by Ehsan Ahmad
She heard quick light footsteps. Yarni ran past the small dark cavern.
“Cerrin?”
“Here. What is it?”
The girl darted in and spoke between hurried breaths. “We got word from one of the men’s crews. Kannalin was pulled out of the line this morning. The guards have him.”
Vellerik looked down at the remains of the box. He was surprised no one had heard him smashing it up, but then everyone else was probably working. He had used the butt of his sidearm, shattering the plastic in several places and destroying the regulator. He had also pulled off all the remaining capsules and crushed them under his boot.
He sat down on the floor beside the box. The soarer was atop a leaf, wings quivering. It wouldn’t last long without the regulator. He shivered as the reality hit him. He could not find solace any more. He was alone with his thoughts.
The dreams had been exactly as he wanted. But after he had woken from them and gone back to sleep, only more nightmares followed. Some were as much memory as invention.
He saw the Batal, cut down as they fled. He saw the bloodied Kinassan bodies laid out on sand and rock. And so much more. Things he had forgotten. Things he wasn’t even sure he had seen. Enemies of The Domain blasted and mutilated and blown into pieces. Natives of all creeds and colors hunted and imprisoned and used. Resistors tortured and executed.
He had protected The Domain and helped it expand, done his sworn duty. But what did he have to show for it? Some pretty pieces of metal and enough money to live on until the end of his life. He would have swapped both for peace of mind.
The narcotics had helped in the beginning, but ultimately they had made things worse.
He would face this on his own, conquer it, and make sure he returned to Seevarta ready for their new life together.
He stood up and dressed quickly. He wanted to get down to the cargo bay, start briefing the men about the Viceroy’s visit. By the time he dragged the broken box into a corner and covered it, the soarer was dead.
There was no news that afternoon or evening.
Cerrin asked anyone who she thought might know something, but the answers were all the same. Kannalin had been taken away along with three other men from his crew (none of whom were connected to Cerrin or Sadi).
She was surprised to wake up the following day because she had not expected to sleep. As the siren finished, she pushed her blankets aside. The sisters were already up and whispering Palanian prayers—to their Maker. Cerrin always did hers, too, partly out of habit, partly to honor her mother, who had never let Cerrin or her father begin the day without a few words for the gods and ancients.
Cerrin crawled into the corner and touched one of the plants while she first uttered the prayer of communion. Then she spoke to Ikala. She felt she was already in a battle and he had already answered by helping her, Sadi, and the others help themselves. She asked him to continue to watch over them and that Kannalin be returned to them safe and well.
But when the day shift lined up outside Block A, he was still nowhere to be seen.
There was no news during the morning break. Cerrin was with five others, shoveling chunks of aronium ore from a huge pile into wheeled crates. The nearest guard was stationed at an intersection fifty feet away. She had to force herself not to look in his direction every few seconds. She could not escape the feeling she would be joining Kannalin soon.
There was no news at midday. She could not eat and had to fight the urge to run when the guard approached. He was simply checking on them, but she still couldn’t eat when he’d left.
She heard nothing for the rest of the day. She lined up with Sadi, Sirras, and all the others as they filed out of the mine but didn’t dare speak to them with so many watching eyes.
The answer came an hour after lights out. She heard some people come in and voices below. It was Yarni who climbed up to the compartment. She crawled under the blankets with Cerrin and whispered to her.
“He’s back. All four of them are back. They’re fine. The Vitaari wanted to rearrange some of the rooms in the tower. They kept them working all that time, but they got double rations from one of the governor’s men.”
Cerrin thanked the gods.
“Can I stay here tonight?” asked Yarni.
Cerrin held her close.
23
There was a skill to it: putting aside all other thoughts and concentrating entirely on what was in front of you. Whether trying to spark a flame, hone an arrow point, stalk an animal—the best results came when you removed each and every distraction.
Having developed the ability over many years, Cerrin had recently made a very specific adaptation. When she was lying in the compartment, waiting her turn, she let the fear come: fear that someone would start asking too many questions, fear that the tunnel might collapse, fear that the Vitaari would discover them. It was not pleasant—and she often found herself sweating and shivering—but by the time she reached the tunnel, her mind was clear and she attacked the work with an energy that surprised even Sadi.
Reach forward; dig in; pull back.
When enough fresh earth had been carved out, she would push her body flat against the side of the tunnel and Sadi would pass up the bucket. Cerrin would fill it and then—while Sadi took it for disposal—tidy up the newly dug section, keeping the shape and the four-foot width.
The tunnel was now angling downward at forty-five degrees. Both women were working with even greater urgency than usual because this night—the fourteenth of digging—was when they expected to finally hit the top layer of the mine.
The Palanian men had taken the previous shift. Though she had not spoken to them, Cerrin knew they would be disappointed not to have been the ones to make the breakthrough. To her, it was only right that she and Sadi should do so, but there was no sign they were even close. Previously confident, Sadi now seemed unsure whether they had ended up in the right place. Cerrin had entrusted this to her, hoping the endless calculations and measurements using a length of rope would do the job. That same rope now connected them: if they did reach the mine, there was considerable danger that the digger would fall.
Cerrin worked on, only giving way to Sadi when she knew she had done significantly more than her allotted fifteen minutes. The Palanian wriggled up beside her and took the trowel.
“Really thought we’d be there by now.”
“It’s as thick as ever,” said Cerrin as she slid backwards.
The dense, sticky consistency of the earth was both a blessing and a curse; it gave the tunnel form but was very difficult to dig through.
Cerrin drew in some deep breaths.
They were a long way from the surface, and the air was stale. It now took so long for the person with the bucket to haul their load back to the shaft, climb up and dump it, that their work was almost continuous. This task, however, was still not as arduous as the digging. Here, all effort was concentrated in the shoulders, arms, and hands. All of them were suffering continual pain in their muscles and joints. The veins on Cerrin’s forearms now bulged like roots under the ground.
There was another challenge. Crawling back and forth in the confined space, they would emerge from the tunnel covered in earth. So now they all kept their spare overalls solely for their nighttime efforts. Standard practice was to change before and after completing the shift.
Cerrin lay on her back to make the most of the short break. She listened to Sadi’s panting breaths and the thumps and scrapes of the trowel. She ran her hands across the caked mud on her arms and started picking it off to save time later.
Sadi suddenly stopped and moved the lamp, one of two Yarni had pilfered from the Vitaari stores. “Bloody great stone.”
“Can you get it out?”
“Think so. Yes, earth’s quite soft here.”
Cerrin watched Sadi push her fingers into it, then grip the stone. It was at least a foot wide—one of the biggest they’d come across.
“There, I think th
at’s—”
It was as if a great hand pulled Sadi out of the tunnel. Cerrin stuck out her feet to anchor herself, but the rope around her waist went tight and hauled her several feet downward. She shut her eyes as clumps of earth peppered her face.
When she came to a halt, her neck was on the edge of something. She could smell the fresher air of open space. The rope had cut into her side and stomach, leaving her winded and coughing. She covered her mouth to reduce the noise.
“Cerrin. Hey, I’m down here.”
Wincing at the pain, Cerrin turned over and realized she was hanging out of a small tunnel that now joined a very big one.
Sadi picked up the lamp, which—like the stone—had landed near her. “You all right?”
“Yes. You?”
“Bit sore.”
Cerrin propped herself up on her elbows and tried to get her bearings. To the left was a dim trace of light.
“Is that—” Sadi untied the rope, then hurried away to the right. Stopping after about twenty paces, she held the lamp close to something. Cerrin spied the metallic surface of the machine she had climbed over. Not far beyond it was the end of the tunnel and their way out.
She no longer felt the pain; it was submerged beneath a flood of relief and jubilation.
Gods and ancients, I thank you.
Sadi returned and stood on the pile of earth that had fallen with her. “We did it.”
Cerrin felt around with her hands and eventually located the trowel, which she dropped at Sadi’s feet. “Tidy up as best you can—in case anyone comes along.”
Sadi grinned. “Yes, Chief. Why don’t you come down and help?”
Cerrin pointed at the rope. “I need to save my strength—for pulling you back up.”
Sonus had waited a week for the strong winds; he needed some-thing to cover the noise. Given the season, he’d known it was only a matter of time, but every night that passed took him closer to the next meeting with Nomora. The warehouse was filling up again, and the freighter would be back before long. He wanted to be able to tell the Lovirr he was ready.
He knew the man on duty and stopped outside the little cave.
“Not going up, are you, Sonus? At this time of night?”
He had yet to invent a better excuse. “Just realized I left some equipment switched on. They’ll be angry.”
Barris was an amiable man with a graying beard. Sonus had fixed a lamp for him several weeks previous.
“Might you lose your privileges?”
“I suppose so.” In fact, the only privilege he still received was working on the surface—and he was due to be back drilling the following day.
“How are you feeling?” Like Sonus, Barris had been made ill by the work.
“Not bad, thank you.” In fact, Sonus hadn’t felt better in years, a development he could not account for. “Sorry, I really should—”
“Go, go,” said Barris. “Just be careful. The Maker is angry tonight.”
Sonus checked the pack on his back was secure, then set off up the walkway. Not for the first time, he wondered how believers like Barris accommodated the presence of the Vitaari into their system of faith. The teachings of the Maker had mentioned nothing about a race of invaders that would lay waste to his creation and enslave his people. He advocated generosity, tolerance, forgiveness, and other positive traits, few of which were of any practical benefit to those housed at Mine Fourteen.
Sonus—who had sat through religious lessons in school—could think of only one tale that provided him with a little inspiration: the story of the bridge-maker.
A solitary farmer needed to use the pasture on the other side of a river. Nobody else from his village would spare him the time to help build a bridge, and they mocked him when he told them he would do it alone. The farmer’s initial attempts failed. His first structure of stone and wood was washed away in a flood. But he rebuilt it even bigger and stronger the following year. Eventually, dozens passed over it every day, and it lasted for centuries. When the farmer died, the bridge was named after him. A simple tale of tenacity and persistence, but one often mentioned fondly by Sonus’s professors at the University.
He continued upward, wind howling through the darkness around him. Though the previous day had been a little warmer, patches of ice had appeared on the metal, making the journey even more hazardous. But for Sonus, the conditions were ideal; he could do what he needed to without fear of interruption.
At the sixth flight of steps, he stopped and squatted by the rock wall, well away from the nearest lamp. He clicked on his flashlight and took the weapon from the pack. Next, he opened a small case containing the plastic canisters: five had been produced, all filled with nails and other metal scraps. He took one and dropped it down the barrel, reminding himself to keep the weapon aiming upward—there was nothing to stop the canister falling out. Sonus was even more careful when he took the power cell from the case. He had selected five of the oldest cells, hoping they would be more unstable and therefore more prone to detonation. He pulled back the bolt, opened the slot behind the barrel, and placed the cell inside. He then retracted the bolt and took a deep breath.
Only now would he discover if his theories were any more than that, if all his efforts had been worthwhile.
He held the weapon in both hands and stood up. It was unwieldy and heavy, due largely to the thickness of the barrel and the other components.
Sonus walked to the front of the walkway and placed a finger on the trigger. Once depressed, this rod would fire the piston into the power cell, hopefully igniting a contained explosion and blasting the ammunition out of the barrel. Eyes narrowed against the stinging wind, Sonus set his feet and held the weapon well away from him. He pushed the trigger down and winced as the piston fired.
Nothing happened.
He was, however, relieved the piston had retracted itself and he could try again. He pulled the trigger three more times. Still nothing. He shook the weapon, then tried once more, to no avail.
As the walkway rattled and groaned, he opened the slot and tipped out the firing cell. The sides of it had been crushed, but the impact had not been sufficient to ignite the charge. Sonus had known this might well happen, but he needed some idea of how often—or how rarely—a detonation might occur. He threw the power cell into the darkness, then returned to the pack and loaded a new one.
Once back at the edge of the walkway, he struggled to stay upright as the wind somehow grew even stronger.
He gripped the handle and depressed the trigger. Again, nothing. He tried twice more, then discarded this cell, too.
By the third attempt, all enthusiasm and conviction had left him. So much so that when this cell did detonate—and the weapon kicked backwards—he dropped it. Surprised by how quiet the blast had been, he knelt beside the weapon and examined it with the flashlight.
Apart from a slightly bent trigger, it seemed to be undamaged. He checked inside the barrel and saw the metal was blackened and scratched but intact. He also noted traces of plastic seared to the surface, but the canister seemed to have been ejected smoothly.
But he had fired into the air; he needed to know what damage the weapon could do. Sonus retrieved a heavy chunk of machinery from his pack: a drill part made of various metals. He placed it against the rock wall.
The fourth attempt showed him nothing: another misfire.
He loaded the last cell, then aimed it at the target. Gripping the barrel and the handle firmly, he fired. The blast gave him a jolt, but he kept his feet steady and the barrel straight. He put the weapon down and grabbed the flashlight.
What he saw made him smile. The shrapnel had shredded the piece of machinery, blowing apart all but the most solid chunks of metal. He had no doubt it would make a real mess of anything organic.
Two out of five; not a great success rate. But it worked.
Cerrin hadn’t been able to sleep after the eventful night’s work, and the day was becoming
a struggle. Though none would admit it to each other, the constant strain of days in the mine and nights in the tunnel was taking its toll. When midday came, she slumped against a cargo container, downed her food and closed her eyes.
“Cerrin.”
The tone of her fellow worker seemed to hold a warning. Fearing it was a guard standing over her, she looked up to see Trantis, one of Sadi’s Palanian allies. Though he had worked on the tunnel as much as her, she had only spoken to him a couple of times.
“Got a minute?”
Without a word, she followed him around a corner, well away from the three members of her crew.
“Sadi’s way off in one of the new shafts. She asked me to speak to you.”
Cerrin couldn’t help feeling slightly afraid of Trantis. He was a large man—not as tall as Kannalin but very broad—and his bulging eyes never seemed to blink. Cerrin didn’t want to get too close.
“You know Erras has been on that crew up in the yard? He managed to get a couple of words with one of the Lovirr while the freighter was loading yesterday—an associate of ours.”
Cerrin knew from Sadi that her group had previously established some limited contact with the Lovirr and that a few of them were far more sympathetic to the plight of the other tribes than was commonly known.
“He passed on information about a friend in Mine Three. There’s a man who believes he can steal one of the Vitaari vehicles and escape.”
Cerrin absorbed this. She admired the courage of whoever this man was, though she could not begin to grasp how anyone could do such a thing.
“Apparently he understands the Vitaari equipment. The Lovirr think he may actually be able to do it. But if he does, he will need somewhere to go.”
“The forest?”
Trantis nodded. “Mine Fourteen is around two hundred miles from here. There are some caves a similar distance away, but he would have little chance of evading the Vitaari there. The Lovirr say he wants to move quickly. They are suggesting we work together—time both escapes to cause maximum confusion. And if he gets here at the right time, he may be able to help us.”
