16. N #4
That helped, but only a little. Her belly grumbled a bit, not really filled, but now it did have something to work on.
If it was intelligent, then could she communicate with it?
Talk to it? She realized she had been talking to it, carrying on long one-sided chats as she had tried to keep her mind busy.
Rock now knew all there was to know about culling slaves, training gladiators, selecting horses, dodging the attentions and occasional affections of matrimonially determined elven lords,
and the sequence of stupid mistakes and casual arrogances that had led her out of the cooking pan and into this particular fire.
She wondered now whether more cooperation, a dollop of humility, and possibly a soup?on of collaboration might have taken her down a different path.
Haldeen had plans for her world, that much seemed true, and a more careful, more clever Triana might have harnessed that, made a deal.
Why go to the trouble of conquest when you can come in, turn the tide in the war with the human slaves, put the slaves back in their place, and be welcomed as the new er-Lords?
I’ll help you, and in return … well, I can help you navigate the petty jealousies, well-nursed grudges, paybacks, and wary alliances of convenience.
Or perhaps … well it really depended on how those pestiferous humans reacted, but …
. My cousin sided with them. Others have too.
Maybe it would have been smart to suggest that the Lords here throw in behind the human faction …
. Use them as stalking horses, expended to exhaust the elven lords.
Two birds. One throw. The human vermin and the elven lords are both depleted, and Haldeen’s people take over …
with a nice reward for the woman who made it all possible.
Then she laughed, and gave the whole fantasy up as a bad idea.
She had seen the weapons Haldeen’s people had used on the first day she had arrived, the metal monsters spitting fire as the dragons were rumored to do, and casting flaming shot from some kind of engine.
To Haldeen’s people, hers were little different than the human vermin.
Haldeen made it clear how much he held her and her people in contempt, and she could not imagine the others felt any differently.
So there was not a chance in a million that the kings here would decide to ally with her folk against the humans and their allies.
Given that the Lords and er-Lords of her world were arrogant and convinced of their own superiority, why should these Lords be any different?
After all, her people had fled from this lot at least in part because of how they had been treated.
She let those thoughts chase each other around as she fed Rock, and gathered the ash that bought her dinner.
She hadn’t quite worked out whether they needed the ash for some other purpose, or if it was just a measure of work that she had completed.
I’ll need to ask his Pisswater Haldeen, the next time I get the chance.
And smiled mirthlessly. After the last encounter, she very much doubted there would ever be a need pressing enough to make him force himself to deal with her.
She entertained herself with improbable methods of escape and payback …
escaping the cell, overpowering the guards, making it to the Gateroom, taking Haldeen hostage, and forcing him to make the Gate work, so that she could get home.
She took out different parts of her fantasy, and worked at them, trying to work them into something that was less fantastic-tale and more escape plan.
She recognized the effort seemed futile now, but she had nothing else to do, and in time, they might slip up.
She remembered her father talking about one of his enemies …
. “He has to get it right every time, Triana. We only have to get it right once.”
Better to have a half-baked and wildly optimistic plan in case the moment came, rather than to miss the chance through indecision.
She heard the stable doors open. She had nearly gotten the bucket filled, enough for the ash to rise up over the rim, but not quite enough for it to be mounded up enough to survive the settling.
She felt nearly faint with hunger, and cursed herself for her slow work.
She had let herself drift, and now wouldn’t eat.
She tried not to cry as he approached the cell.
It was the taller of two, Gelbert. She looked for the shorter one, with the voice full of gravel. “Just you?” She tried to keep her eyes away from the canvas satchel that he set down by her feet. Her next meal.
“Yeah,” he replied. “Smiley is down sick. Got breakbone fever.” He shrugged. “Had it as a child, I think, or he’d be dying. As it is, he’s just wishing he were dead.”
“Breakbone?” she replied, softly, trying not to stare at the bag with the food.
She noticed he hadn’t asked her to stand on the step.
She started to worry. Two guards. One to watch Rock, and one to enter the cell.
The Watcher with his rod, ready to drop her if she so much as moved from the step.
One guard … would that mean no food? She felt weak and famished. Her right knee shook of its own accord.
“Yes,” he replied, ”breakbone fever. Looked like you were sick with it. You must have gotten it as a child, and had a mild case, or we’d be shoveling you into the latrine hole.” He stood well outside the bars, outside dagger throwing range … not that she had one to throw.
“No,” she replied. “I’ve never been sick before, until I got that child’s disease upstairs … shortly after I first came here.”
He laughed dryly, more cough than mirth.
“Get it as a child, and it’s bad, but nothing like what it does to adults. Called breakbone … your muscles seize up. Usually not to where it literally breaks the bones, but close enough, and it sure as hell feels like all your bones are breaking. It’s the fever that gets you. Broils your brain.
If it was your first time, then by all rights, you should be dead. It takes two-thirds of adults that it sicks, and the rest aren’t doing anything except lying weak and still for days. You were down with it a day, maybe less, and now back on your feet.”
He shrugged. “You ain’t dead. So, you had it before, and this is a mild case.”
She shrugged. “I’d never been sick before I came here. Not ever. Maybe I’m just good at healing?”
He looked skeptical. “Maybe. I can’t explain it.” He paused. “They did tell me you were a nutter. That you think you’re a princess in some airy-fairy land. Head full of dreams that never happened, and too far gone for the physicians. So, who’s to say what might be real to you?”
“I see,” she said. She worked that around in her head, trying to think of a response, when her stomach rumbled, loud enough for him to clearly hear it. He chuckled. She looked at the bucket. Almost, but not quite full enough. He followed her gaze, took a deep breath, and looked at her.
“The rules are the rules,” he said, “but given the circumstances.”
He opened his satchel and took out the covered bowl.
She couldn’t have wanted it more if it had been the sweetest ambrosia.
He stood for a moment, thinking, then chuckled again.
“Pile the dirty bowl next to the door, where I can open it without entering. Assume the position. You know the drill.”
She went and walked to the step, passing Rock. She saw him shift slightly, turning a bit, to keep his body between the guard and the rod she had removed. Rock can “see” Gelbert somehow, and knows to hide where the rod was removed. Intelligent. She stored that thought away.
She stepped up onto the first step, faced away, and put her hands behind her head.
She heard the cage door open, and the scrape as he removed the bowl.
She heard the satchel open and the soft clink as he set the porcelain down on the floor.
She felt faint, and wanted the food so badly that she could barely stay in place.
The cell door closed, followed by the double clang of the lock closing.
She fought to keep her voice steady, and heard the tremble.
“May I turn?”
“Yes,” he replied, “I’m clear.”
She turned, her eyes locking on the bowl. His eyes followed hers.
“I’ll go, so you can eat.”
Once he moved away, she abandoned any pretense of dignity. She ran to the bowl and wolfed down the gruel. It was not enough, it was never enough, but at least for a few minutes, she felt full.
She heard the stable door close. Gelbert departed, leaving her alone with Rock, and her thoughts.