Chapter 8
Eight
Elaine
Iscraped the thin layer of salt crystals from the bottom of the metal tray that I’d scavenged from a trash pile on the beach two days ago.
Timur had accompanied me on that rare outing that we had made at noon, when the sun was at its zenith and most fae hid inside their caves or their beach shelters.
Timur held his hood with his skeletal hand, making sure his skin remained in the shade.
Apparently, the sun didn’t affect the parts of him that were bone—a small blessing that came from his terrible affliction.
Trash piles were in abundance at Ashgate, scattered all along the beach as far as the eye could see.
Sadly, most had been rummaged through many times already and now contained few if any things of value.
In the rubble of chipped stones, weathered bones, and rotten seaweed, I managed to find a tin tray, a flat piece of wood the size of a ruler, and a big shell that I could use as a container to collect my salt.
“I can buy you a tray and whatever else you need,” Timur rumbled from under his shroud as I scrubbed my treasures clean in the ocean surf.
I knew he would. He’d never said no to anything I’d asked for so far. Only I never asked for much, dead serious about saving every coin we made.
“I don’t really need these,” I said, “not enough to waste money on them. I just want to try something to see if it works.”
In the past week, Timur had managed to find enough clients to arrange for dinner every second night.
Sadly, there was nothing for me to do between the dinners but hide in our shack.
I slept for hours, washed my clothes, and had a sponge bath with the soap he bought for me, and I still had many long, boring hours of nothing to do in between.
Through Timur, I knew that no more Joy Vessels arrived to Ashgate after us.
It both worried me and filled me with hope.
I didn’t know what happened to Ciana or where she was now, but I hoped it was a better place than Ashgate.
Maybe the royal guards arrested the traders and brought Ciana to Kalmena or Teneris.
In a royal sarai she’d be safe until I made enough to buy my freedom.
Then, I’d figure out how to find and free her too.
After our scavenging, I’d filled the tray with the briny sea water, and left it on the roof of our shack for two days, until the water had evaporated in the sun, leaving the sparkling salt behind. It wasn’t much, but it filled about one third of my sea shell container.
On the nights when we weren’t selling my joy for food, Timur bought me rice packed with boiled seaweed.
That was the best this city had to offer with other options being raw fish or various uncooked sea creatures.
I loved sushi, but sucking raw mollusks from their shells or pulling gelatinous strings of meat out of the crustacean’s limbs wasn’t the same.
We couldn’t have a fire out of fear that it’d attract unwanted attention because shadow fae didn’t normally cook for themselves, at least not on the Ashgate Beach.
Most of those who lived on the beach ate raw fish they caught in the ocean or dug mollusks from the sand during the low tide.
Those who had money to spend bought rice packs from the merchants in the ground-level caves.
But regardless of what they ate, they ate it absolutely unsalted.
I doubted that even salt could improve those packs of flavorless rice and boiled seaweed, but I hoped it’d make them a little easier to swallow. At least until we had enough clients for me to have a proper dinner every night.
That was the reason Timur left every night around midnight. He met with his contacts from Kalmena at the end of the shadow tunnel in the desert above the city. Together, they figured out the schedule and confirmed appointments.
When he returned, he usually updated me, then took a quick nap in his chair that he positioned between the trunk with his weapons and the locked door, only to leave again before midday like he did today.
Whenever possible, Timur preferred to run his errands in the city while I slept during the day. He hoped that most of the Ashgate’s population would be asleep at that time too, though he slept little himself.
Somehow, Timur managed to get enough rest to function by taking a series of random naps at all hours of night or day.
But those never seemed particularly restful.
He’d groan and grind his teeth in his sleep, often jerking awake as if from a nightmare.
Thankfully, there hadn't been any more of those terrifying screaming episodes again.
Between all his absences, Timur didn’t spend much time with me, but I’d gotten used to his quiet presence enough to feel like something was amiss when he was gone.
I knew better than to complain, of course.
Timur left to find people who would pay for the privilege to feed me.
And without those people, there’d be no money, no freedom, and no future for either of us.
I often felt on edge in Timur’s absence. For better or for worse, he was my one and only protector in this city. As I scraped the salt and collected it into the shell, I listened for any sound from outside.
It was afternoon now, with the sun shining brightly in the sky.
Inside our windowless dwelling, however, it always looked like twilight.
A faint green glow shone from Timur’s bracer attached to the inside of the door.
He took the second bracer with him. The magic between the two kept the doors locked.
I could leave anytime by removing the bracer from the door if I had to.
However, no one could come in here, only Timur.
Of course, if anyone really wanted to get into our shack, the bracer wouldn’t stop them from knocking the walls down. Timur and I never spoke about that, but I was sure he knew it and that was why he insisted I stay quiet and keep my existence a secret from our neighbors.
As I put away the empty tray, a sudden scream pierced the air. I froze with my hands suspended in the air.
More screams came from the outside. Yelling in many voices. Howls of pain and sounds of fighting. They seemed to be coming from somewhere above. From the Wall?
With my sandals padding softly on the packed sand, I quietly creeped to the door, then peeked through one of the many cracks in the wood.
The direct daylight blinded me, making me blink. I couldn’t see much without my glasses anyway. The Wall rose like a shroud of darkness some distance away from our shack.
I squinted, peering at the cliff face while trying to make out the caves and any shadows that might be moving between them. But it was no use. Without my glasses, I couldn’t see anything from this distance.
A blood-curdling scream rushed from above. Then something dark and heavy dropped onto the black beach. I thought it was an object—a sack of grain, a carpet roll, a piece of furniture maybe. Then the object groaned and screamed in pain.
It was a person!
Dark, thick blood poured from his shoulder where the man was missing an arm.
How did he fall?
More shouting came from above, then another dark shape plummeted to the ground next to the first. I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman. They tried to get up but dropped as if being cut down, screaming and rolling on the ground with their legs clearly broken.
Several people rushed to the injured along the beach. I hoped they came to help. But one of the newcomers kicked the injured man in his side. Bending over, the looter snatched a knife from the person on the ground, then quickly went through their pockets.
A dark shadow moved across my field of vision. This one was close, right in front of my door. Fear slammed into me like a fist.
I leaped away from the door, grabbing my tray and ready to strike the first person who’d come crashing through the wall.
The bracer on the door moved quietly. The door opened, and Timur rolled inside in his chair.
“Timur…” I exhaled, my limbs going weak with relief.
Still clutching the tray in one hand, I rushed to him and climbed onto his lap.
I pressed myself to him, wishing I could crawl under his cloak and hide from this world and all its sufferings.
I didn’t think, I simply sensed that he was the safest place in the whole of Ashgate.
I gathered my legs under me and hid my face in his neck.
“Shh, my sweet,” he murmured.
His warm breath washed over the side of my face. The bones of his right arm pressed around my middle in a hug while his left arm glided soothingly down my back.
The shouts and fighting outside didn’t stop. Another thud of a body hitting the beach made me shudder.
“What’s happening out there?” I wanted to close my ears with my hands, then realized I still held the tray.
“Evictions.” Timur said, calmly taking the tray from me and setting it on top of the trunk by the wall.
The heartbreaking screams of pain outside cut my hearing again and again.
My throat tightened from compassion for those who were literally tossed out of their homes, and my stomach hollowed in fear.
Instead of pressing my hands to my ears, however, I wrapped my arms around Timur’s neck, holding on to him as if he were my lifesaver in the stormy ocean.
“They’re killing them,” I said in a shaky whisper.
Resting the side of his chin on the top of my head, he kept stroking my back soothingly.
“They’re vacating the caves that their inhabitants couldn’t pay for,” he explained.
It wasn’t easy to kill a fae. As high as the Wall was, they didn’t die from falling off it. Those tossed from the highest floor, however, certainly ended up with broken bones.
“A man had his arm cut off,” I remembered with horror.