So close…
Then Rhaif’s stomach lurched as she leaped high, bounding like a desert hare from the poisonous strike of an adder. She sailed across the last of the distance and hit the wagon’s rear with a jolting impact. He would’ve been knocked loose, if not for her kidney-bruising grip. Her other hand latched on to the wagon’s top frame.
She did her best to push him upward, almost dropping him, but he caught hold and scurried into the wagon. Once on top of the ore pile, he sprawled on his back, spent and exhausted, oblivious to the shards poking and cutting. He didn’t care. Right now, it was the most comfortable bed in the world.
She climbed up and settled next to him on her knees. She cast her gaze back toward Chalk.
“It’s all right, lass,” he gasped. “They can’t catch us now.”
He didn’t even bother looking for any sign of pursuit. He felt the trundling wheels of the caravan roll ever faster. Few creatures were faster than a sandcrab. They could even outrace a skrycrow. At such speeds, the caravan would reach Anvil long before any message could be sent. And once there, he could quickly lose himself in the tumult and chaos of the port. Maybe even take a ship abroad if need be.
“We’re safe,” he sighed out, assuring the woman and himself.
He patted her thigh, again noting the strange pliancy of her bronze, as if it were merely tanned flesh.
She ignored him. Her gaze aimed skyward, but not toward the sun. She stared toward the low horizon, where a half-moon sat. He remembered his earlier assessment of her, how her countenance reminded him of the Huntress. Both the dark Daughter and silvery Son made their home in the moon. It was said the two continually chased one another, round and round, leading to the moon’s waxing and waning. But such a chase remained a great phylosophical argument. Did the Daughter pursue the Son? Or was it the other way around? Wars had been fought over such a religious quandary.
But at this moment, he couldn’t care less.
I’m free…
He laughed up at the sky.
It seemed impossible. Joy swelled through him, calming his hammering heart and breathless panting. He finally sat up. He stared as the caravan crossed over a sea of black glass, where the sands had been fused by some fiery cataclysm. The reflection of the sun off its surface was blinding.
At the same time, the day’s heat grew steadily. He searched around him. They needed to get out of the direct sun—or at least, he did. He considered how best to dig a shelter in the broken rock.
Seems my mining duties are not yet over.
Despite the burn of the sun, he returned his attention to the mystery kneeling beside him. What exactly had he stolen from the Shriven? What manner of spirit was trapped in that bronze? He recalled the archsheriff mentioning a coming war, how such a creature could turn the tide. Rhaif now understood. Any army led by such a miracle—or, for that matter, a legion of the same—would be unstoppable.
Still, he sensed such an abuse of her would be wrong.
It was not her nature.
He tried to read her face as she stared at the moon. Her features were now sculpted in an expression of sorrow, as if mourning a great loss. He reached again to her, then lowered his arm. He owed her, this spirit who had bought him his freedom, who saved his life. He wanted to ask her how he could repay such a debt, but he feared she could not speak. Or maybe she simply needed more time to fully settle her spirit into the bronze. Either way, there was nothing he could say.
In their shared silence, she continued to look at the moon. As the caravan continued its course north, Rhaif settled back. A lethargy spread through him after the day’s many terrors. He listened to the driver’s song trailing back to them, to the steady rumble of wheels. He knew he should get started on that shelter, but his eyelids grew heavy and drooped closed.
After a time, a low moan rose from beside him, stirring him back awake. He turned and looked at the woman, her gaze still on the horizon. He could not say if the sound was a mournful exhalation or her first attempt to speak.
Still, Rhaif’s skin pebbled with cold bumps.
Her lips parted again, and the sound firmed around a single word, whispered to the moon.
“Doom…”