Chapter 69 Samson
SAMSON
“Come home,” his mother says. “Come home, for my eyesight grows weak.” But the son of sea marches on to his deadly purpose.
—from A Lament of Seshar: A People’s History
Samson drooped, his bones heavy, his mind fogged from the drugs they had pumped into him. Cold, biting air slid across his hands, his wrists. There was something familiar about it, something familiar about the smell of pine and earth and…
He woke to the icy shock of water. Samson sputtered, coughing, but then the guard threw another bucket. The water slapped his face, hard like cement. Samson crashed back against the wall.
“All right, he’s clean now,” the guard shouted.
An officer marched in, but as he drew closer, his nose wrinkled.
“Mountains, he still smells like shit.”
“Don’t get too close, he’ll bite,” the guard laughed.
“Oh, I don’t think so.” The officer studied Samson. A smile cut across his face. “Look at him.”
Samson slid farther down the wall to edge away from their gazes. Shame and anger roiled through him. He felt small, powerless. Water dripped down his naked chest, his thighs. Blood still ringed his wrists and ankles, and his teeth chattered.
Look away, he wanted to shriek.
The guard chortled. “No fight left.”
The officer unhooked the chain and tugged forcefully. Samson stumbled. He landed on his right knee, biting his tongue and letting out a muffled cry.
The guard sniffed. “Can’t even walk straight.”
“Up,” the officer snarled. He kicked Samson in the shin, hard.
Samson crawled onto his hands and knees, but he did not get up.
“Useless.” The officer yanked the chain, sliding Samson’s arms out from under him.
He hit the stone floor. It was slimy and cold, dirt caked into the grout. The texture was revolting, and Samson had the urge to scrub himself until his skin was raw, but he did not move.
He knew it was useless protesting, useless to fight. But still. He would rather die than follow a Jantari’s orders ever again.
The officer hauled Samson up and roughly pushed him against the wall. He was shorter than Samson, but wider, with hands that dwarfed the large coconuts found on Seshar.
“Now listen, islander,” he hissed. “You will walk. Or I will drag you face-first through your own dirt and piss. Either way, you’re coming.”
Samson closed his eyes, wavering. He wanted to annoy the officer, petty as it may be.
Even now, irritation settled on the officer’s face, deepening his scowl.
He’s going to hit me, Samson thought dully.
And yet, Samson was not afraid of the blow.
The officer’s irritation gave him satisfaction.
However small. It was the only victory he could manage.
The punch nearly took him out.
The officer hit the bruise on his chest, and Samson gasped. His head knocked against the wall, white spots searing across his vision. Skies above, it hurt.
“Now move,” the officer growled.
This time, when he pulled, Samson followed.
A plain black uniform was laid out on a bench outside the cell. The officer ordered him to put it on. Samson donned it wordlessly, holding out his hands as the officer undid the cuffs to slip on the sleeves. When the cuffs unlocked, Samson did not try to charge or even to run.
What was the use, when all he had left, all the people he had loved, were gone?
“This way.”
They went down a stone corridor that smelled of old, dried blood and musty sweat.
A few cells held remainders of their past occupants.
Samson spotted a torn patch of fabric, possibly from a jacket.
An orange splotch, hastily scrubbed, adorned the floor of another. In one corner, he found a decaying toe.
The tunnel began to veer upward. Guards stood before a metal door, and faintly, Samson heard the clink of metal and the rumbling of earth beyond it.
“Officer Ren,” a guard said with a salute. His lips twitched into a scowl as he looked at Samson. “Islander.”
“We’re to take the islander to Rhea’s Chamber and wait for the king,” Ren said.
“But, sir, the chamber isn’t fully stabilized—”
“It’s the king’s wish,” Ren said, his voice edged, and the guard shut up quickly. He opened the door. A cold, sudden draft whipped past them, and Samson felt a low moan reverberate through his bones.
It was only then that he registered where he was going. The mines. Great Serpent, they were taking him back. Fear, true fear, leapt through Samson. It zipped up his spine, metallic and harsh.
“No,” he croaked.
It was the first time he had spoken.
The officer turned. “What?”
Samson shook his head, the effort itself making him dizzy. “I won’t go.”
At this, Ren laughed. “Oh, you will.”
He pulled, but Samson locked his legs, surprising himself. He did not know where this strength came from. Maybe it was panic, desperation. He tugged back, eyes wide.
“I won’t go,” he repeated, voice high.
But Ren yanked him forward. He kicked, floundering, and Ren slapped him across the face.
His neck whipped to the side as pain exploded down his cheek. Samson stumbled, and then Ren wrenched his face toward him, his breath hot and rancid across his burning cheek.
“Remember. I will fucking drag you.”
The bastards had brought him to his mine.
He saw the silver serpent snaking down the gates. Recognized the milky-white stalactites hanging above the tall cavern. From the tunnel on his right, he could hear the echo of machines, the shouts of men, the ringing of tools.
And beneath it all, he heard the whisper.
It was like a stream that ran beneath the stones, everywhere all at once.
How many suns had his men spent mining for Farin while trying to find the source of that voice?
Power lay beneath this mountain. He had sought it for so long as a free man.
It was with a sick sense of irony, then, or fate perhaps, that they would lead him back here now, chained and broken.
Ren and a soldier led him through a tunnel he did not recognize, the muffled shrill of drills and the thump of hammers growing louder.
He did not remember his men ever mining this area.
They had kept it untouched, instead mining up north while secretly exploring passageways that dove deeper into the mountain.
But the thrumming beneath his feet was unmistakable. The Jantari had found his secret.
The walls hunkered closer. The shadows slunk down, latching around his ankles and pulling him forward with cruel delight.
They grew bolder the deeper they went. Licking his face, his hands, his feet.
Encroaching on his vision. Samson trembled, his breaths short and panicked.
His eyelids felt hot, feverish, and he tried to touch his face, to somehow open his mouth and shove air into his chest because, skies above, he could not breathe—
He crashed to his knees, gasping. Ahead, the Jantari soldiers turned. He tried to call out for help, to tell them he could not breathe, but Ren simply grabbed him and threw him over his shoulder. Samson struggled, but Ren marched on without pause into the access shaft.
They dropped, fast. Samson whimpered as the sound of machinery grew closer. When the platform abruptly stopped and the doors opened, it hit him full blast.
The screech of drills, the sharp barks of overseers, the tired grunts of laborers. Samson tried to twist out of Ren’s grasp, but the officer held him tight. The indignity and hot shame of being lifted and carried like a sandbag knifed through his gut. He still had his pride, damn it.
Ren dropped him suddenly, and he landed on his hip. Samson hissed in pain. By the time he regained his bearings, he realized the mine had fallen silent, save for the whispery drip of water.
Butcher, it crooned.
Through bleary eyes, Samson saw his brethren. The miners had stopped working and were staring at him, some surprised, others troubled, a few already retreating in horror. He could not tell who was more crushed.
Him, realizing that he had returned to this place of terror.
Or the Sesharians, realizing with shock that their hero, their tormentor, was trapped just like them.
Samson saw their hope perish in their eyes.
And he hated himself even more for it.
“Samson Kytuu has returned to die,” Ren called out. “So. Let’s give him a warm welcome home.”
Samson could not bear to meet their eyes, but he could feel their weight. Their disappointment.
Ren paraded him past. Samson tried to hold his head high, to look brave, but their gazes hooked into him, peeled him apart.
One Sesharian caught his attention, then quickly looked away.
They could do nothing to help him, and neither could he do anything for them.
An acidic lump rose in his throat. He tried to call his Agni, to save whatever shred of dignity he had left, but the iron bonds tightened around his wrists, cutting off his blood flow.
He tried not to shiver, found he could not stop shuddering.
His legs cramped. A wave of exhaustion suddenly struck him, and Samson swayed.
He closed his eyes. For a moment, he wondered if it would have been better to die in Tsuana.
Better to bleed out on a beach than the cold, hard stones.
Better to die a martyr than a failed hero.
Samson opened his eyes, his chains rattling behind him as he continued his march.
And then a young girl stepped forward.
She was a child, too young, too small for the dark confines of the mine. Dusty black curls crowded her forehead, but her eyes shone with a light that would give the Jantari pause, if only to remind them of what they could not kill.
Hope.
“Blue Star,” the girl said in Ambari, and knelt.