by Casey Eanes
Grift flashed videos of mobs firing pistols and throwing firebombs at Grogan military within the walls of Rhuddenhall. Willyn watched as men, women, and children were tazed, beaten, and dragged into the city square for execution following their attacks.
“There is a remnant of Grogans who are calling themselves the Reds who continue to press against Hosp’s regime. They would have you as their leader.”
A firestorm of anger and pride began to swell within her. All Willyn wanted to do was find Hosp and choke the life from him. Not only had he killed Hagan, but now he was ripping her Realm apart.
She shook her head, “I was a fool. I played right into his trap and left my brother. I left my people, and now Hosp used that opportunity to poison Hagan and the entire Groganlands with him.” Her eyes fell on the distant, blue horizon. “I have to kill him.”
Luken spoke up, “In time. But first we have to get to the port of Falal. I am afraid if we don’t get there we will not stand much of a chance to do anything.”
Willyn swung her head toward Luken. “Falal? Why are we headed to Preost?”
“Because that is the only Realm that has not bought into Seam and Hosp’s charade. We need their protection, and if we are fortunate the final Keeper will also be there.”
Willyn looked to Grift, searching for an answer.
“Who is the final Keeper?”
Grift spoke, “Wael. The Mastermonk. He is the longest standing Keeper, and leader of our Order. If we can make it to him safely then we can at least safeguard the two final keys. From there we can work to re-unite you with the Red resistance in the Groganlands. It is our last opportunity to stop Seam and Hosp before they gain any more power.”
Luken stepped to the boat’s railing and stared out over the eastern horizon. He ran to the boat’s controls and punched the throttle. The boat pushed forward, offering the last reserve of energy it had. Luken picked up an assault rifle and adjusted its scope before using it to spy back over the water.
“Grift. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it seems our plan might have just become a little more difficult. We have several drones on the horizon.”
“Aleph, help us,” Grift whispered.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The sound of screeching brakes jolted Kull from his sleep. He sat up and looked out the open door of the rail car. The outline of large buildings flashed by in the night. It was difficult to make out much detail, but the moonlight lent a faint light that revealed the massive nature of the passing structures. Wael was standing in the doorway, craning his neck to see further out into the darkness.
“I thought you said we had more time until we reached Elum,” Kull said.
“This is not Elum. I know exactly where we are, and we are in danger,” Wael answered. “Now, take off that robe and ask a bagger for a change of clothes. We don’t have much time.”
Kull’s mind filled with questions, but he knew it would be no use to ask them. He tried to press for the door to see the city, but Wael placed a large hand on his chest.
“Kull, we don’t have time. Listen to me and change your clothes now. Your life and any chance you have of finding your father depends on it.”
The rail car was quickly losing momentum and the whine of the brakes stirred most of the baggers from their sleep. Men and women sat up and chattered, trying to learn why they were making an unexpected stop. A thought fell in Kull’s mind. They have found us. They are stopping the car to arrest us. To take Wael’s Key! The Preost garb would not do them any favors.
He tapped a young bagger on the shoulder who looked to be close to Kull’s age, about fifteen or sixteen. The boy was big for his age, bigger than Kull, but Kull figured if anyone in the car would have clothes he could borrow that this was his best chance. The boy turned, flashing a grin full of rotten teeth.
“Can I help ya?”
Kull swallowed any sense of awkwardness as he spoke, “I need a pair of clothes. Do you have something I could wear?”
The young man’s grin grew even larger and he chuckled as he looked over Kull.
“Gonna cost!” he said, “How many credits ‘em got?”
Kull shook his head, “None. I have no money, but you can have my tunic. You could sell it.”
He held up the long robe that flowed from Kull’s body, rubbing his finger over it. Kull could see the numbers whirling in the boy’s mind. “No, no. Not good ‘nuff. Need credits,” the boy whistled through his rotten smile.
Wael stepped behind Kull and lifted a small satchel to his ear. He shook it and looked back to the boy.
“Fifty credits enough?” Wael asked. “It is all we have.”
The bagger’s eyes flashed open and he laughed out loud as he turned and dug through his satchel. He pulled out a worn pair of field pants and a bright new linen shirt. He tossed them to Kull and reached for the bag of credits. Wael handed the purse to the boy and leaned in close to the young man.
Kull could hear him whisper in the bagger’s language. The boy’s eyes grew even wider and he flashed a knowing grin to Wael. Wael placed his hand on Kull’s shoulder and looked back out the door to the buildings that were barely creeping past them now as the train continued to slow.
“What did you tell him?”
“I simply told him that you are his brother if anyone asks, and for our secret he now has one hundred credits instead of fifty.”
Kull chuckled as he began changing clothes. “I never thought I would see the day that a Preost monk would bribe someone to lie. What is this world coming to?”
Wael’s normally stoic expression melted into a smile for a moment and he laughed.
“Ah, Kull, I did not pay him to lie. We are all brothers, whether we realize it or not. I asked for no lies. Now hurry. Change. We don’t have much time.”
Kull switched into the bagger’s clothes and again tried to peer out of the hedgehog door. He was able to make out the outline of black figures forming a perimeter around the rail car. Grogan infantry were waiting for the line of rail cars.
Speakers outside blasted a message into the car, “All passengers, prepare for boarding and inspection. Interference will not be tolerated. By order of the Groganlands’ Council and the High King of Lotte, this train has been commandeered for inspection.”
He looked at Wael with eyes full of confusion. The High King and the Grogan Council? What was going on? The car erupted with confused expressions and questions as all the baggers looked outside to find the source of the announcement.
Wael looked back to Kull and grasped his hand. Kull could feel something cold pressed into his palm.
The Key. He looked up into Wael’s hollow eyes. He wore the look of a man walking toward his execution, given one brief moment to speak.
“Kull, they are coming for me and no one else. They seek the Key. It is yours now; protect it with your life. Do not let them unlock the Kings.”
The next few moments blurred together in a swarm of chaos. Eight faceless soldiers wearing black riot gear galloped into the car. Wael stood up amidst the baggers, as if to greet guests to a hosted dinner party.
“Aleph’s blessing on you. I know you are here for me, so here I am. Take me if you must.”
The guard at the point of the pack answered Wael with a crushing blow across his face. Wael stooped, his face willfully receiving the blow. Despite the attack he arched his back straight and recovered, his head held high. His eyes lowered on the man and in an instant, Wael seemed like a titan in the presence of his enemies. He spoke loud enough for all to hear.
“I will not risk you hurting these people. Do what you must, but do not hurt the others.”
The soldiers began to pummel Wael with their clubs, sending him to his knees. A waterfall of violence fell over the monk, and he lay on the railcar floor in a broken crumble as the eight soldiers tore through him. Kull’s throat twisted in a knot as he held his scream. The horror of seeing Wael fall and submit to such treatment overwhelmed him, freezing him in a horrific
trance. Finally the soldiers ended their thrashing and tazed him. The smell of burnt flesh filled the car, and baggers tried to flee. Wael screamed as they sent lightning through his body, but he offered no resistance to their attacks. The boy who sold Kull clothes pulled him back into the crowd as the soldiers continued to swarm over Wael. Kull and all the others were ushered out of the car, but the sight of Wael’s crushed face would not leave Kull’s mind.
Following the capture, everyone on the hedgehog was detained for several days. The soldiers said they had to do a full examination of the railcars’ contents. Two days went by full of anxious waiting as the coalition of Grogan and Lottian forces ripped the hedgehog apart. Soon, the baggers were loaded back on the railcar and carried to a desolate patch of desert dirt. Without explanation they were all put on work detail in the desert. The soldiers claimed the work was being commissioned by the Groganlands Council and that all who assisted would be rewarded, but as baggers started to collapse and die in the desert heat, Kull soon knew that this was a lie.
***
The heat of the desert swallowed the mass of baggers as they dug through the dry, brittle skin of the earth. It gave way without hesitation to the hollow scrapes of shovels and picks. Dust and sand filled the air, covering the workers from the harsh rays of a cruel sun overhead. After hours of digging, they had formed a massive crater. As they dug deeper, the dark brown sand of the desert gave way to a bright, chalky, white powder.
Kull stooped down as sweat poured off his brow. Perspiration soaked through what had once been his new linen shirt. He stooped down to examine the change in earth, allowing his fingers to rub the new white substance. It was not sand, but it seemed familiar. He could not place it. He leaned on his pick and glanced around the labor camp. There were hundreds of them, all of them digging in this one spot. Grogan soldiers stood surrounding them, their pistols and rifles ready in hand for redirection.
“A cla on morte de vellu! A cla a morte de vellu!” One bagger called out to the other workers. The guards swarmed over to him. A single gunshot rang out and a command blasted over the loudspeakers:
“You will not stop digging under any circumstances. Loiterers will be redirected.”
The baggers’ chatter was cut, and Kull threw his head down, dipping his pick back into the strange white soil. His shoulders, his arms, and his back felt like hot iron. He had been in the camp for several days, and all they had done was dig at gunpoint with scarce food and little water to keep up their strength. He placed his hand on his chest. Behind the sweat-filled linen shirt hung a small key, looped on the same chain as his mother’s emblem.
It is still there. You haven’t lost it. Touching the secret held around his neck sent a wave of grief over him, over what happened to Wael and the uncertainty surrounding both of his parents. None of them had given up, and neither could he. He buried the grief within his mind and made himself take another swing into the earth. He focused on his pick’s landing with each swing, allowing his mind to rest as his body toiled. The white chalk continued to fall away, but instead of powder, it broke off into more uniform chunks. Kull studied the clumps of white soil. The white powder was not rock, soil or sand. His eyes darted over the white ground. What is it?
His pick landed, and the earth gave way. Over and over again until there, in the ground, the hollow visage of a skull stared back at him, smiling gleefully at the sunshine filling its dark, hollow sockets. Kull dropped his pick and fell to his knees. He looked back at the chunks of earth, a silent scream boiling in his mind. Bones. A mass grave. Aleph above, why are they making us do this?
All around him, the baggers’ silence erupted into screams of protest. They, too, were uncovering the awful truth. The sound of bullets rang out along with the robotic voice droning over the intercom.
“You will not stop digging under any circumstances. Loiterers will be redirected.”
A Lottian guard was making a line for Kull, his hand wrapped around his pistol, ready to use it. Kull stood to his feet and began swiping at the ground again, trying to look away. The guard continued to press forward until another bagger started screaming at the site of an uncovered set of bones. The guard smacked his gun down over the bagger and then opened fire.
Kull cringed and slid deeper into the crowd, beyond the eyes of the guard that he knew had a bullet saved for him. He dug at the ground and took quick glances to try to gather any clues from the pit. Nothing stood out. There was only pain, exhaustion, and bones. The digging endured for several more hours until the loudspeaker cranked back to life.
“Shift change. Mandatory rest. All loiterers will be redirected.”
The guards corralled the mass of baggers in the pit back to the rail cars. The hedgehogs had been pulled to inactive rail lines and parked with their doors wide open. Kull followed orders as he climbed into the vehicle and sat down. People collapsed all around him, panting and trying to cool themselves. The guards prowled outside of the cars like panthers.
Kull whispered to the man next to him, “Any idea what we are digging for?”
The man shook his head and refused to make eye contact with Kull. Kull turned to another bagger and asked the same question.
“No talking. Want to live,” was the bagger’s only response. Kull slumped against the wall and took in a deep breath. He closed his eyes and thought back to the moments before this new, confusing nightmare began. What would Wael have him do now?
***
The digging continued for another excruciating day. Ten hours of work were followed by two hours of rest. The regimen was hellish. It was as if they were digging bones out of a furnace. As soon as the sun set, the baggers began to get restless, throwing down their tools and looking mad-eyed at their captors. Surely, they thought, they would be able to sleep through the night. The hopes were in vain, as the rumble of generators echoed through the frigid night air, causing artificial light to pour in from overhead. The work would continue regardless of the conditions.
Never in Kull’s life had he fought so hard to keep his wits about him. The toil of just this one day was enough to make him forget his mother and father. Enough to forget Wael. Enough to forget the Key resting under his thin, sweat-soaked shirt. This was labor meant to rob one of all hope and make them wish for death. He did not know how much more of it he could take because he knew that as soon as he would sit and rest, the vicious cycle would begin again. By the end of the first day and night Kull witnessed at least twelve shootings and twice as many people falling victim to the heat or to the cold. The guards who surrounded the pit stacked the victims’ bodies into orderly piles. Kull found the sight horrifying, but after another seven hours of work, he could feel his mind unhinging. Accepting the bodies, accepting the murder, accepting his fate. To dig until he died.
Focus, he thought to himself. You have to focus. As his shovel ate at the bone meal soil, his mind flickered up a picture of his dad. Dad would know what to do. What Kull would give just to have his father by his side. He could hear his voice during their extensive trainings, “Keep pressing on. There is always an opening, always a weakness. Use it for your advantage.”
Kull began to steal glances as the desert night gave way to the dawn. The sun crept over the horizon and drowned out the lamps that buzzed with artificial light through the night. He knew that another rotation was going to happen with daybreak, and he observed the guard shift restlessly at their post, ready to make the change. The shift change came, and Kull was pulled from the night detail to the railcar for his regimented two-hour rest. All around him the baggers fell to the ground, some passing out from exhaustion. Kull leaned his back to the metal car, balancing into a squat. He could feel his eyelids swaying with weight, but he forced himself to notice the changes taking place in the dig workflow. He started to see the different shift of baggers moving throughout the dig site.
There has got to be something I’m not seeing. There has got to be an opening. He stared out, looking for an answer. An hour passed, and Kull remain
ed, determined not to let sleep take him under. He looked around at his fellow laborers and the guards’ blatant weakness became apparent. The soldiers were well-armed, but they were outnumbered. In fact, there were hundreds of baggers to the twenty soldiers that stood guard over the work camp. Hundreds of baggers armed with shovels and picks. The thought fell over Kull, and he pondered his next move. I have no choice, he thought. They will bury us here.
Glancing through the railcar he looked to see if anyone was awake. Kull knew that there was no way he could do this on his own. He had to make allies and quick. There, in the same car, was the boy who sold him clothes. He was awake and their eyes met with sudden purpose. The bagger motioned for Kull to come near, and Kull slinked back further into the car.
