Chapter 1 #2
I gnaw on what’s left, snapping the bird carcass into smaller pieces and sucking on the splinters until there’s nothing but sharp bits that I can’t possibly eat. I know. I’ve tried. The others here do similar.
I cast the pieces aside, ignoring the unlucky ones who skitter forward to steal them. I go to the river and drink, keeping my eyes open in case one of the others is angry that I got the chicken.
Survive.
But no one bothers me. Most are wary. Maybe they’ve noticed the accidents that happen when I’m around. Maybe it’s because I’ve killed here more than once.
There was a male. Days go, I think. He caught me when the overseers weren’t looking. Pushed me against a wall and held me there while he fumbled with his breeches.
We were close to one of the shafts, so I pretended to submit, and when the fool lowered his guard, I pushed him.
He teetered on the edge for a moment longer than I thought he would before he was swallowed by the darkness.
None of the overseers noticed, not that they’d have done anything but watched if they had.
I gulp from the river until my belly is full, and then I drink some more.
I wash the new cuts and scrapes I received today, as well as my older injuries. There’s a deep and oozing gash on my side with red lines beginning to radiate out from it that I know means fever and weakness will follow. That means death a hundred ways here.
Survive.
So, I wade into the river a bit deeper, as I have done before, and I reach for the bottom to find the purple algae I know grows amongst the bigger stones. I pull a wad up and push it into my mouth, grimacing at the bitterness and making absolutely sure that I don’t swallow any.
One of the males is watching me from the other side.
He makes no move toward me though. Those who try to get across the river are killed by the guards watching from the holes in the ceiling if they don’t drown in the deeper water first, which is why I stay close to the bank when I need to do this.
Don’t want to catch an arrow because some flea-bitten goblin made a mistake.
The man tilts his head at me, clearly wondering what I’m doing. I ignore him as I chew the slimy plant, letting the juices that leak from it run down my chin until it’s a rough texture and the color of violets.
I smell it, making doubly sure it’s the right plant, and when I get the earthy, bloody scent I want, I cover the deep cut with it, pushing it in and letting it sting.
One of the women who’s sitting by the bank, sucking marrow from a thick bone, gestures toward the river at me with her head.
‘Why?’ she asks, her voice low and gravelly, likely from not being used for a while.
I tap the plant in the cut. ‘Stops fever.’
I’m surprised to find that my voice sounds the same as hers. When was the last time I used it? I can’t remember.
‘How—’ She chokes, then clears her throat and swallows, trying again. ‘How do you know this?’
I blink at her, trying to recall. It must have been something I learned from The Barrack’s healer, but trying to remember is like wading through thick mud.
I stop.
‘Another life,’ I rasp.
She nods and her eyes scan the bank across the river. The male who was watching me is on his hands and knees, gagging. He coughs loudly. It echoes through the cavern. He spits out the algae and then blood sprays from his mouth over the stone in front of him. He collapses on the bank, unmoving.
‘Don’t eat it,’ I mutter.
The woman’s lips split wide and she cackles loudly before going back to her marrow bone and watching the male across the river dying with obvious glee.
I walk slowly to the wall, keeping my eye on the others, not looking at the male side again.
The danger will come from my fellow women.
But no one moves toward me.
When the other fighting slaves around me begin to give in to sleep, I stay awake a little longer, just to make sure no one’s been plotting. Only then do I close my eyes as well.
I dream of laughter, of smiles, of men whose faces I can almost see, and of pleasure that only exists deep in my slumber.
MORGAN
Spring has finally come. I open the casement at the back of the cottage I share with the others in the free human village of Halsford and breathe in the warm air. It always takes longer to feel the seasons change up here in the Ranges.
Jak will already be in the healer’s rooms just off the apothecary shop on the main road, so I’m alone but I have nowhere to be just yet.
I meander around my chamber and the main rooms, feeding the glowing embers left from last night’s fire with some kindling and finding the old, faded tunic I wear when I’m helping with the cottage building.
I wash, dress, and grab the dark, earthenware teapot from the table, spooning some of the loose leaves into the bottom. I put some more wood on the fire and pick up the copper kettle, putting it on the hook, swinging it over the flames.
I pause, staring down at it, getting the oddest feeling that this has happened before. The wood on the fire, swinging the kettle beneath, and making tea. I do this every day, I reason. Of course it’s familiar.
But when I look at the table, I get the sensation that there were two cups, not just the one there is at the moment, and it wasn’t here in my cottage at all.
I’m not sure how long I stand there, staring at the table, but the kettle begins to whistle loudly. I come back to myself with a start, taking up the long pincers and pulling the kettle out from the hearth. I grab the handle with a tea towel and fill the teapot quickly.
I hear familiar steps coming up to the stoop.
‘Tea?’ I call, already knowing it’ll be Jak.
He pushes open the door and enters.
‘Morning,’ he says, brightly. ‘Aye, if there’s enough.’
I give him a nod and take a second, finely finished cup from the shelf. I put it beside mine.
I get that feeling again. Two cups. A sunny window. Plaiting long, dark hair, and finishing it with a leather tie.
‘Are you alright?’
I look up. Jak is frowning.
‘Yes, of course,’ I murmur, but I can’t shake the sensation, and it’s morphing quickly into a feeling of abject dread.
‘Do you sometimes get a notion that…’ I trail off, not sure what to say, not sure what Jak will think.
I don’t need him going to the others with tales of Mount Morgan’s mind fraying at the edges.
But when I glance over at him, his expression isn’t of confusion or concern for me.
‘That we’ve forgotten something?’ he asks very quietly.
I nod. ‘Something very important.’
He’s uncharacteristically grim as he looks down at his cup. ‘I get flashes sometimes. Since we got back.’
‘And I,’ I admit. ‘I remember the mission, I recall the Dark Realms, taking Soreno and Tori to be sold.’
‘And Locke urging me to return,’ Jak says, nodding. ‘Telling me the mission was almost finished and there was nothing more that was needed from me.’
‘He said the same to me,’ I murmur, staring into my dark, swirling tea as if it has the answers I seek, frowning as I wrack my brain.
But I come up with nothing.
‘You don’t think…’ Jak’s words stall, and he searches my face. ‘You don’t think some conjurer…’
I voice the thought aloud. ‘Worked some magick upon us?’
He snorts. ‘I know. It’s a silly fear. They couldn’t have. Not without us knowing.’
I raise a brow at him, not so sure, and he looks uncertain.
‘I suppose there’s no way of finding out for sure. Locke hasn’t returned yet, has he?’ he asks.
‘No, but he isn’t the only one who could tell us,’ I say, standing abruptly and almost hitting the top of my head on the thick beam that runs the length of the cottage ceiling.
I tip my tea down my throat, ignoring the burn as it scalds my tongue.
‘Come on.’
‘Where to?’ Jak asks, but he stands as well.
He brings the cup with him instead of gulping it and I give him a narrow-eyed look.
‘That better find its way back to our shelf,’ I warn, ‘or you’ll be paying Nora to make us another.’
He rolls his eyes. ‘I’ll not lose it,’ he promises.
We make our way down the main thoroughfare, still somewhat boggy from the recent winter thaw, past the other cottages, the grain store, smithy, butcher, apothecary, Trading Post, and baker to a larger building, the hall where the village’s council presides.
It’s still quite early, so there aren’t many up yet, which I’m glad of.
I usually try to ignore the stares and the people who practically leap out of my way when it’s livelier, but it’s difficult.
I’ve lived in Halsford since it was barely one small hall and a couple of houses.
But memories here are long, and more than one resident knows my name, or perhaps, even saw me in a black fight while they were enslaved.
Then, of course, there’s what happened two years ago.
Nothing’s been the same since before the fire.
I’m tolerated here now, but not much more than that.
We arrive at Halsford’s Village Hall. So far, half the building has been converted to stone from its original timber, with the rest to be completed over the next few weeks.
I peer up at the remaining charred beams with a builder’s eye, noting that they’re still strong enough to support the roof for another winter at least.
I rap on the front door, Jak waiting just behind me looking a little puzzled.
It opens a moment later and a human woman pokes her head out.
‘Bit early to speak to the magistrate, isn’t it?’ she asks.
‘Lia.’ Jak smiles warmly in surprise when he sees her, stepping forward.
‘Jak! I didn’t realize you were back. When did you return?’ she asks.
‘About a week or so ago,’ he says a bit noncommittally and I wonder if, like me, he doesn’t quite remember the specifics.
Then he grins and embraces her. ‘I didn’t know you’d returned from the Underhill either.’
She looks surprised, freezing for a moment when he touches her, but then shakes her head and her arm snakes around his back.
‘Gods, Jak. There are few besides you who will brave the Harbinger’s wrath simply to give me a hug,’ she laughs.