by Rob J. Hayes
I gasped as the first swing connected and Isen let out a cry. It was not easy holding the marker and the shock of it hurt as though your arms were bursting apart. I was used to it, but Isen wasn't. Prig heard me and turned to stare, an ugly grin on his fat fucking face. He knew as well as I that he had finally found a way to scare me. I imagine it was a great victory for him. It was certainly a defeat for me. I knew then I would never hold the marker again. Prig loved to torture me above all others and now he had a way to do it.
After the marker was in the wall, Prig set us to digging. We had a fair way to go that day and I had my weekly interview with the overseer afterwards. Prig wanted some time to relax on the Hill with the other foremen, so he drove us hard. There wasn't a single member of the team who escaped without at least one lash across their back.
Isen got it the worst. Between the rigours of the fight the night before, and Prig's ferocity on the hammer, Isen could barely close his hands. Hardt worked even harder than normal, trying to make up for his brother's slack, but Prig noticed. On the fourth lash, I couldn't take it anymore. I couldn't take seeing Isen whipped bloody knowing that it was my fault, that Prig was doing it to hurt me.
In hindsight I only made things worse.
I threw down my pick and turned to face Prig, stepping between him and Isen. Maybe it was the surprise, or maybe it was the look in my eyes, but he hesitated, just for a moment. Then I saw his face screw up with rage and he lashed out with the whip.
Now, the pain is an abstract thing. I know that it hurt, that it felt like my face had been lit on fire. Thankfully I can't feel it anymore. The whip cracked across my left cheek and I cried out, stumbling backwards into Isen but keeping my feet beneath me.
I still bare the scar of that lash today. I still bear most of the scars that rancid cock-filled arsehole gave me, but that one is a constant reminder of the power that slug-fucking bastard had over us. I have forged a throne out of my determination. I have matched wits and strength with creatures arrogant enough to think themselves gods. I have crushed empires, and watched my own fall to ruin, yet I still bear the scars that pitiful bully gave me underground.
Prig might not have stopped at one lash, he certainly looked willing to deal me another, but Isen shoved me aside so hard I found myself lying on the rocky ground and staring up him, thinking he should be grateful. I did not count on the pride of young men in their prime. Nor the danger of wounding that pride. Honestly, I'm not sure which of us was the bigger idiot. I think we were running neck and neck.
"Don't ever," Isen snarled, his face twisted in rage. I was shocked, blood rushing in my ears and running down my cheek, and my mind reeling. I didn't understand. I still don't. Men can be the most fucking foolish of creatures sometimes. "I don't need some stupid little girl trying to protect me."
Hardt's big hand appeared on his little brother's shoulder and he pulled Isen away. Away from me. The rest of our team stood around, watching and doing nothing. Prig grinned that shit-eating grin of his, anger gone, replaced by smug victory. He licked his brown lips and lashed his whip at the ground. "Back to work."
Chapter 9
Isen disappeared as soon as Prig announced the work was done. I watched him go, though part of me wanted to run after him. He hadn't spoken a word to me or to anyone since calling me a stupid little girl. The insult burned, regardless of how true it was, stinging worse than the gouged flesh on my cheek. I would have hated anyone calling me such, but from Isen… I wanted him to see me as more. I wanted him to see me as a woman.
I didn't know how long I had before my interview with the overseer, but I knew it would roll around sooner than I'd like, and the cut on my face needed tending to. It had stopped bleeding, though it still hurt like a fire burning away at my cheek. Josef always tended to my wounds as I did his, so with that thought in mind, I ignored the other scabs and stormed away to our cavern.
Josef wasn't waiting for me when I arrived and that started a niggling feeling worming its way through my gut. He almost always finished his work before my team. It wasn't unheard of for him to finish later, but… Sometimes I get a feeling. It's like dread and sorrow mixed into one. I knew something bad had happened, I could feel it in my bones, and it scared me.
Hardt arrived shortly after I did, a few of the others in tow. Thinking back, I honestly can't even remember their names. Not a one of them. I'm sure Hardt could though. He probably considered them friends. I wonder if it hurt him when I murdered them all.
"I suppose we better have a look at that cheek," Hardt said in his quiet rumble. In moments he had a bowl of water and strips of cloth in hand. Maybe it was more than moments. I was so worried about Josef I wasn't thinking clearly. I was pacing, hands clenching and unclenching, breath coming fast and ragged.
As Hardt set to cleaning out the wound, I kept my eyes locked on the cavern entrance, waiting for Josef to appear.
"Sorry about my brother," Hardt said. "He had no right to say that to you just for standing up to Prig."
I snorted. "Then why did he?"
"Pride," said Hardt. "He's a man grown and you're just about half his size. You standing up to Prig like that when he won't, when none of us will… It shames him. Makes him feel less of a man. He wasn't really angry at you, more at himself."
I winced at the pain in my cheek. "But you're not?" I asked. "Not ashamed for letting Prig beat your brother like that? Not ashamed for acting like a fucking coward?"
Hardt paused. Out of the corner of my eye I could see him staring at me, though his eyes looked unfocused. "There's no shame in surviving," he said. "Prig's a shit-chewer and no mistake, but I don't hurt people anymore. Besides, what would standing up to him get me? You might be safe from real reprisal, little soldier, but me... I could kill Prig. Deko would hear of it soon enough, and then I'd be dead and Isen would be alone. And you'd get a new foreman, one who might be even worse than Prig.
"My dad used to tell me to pick my fights carefully," Hardt continued. "Then he'd punch me about as hard as a grown man can punch a boy and tell me all over again. I spent a good few years taking any fight I could. And spent a good few years learning the lesson he was trying to teach me, in his own way. Now I have."
I thought about his words. On the surface they sounded like cowardice to me, though I now know there was something to them. Unfortunately, it's a lesson I seem incapable of learning. I've never been able to pick my fights. I let them pick me, and then I beat the odds. Or maybe I've just never met a fight I wasn't willing to take.
I was still mulling over Hardt's wisdom when Josef stumbled in through the cavern entrance. I was on my feet in a moment, regardless of whether Hardt had finished cleaning my wound. Josef was cradling his left arm and one eye was swollen shut. A dozen little cuts marred his face and his rags were stained red in places.
"Don't fight," Josef said urgently, shaking his head at me as I ran over to support him.
Prig sauntered into the cavern a few steps behind, that same shit-eating grin all over his face. It didn't take a leap of logic to see how Josef had ended up so badly beaten. My anger raged. My hatred was a fire inside of me, burning away all reason. I have been known to let my anger get the better of me and this was one of those times.
Josef grabbed my arm with his one good one and shook his head at me. "Don't..."
I didn't listen.
Shrugging free of Josef's grip, I ran at Prig and threw a punch. It was a messy haymaker of a strike. These days I'd be embarrassed by such an attack, but back then I didn't know how to fight. I thought my rage would see me through. That my ferocity would overcome any lack of training or brute strength. I was so fucking wrong.
Prig caught my punch, twisted my arm behind my back and shoved me up against the nearest wall. I just about managed to turn my head in time to stop the impact from breaking my nose. Unfortunately, I turned my head to the right and Prig ground my wounded left cheek against the cavern wall. Pain is something one can get used to, and I thought I had, but an op
en wound pressed against rough stone taught me otherwise and I let out a scream.
"Any of you scabs so much as move my way and I'll put my knife in her and then in you!" Prig roared. He was pressed up close against me, so close I could feel the heat coming off him and feel his breath on my neck. He pushed me harder against the wall and twisted my arm a little further. I'm ashamed to say I squealed from the pain. I think he enjoyed that most of all.
I considered grabbing for my little shard of mirror, but with one arm twisted behind my back I had no way of reaching it.
This is why, in all my life, I have never hated anyone so much as I did Prig. No one else has ever made me feel so helpless. Not even the torturers down in the Red Cells. Not even the emperor with all his fucking knives.
A punch to the kidney is a dangerous thing. It's a vital organ and one that has very little protection when struck from behind. The pain of Prig's punch blotted out the agony in my cheek. My legs collapsed beneath me and I could not even scream. I collapsed against Prig's grip and floundered, lost in the pain. Thought and reason blasted from my mind. Then I was moving, pushed along by the fat bastard, my arm still twisted behind my back.
The caverns and tunnels seemed darker than usual and passed by in a blur. We were on one of the lifts, halfway down to the main cavern floor, when I started thinking again. The pain was all over, as though my body couldn't make sense of what hurt, so everything was agony. I looked down at the cavern floor growing closer and realised how close Prig was holding me to the edge. All he would have to do was let go of my arm and I would fall. It was a strange thing to realise the pain of my arm twisted behind my back was all that was keeping me alive. Strange to think, as much as my shoulder seared with pain, I didn't want Prig to let go. I didn't want to die.
No sooner had the lift bumped to a stop we were moving again. Scabs turned to watch as Prig pushed me onward, my arm still twisted behind my back. None of them helped. Maybe they were too smart to stand up for another scab, or maybe they were just cowards, happy enough to watch someone else in pain as long as they were spared from it. That was the way of the Pit, the way those in charge bred isolation into us all. Nobody was willing to stand up for anyone else in case they found themselves in the same situation. We might have all been in the same shitty, sinking boat, but we were also in it alone.
Prig didn't have to march me through the Hill. I think it was routine that made him. It would have been better for both of us if he'd marched me straight to my interview.
"Prig." Deko had a deep voice and sounded almost lethargic as though sparing any attention at all was a great effort.
"Dipped in goat shit," Prig spat under his breath, and pulled me to a stop. We were deep into the Hill and I could see a number of foremen watching us now. I sagged a little in Prig's grip now that I was stopped again, though he quickly convinced me to stand straighter with a slight raising of my arm. "Don't say a word," he hissed in my ear.
"Come show me what you got there, Priggy," Deko continued. I turned my head to see him sitting on a table with his four most vicious captains lounging nearby. Deko's eyes were fixed on me. I should have looked away. Instead, I stared straight back at him. Defiant. Daring him to take an interest. Refusing to back down no matter how fucked I was.
Prig pushed me forward slowly, it was a meeting neither of us wanted. Deko was a daunting man up close. He wasn't tall, but he made up for that lack in girth. His arms were thick with muscle and his belly bulged. It said a lot that down in the Pit a man could grow so fat. He had black hair, long and matted and streaked with grey. But by far the most striking thing about him were his eyes; they were dark and shone like lamplight reflected off a pool of oil.
"She's got an interview with the overseer," Prig said. It was the first time I had ever heard the man sound humble. It might have made me smile had I not been near crippled with pain, seething with rage, and still very much at the fucker's mercy.
"I don't give a rancid poxy shit," Deko said with a grin. His captains laughed like the good little sycophants they were. Well, all except Horralain, but then I'm fairly certain that monster didn't know how to laugh.
"He don't like her being late," Prig said. As far as I had been able to tell, the overseer barely cared if I was late or not. But then that day was a special day, and Prig knew it.
"Priggy, Priggy, Priggy. Are you arguing with me, little Priggy?" Deko asked. I heard the scuffing of boots on the floor behind us and felt Prig's grip on my arm tighten.
"No, sir."
"Good," Deko said. "Best not speak again unless I ask you to then." He sniffed and scratched at his belly. He wasn't wearing a shirt, but then I had never seen the man wear a shirt. I think he liked people to see all the scars he had. A show to make potential challengers think twice seeing all the attempts he had survived.
"I've seen you around, scab," Deko said, turning his full attention to me. "Who are you?" He looked relaxed, but his captains did not. Behind him, I could see all four of them looking as though they were ready to leap at me and tear both myself and Prig to shreds. I almost thought it would be worth drawing out that violence if it meant Prig died with me. A final fuck you to the man who made my life miserable.
There was Karn, the man the other scabs called The Butcher. Poppy, a tall woman with more scars than Deko himself. Rast, who, rumour had it, was an ex-Terrelan soldier sent to the Pit for war crimes even the brass couldn't justify. And finally, Horralain, a mountain of a man who had once wrestled a khark hound down in the arena. I have summoned a few khark hounds in my time. Monsters from the Other World, they are as large as a bear and covered in razor-sharp spikes that grow through their skin. I have seen just one of the Other World beasts tear ten men apart. They are a nightmare of teeth and claws given terrible form, and that said a lot for the man who had wrestled one and survived.
I considered lying to Deko, telling him I was the queen of Polasia just to spite them all. I have since met the queen of Polasia. I have seduced her son and sunk her favourite demonship. It's fair to say our relationship is slightly strained these days, but back then I was nobody and I doubt she would have minded my baseless claim.
"Eskara," I said, still gritting my teeth through the pain of a split cheek and my arm wrenched behind my back. There seemed little point in lying and much more to be gained by telling the truth.
Deko laughed and his captains joined in. I didn't see what was funny, and I could tell by Prig's rapid breath stirring my hair that he was just as unamused.
"How are you liking my little kingdom, Eskara?" Deko asked after a few moments.
I attempted a shrug. It's worth noting that if ever you have your arm twisted behind your back, do not attempt to shrug.
"I wouldn't recommend it to my friends," I managed to growl through the pain.
Again, Deko laughed.
"What's wrong with your eyes?" I asked. Perhaps I could have phrased the question a little better, but I was under some considerable strain.
The laughing stopped and all pretence of a smile slipped from Deko's face. He stood and took a step towards me, bending down so his eyes were level with mine. He had a big face, round, pitted, and covered in a thick mat of oily beard. His eyes shone, an unnerving sight, but I locked my gaze with his all the same, still unwilling to back down.
"What?" Deko goggled his eyes at me and I could see little red streaks snaking out from the edges towards the pupils. "Do my eyes scare you?"
"No." I said. It was a lie of sorts. Of course I was fucking scared. Terror to go right along with the anger burning like a furnace inside, but it wasn't his eyes that scared me. The mystery of why they shone was something I was clinging to. That riddle was perhaps the only thing stopping me from collapsing and sobbing my way out of the situation.
Deko stared at me for a few seconds longer before snorting and backing up to sit on his table again. "There's nothing wrong with my eyes," he said. "It's just carrot juice." Again, his sycophants laughed along with him.
I had heard many times in my youth that carrots granted good night sight, but I dismissed it as an old wives' tale. Of course, I was taking Deko's words literally at the time. I didn't understand the joke. I didn't understand that I was the joke to them.
"Tell me something, Eskara Helsene," Deko said once the laughter had faded. "What do you know about Impomancy?"
Despite the anger burning inside I felt my blood go cold. Deko knew my name— my full name— and he was asking about Sourcery. There was only one explanation. He knew who and what I was. I felt something else as well. Hunger. There was a possibility, slim as it might be, that Deko was asking about Impomancy because he had a Source. I think I would have done anything right then for a Source. Then I would have used it to turn the Pit into a glorious fucking tomb filled with the bodies of every fucking inmate down there.
I felt Prig lift my arm a little and my shoulder blazed in agony. It felt as though it were about to pop from its socket and I have experienced a dislocated shoulder more than once in my lifetime. It is not a pleasant injury.
"I know a little about the school." It was a lie, but I decided it was best to hide the full extent of my knowledge and abilities. Deko might have known I was a Sourcerer, but at the time I wasn't sure he knew just how powerful I was. Or perhaps I should say how powerful I could be. Without Sources I was nothing but a young woman in a precarious situation.
Deko nodded. "Maybe you'll be of some use then," he said. "All manner of nasties down here with us. The last adviser we had perhaps wasn't as smart as he thought. What is it, Prig?" Again, the sycophantic laughing from his captains.
Prig let go of my arm as he stepped beside me to talk to Deko.
I have always had trouble letting go of my anger. It boils inside of me for days and there is no quashing it save for violence or sex. Or sometimes violent sex. But when I was younger I only knew about the violence.
Prig started talking but I couldn't hear him over the rush of blood in my veins. I hated the fucker. I hated all of them, but I hated him so fucking much! For everything he had done to me, all the pain and humiliation. For everything he had done to Josef just for knowing me. For everything he was going to do to Isen just to bloody well get to me. I hated Prig and I wanted to see him hurt. I wanted to see him bleed. I wanted to see him die!
