by Jodi Taylor
‘Ready when you are. I’ll set the fire. You get him away. Don’t wait for me. We can make our way back to the pod separately.’
‘For God’s sake, be careful in the brickyard, Max. I don’t want to have to rescue you, too.’
I stood straight, radiating classy but strangely unaccompanied Babylonian matron, inexplicably wandering around a brickyard and what are you going to do about it, buster? ‘We have to get this right. This is our one chance.’
‘Understood. He knows we’re here. He’ll be expecting something.’ He paused. ‘If this goes wrong, we could all of us be working in the brickyard this time tomorrow.’
‘If we’re lucky.’
I crossed the rickety old bridge and began to walk slowly towards the yard. I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. Within the compound, Clerk appeared able to come and go as the work demanded. He wasn’t manacled or restrained in any way. And it wasn’t an enclosure. There wasn’t even a formal gate. The canal was one boundary, a dusty track another, the next-door brickyard another, and the dilapidated old building the fourth. We should be able to do this. But if anything went wrong then the consequences – especially for Clerk – would be dire. As I’d said – we only had the one chance.
I felt for my matches. All historians carry a small stash of basic supplies. Matches, a compass, water-purification tablets . . . Box in one sweaty hand, match in the other, I set off, walking slowly along the track, because rapid movement tends to attract attention. I looked straight ahead, not catching anyone’s eye, but no one shouted. No one even seemed to notice me. Past a couple of empty crates. Past the pile of old wood. I stood with my back to the straw, looking around as if lost. Most of the slaves had their backs to me. The foreman and the clerk were still engrossed in their clay tablet.
Now.
I made myself strike the match slowly and calmly. Don’t stab at it. Don’t snap the match. Because if that happened then I’d have to fumble for another one and believe me, I was horribly exposed at that moment. Taking a deep breath, I struck the match and waited for it to flare. Stooping a little so it wouldn’t have far to fall, I dropped it on to the straw. It disappeared into the depths without so much as a flicker and believe me, that was a very nasty moment.
One endless second later – not very long but easily long enough for me to imagine every disaster under the sun – I caught a little whiff of smoke. Time to go. I strolled away, hearing the straw begin to crackle behind me. Picking up the pace, I exited the compound, hurrying along the bank and back over the canal.
I paused on the other side of the bridge, stun gun hidden in the folds of my shawl, pepper spray ready in case I was needed as back-up, but Sands was already in the compound, lurking unobtrusively behind one of the many vats of something.
Part of the brickmaking process was repeated heating and cooling and I suspected fires happened quite regularly because everyone seemed to know what to do. Three or four men seized hides hanging from a hook, apparently just for this very purpose and began to slap at the flames. Others ran for buckets and containers, including Clerk who shouted, ‘I’ll get water!’ In English admittedly but he was gesturing at the canal and the inference was clear. Seizing a leather bucket, he ran in the direction of the canal and then veered off at the last moment, running between the workshop and the packed crates. Sands grabbed at him and began to pull him away. Somewhere a dog began to bark. I hung around long enough to make sure no one followed them. They didn’t – their attention was entirely on the rapidly spreading fire and the immediate damage – and so I pressed on ahead and then looked back to see what was happening. Because that worked so well for Lot’s wife, didn’t it?
They weren’t far behind me. Sands was holding Clerk up. His legs were all over the place – a combination of nerves, exhaustion and the weakness that frequently follows overwhelming relief. No one was behind them but an ominous pillar of smoke spiralled up into the sky. Oh God, don’t say I’d burned down the fabled city of Babylon.
I ran to meet them and together we helped Clerk into the pod. I slapped the door shut on the world outside and he was safe. Whatever his life had been these past few months, that was over now. But it would take a while for that to sink in.
Clerk collapsed on to the floor and put his head in his hands, rocking to and fro. He must have dreamed of this moment for so long, used it to keep himself going during endless days of back-breaking toil. I know from experience you can keep going during the tough bits. It’s the sudden relief of knowing that it’s all over that knocks the legs out from underneath you.
We gave him a moment. I busied myself with the kettle to give him a little privacy and Sands helped him drink some water.
He was filthy. Smothered in dirt and dust and telltale blue splashes from the dye that would mark him out as a runaway slave. I handed him his tea.
‘Don’t burn your mouth.’
He sipped, closed his eyes for a moment, then sipped again. Then the rest of it disappeared faster than bathwater down a plughole.
There were so many cuts and bruises on his arms and legs which could have been occupational, but when he leaned forwards, I saw several fresh, red scars across his back. There was an awful lot of matted hair and beard, as well. He looked incredibly frail.
I was desperate to know about Prentiss, but this moment belonged to Clerk. First things first. ‘Are you hungry?’ I said. ‘Would you like something to eat? Or more water?’
He reached out his hand to me as if he still didn’t quite believe it was me. ‘Max . . .’
I gripped it with both of mine. His was rough and calloused and his nails thick and broken.
‘I’m sorry we took so long to get to you. How long has it been?’
‘Over a year, Max.’ His voice was hoarse with disuse.
I stared at Sands. Oh God. A year. A year in hell. I took in the bruises, scrapes, insect bites, the all-over damage . . .
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I’m so sorry.’
He shook his head. ‘It’s me that should say sorry. I lost faith. I waited every day. Everyone who walked past – I looked up, expecting to see . . . And no one came, Max. No one.’
His voice cracked. I looked at Sands. I’d never seen him look so grim.
I passed Clerk more water. Little sips and often were the way to go.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Those first weeks nearly killed me. And every time I couldn’t keep up and flogging didn’t work, they sold me on. I don’t know where I would have ended up next because you can’t get much lower than the brickyards.’ He grinned without amusement. ‘They must have thought I was too feeble even to be a flight risk. I wasn’t even worth a set of manacles. You get fed by the number of bricks you produce and I’ve been on less than half-rations for months. I didn’t have the strength to escape – and where would I have gone anyway? – so I just got on with it. Every day.’ He looked away. ‘And then, after a while you just stop hoping.’
This was true. Something similar had once happened to me when I’d been marooned back in 1399. At some point, you do give up on the past – which ironically is the future. You accept your fate and just concentrate on survival. At least he’d still had that survival instinct. I wondered at what point he would have quietly given up on everything? What would have happened to him then? Sold on again? Or pushed out and left to die on the streets? Or quietly strangled, his body tossed outside the walls for the desert dogs?
Clerk went on. ‘And there’s none of this let’s all stick together and I’m Spartacus crap. There are so many different nationalities here we could barely communicate with each other. The weakest lost their rations to the strong. I once went nearly three days without food until I stopped being Mr Nice Guy and became as ruthless and vicious as everyone else. There was one bloke – I stole his food . . . He was too weak to defend himself . . .’
Tears ran down his face.
&n
bsp; I gripped his hands. ‘It’s over. It’s all over. We’ll find Prentiss and then we’re all out of here forever.’
He shook his head. ‘No.’
A terrible fear gripped me.
‘She’s not . . . ?’ I couldn’t say it.
‘No, she’s not dead.’
Sands looked across at me. This was an astounding piece of good fortune, but we were both thinking the same thing. We shouldn’t press him too hard. Let things proceed at his pace.
‘Start at the beginning,’ I said. Sands found a ration tray for him and pulled the heating tab. ‘Tell us what happened.’
Clerk gobbled and talked at the same time. ‘Hyssop and her bloody idiots are what happened. I tell you, Max, this is the second time I’ve been screwed by amateurs.’
Which was true. The idiot Halcombe had done something similar and Clerk’s team had borne the brunt of that as well. There had been a fish fight in Caernarvon of which we were not proud.
‘What exactly happened?’
‘I don’t know what they did – they were behind me. We’d finished at Esagila. Prentiss and I were packing our gear and moving away. I know Hyssop was somewhere around – I’d seen her out of the corner of my eye. The temple precinct was pretty much deserted after the festival. There didn’t seem to be anyone around, just a few slaves clearing away the rubbish left over from the festival. I heard that idiot – the Scottish one . . .’
‘Scarfe,’ I said.
‘Yeah. He was behind me. I heard him say, “Back in a minute,” and when I turned around, he was trotting into the courtyard. Prentiss hadn’t seen any of it and was moving out. She was going one way and he was going the other. I called him back and he ignored me. I said to Hyssop to get him back and she said just a moment. He disappeared inside. Ten, twenty seconds, Max, certainly no more, and then he was back out again. There still wasn’t anyone around and I was beginning to think he’d got away with it after all and suddenly – from nowhere – there were people shouting, pointing, waving their arms . . .
‘It was chaos. We scattered. I don’t know where Hyssop and Scarfe went. I could hear her shouting to Scarfe. I don’t know what she was shouting but it certainly wasn’t “Save the historians at all costs” – and then they grabbed me.
‘I think they thought because Hyssop was female that it was me who had told them to violate the sanctum. That I was the one in charge. Which I should have been,’ he added bitterly, shaking his head. ‘I shouted to Prentiss to run. I didn’t even have time to use my com. Prentiss had no idea what was happening until they grabbed her so she wouldn’t have had time either. The priests started to drag us away. I thought Hyssop’s clowns would intervene and it would just be a case of running like hell back to the pod but . . .’ He stopped again. ‘They split us up.’ He swallowed. ‘Prentiss was dragged away. She put up a hell of a fight. One of them punched her. She stopped screaming.’
Clerk stared blankly at the wall. ‘I struggled to get an arm free. To call for help. Someone hit me from behind and everything’s a bit cloudy after that. At some point in the struggle I’d lost my earpiece and com. I can only assume the same happened to Paula or that she was unconscious as well. When I woke up, I was outside the city. I was there for a while. There was a compound. Full of men. I kept waiting for Hyssop. Or if not her then you. That someone would be along any moment . . . Nothing happened. No one came.’ He struggled for a moment. ‘And then I wondered if Prentiss might be dead and everyone thought I was as well so you weren’t looking for us at all.’
He stopped again.
‘We looked for you everywhere,’ I said, desperate that he should know this. ‘Everyone who could be spared from St Mary’s was here. And a few who couldn’t. Everyone pitched in. We had tag readers, proximities, the lot. We searched. We shouted. Why couldn’t we find you?’
‘Well, the only thing I can think is that when I came round, I was out in the desert. It was night and I was looking up at the stars. Most of my clothes had gone. I think we were at an oasis somewhere. I’m sorry I don’t know for how long. Time was . . . strange. I couldn’t seem to measure it.’
I nodded. One of the symptoms of concussion.
‘I thought it had only been a day or so but I discovered later it wasn’t. Then I was moved again. I had no idea what was going on.’
‘Do you know where you were?’
‘Well, I suppose you’d call them some sort of holding pens. There were a lot of people about. We were divided up into groups. I’ve no idea what the criteria were. I don’t know how long I was out there but they fed and watered us reasonably well. Keeping us in good condition for the sale, I suppose.
‘Then, after a while, I don’t know how long, a load of men turned up and we were filtered back into the city again. About a hundred a day, I think. Presumably they didn’t want to flood the market.
‘We arrived just before dawn and I was sold before lunchtime. It’s . . . a pretty humiliating experience, Max.’
I nodded.
‘My first job was hauling timber. They harnessed us like horses and we pulled great loads of it through the desert. My hands bled, my shoulders bled, my sandals fell apart so my feet bled . . . after a while I couldn’t work so I ended up in some sort of kitchen, I think, carrying water. That wasn’t too bad but it didn’t last long and then I was humping rocks for a while, until I couldn’t do that any longer and then I ended up at the brickyard. I’d given up by then. I never thought anyone would find me.’
I sighed. I hadn’t yet told him this was our last jump. ‘Do you know where Paula is?’
‘Yes, yes, I do. She’s here. In the city.’
I nearly fell off my seat. ‘What? She’s been here all this time?’
‘I don’t know if she’s been here the whole time – maybe something similar happened to her. Perhaps all slaves are taken outside the city. It was a big holding area and we were all men. I assume they kept the women elsewhere. Is there another tray?’
‘You can have one more,’ said Sands, passing him one. ‘And another in a couple of hours. You can’t have forgotten the drill already. Eat and drink little and often.’
Clerk nodded and pulled the heating tab.
‘Prentiss,’ I reminded him, gently.
‘I honestly thought I was alone for the rest of my life – which wasn’t going to be very long – and then . . . one day . . . I was on water detail. We have to keep the water barrels filled up. Brickmaking is like a production line and if it has to stop for any reason – such as no water – then a lot of people get very annoyed. Anyway, no one ever wants to do it. Trudging endlessly to the canal and back for water . . . it’s hard work. It was my turn and the sun was sucking the energy out of me. I was filling my umpteenth pitcher and . . .’ he laughed, ‘I looked across to the other bank, quite casually, and there she was, filling her own pitcher. I couldn’t believe it. I shouted. Typically, everyone looked at me except Paula. I shouted again. I shouted so loudly I hurt my throat. She looked up and there I was coughing like a madman. I waved but I don’t think she knew who I was. She crouched there for ages, just looking at me. She didn’t wave. She didn’t do anything. Then she stood up. Before I could do or say anything, she picked up her pitcher and ran away. I couldn’t lose her. I didn’t stop to think at all. I jumped in the canal and swam across – it’s not very wide at that point. People were laughing at me. I scrambled out – dripping wet – and followed on in the direction I thought she’d taken.’
He ripped the cover off his second tray and got stuck in. Chicken stew by the smell of it. Sands and I exchanged glances. A second piece of luck. Things were looking up. About bloody time.
I hardly dared ask. ‘Did you find her?’
He chewed, swallowed and nodded. ‘Yes. There was no way I was going to let her disappear. I caught up with her behind the back of someone’s animal pen and the next thing we were surro
unded by a herd of idiot goats who thought we’d brought their lunch.’
Neither Sands nor I asked what passed between them. That would be private.
‘Do you know where she is now?’
He nodded.
‘I think so. She described the street. The shop at the end, she said. The silk merchant’s. She couldn’t stay. Her owner gets nervous if she’s away too long. And I had to get back to the compound before they missed me . . . You don’t want to be an escaped slave in this city. Or rather, you don’t want to be a recaptured escaped slave in this city. If they caught us . . . if they chopped off our hands and feet . . . or blinded us . . . Anyway, after that I volunteered for water duty whenever I could. It’s a shit job and no one else wanted it so I got down to the canal quite often, but I never saw her again. She was reasonably dressed so I suspect she’s a house slave, rather than working in a brothel or worse, but I don’t know.’
His voice was rising. He seemed ashamed he hadn’t tried harder to escape. Looking at him now I suspected that some days, he barely had enough strength to take one step after another.
Sands put his hand on his shoulder. ‘Calm down, mate. We’re St Mary’s. We’ll get her out. This time tomorrow you’ll both be back home again.’
Clerk shook his head. Hair flew everywhere. ‘No, you don’t understand.’ He put his tray down and put the heels of his hands to his eyes. ‘She was pregnant and that was months ago.’
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
I sat back on my heels. Now we had a real problem. Not so much if Prentiss was still pregnant. We could get her out. But if she’d had the child and it had survived, we couldn’t take it out of its time. Not without bringing the Time Police down on us again. And they might – probably would – take the opportunity to reopen the Troy investigation as well, which definitely wasn’t something we could afford to have happen. Especially without Dr Bairstow to keep them at bay. So, the child had to stay and if the child stayed then it was almost certain Prentiss would stay too. It couldn’t be more than a few months old and needed its mum. And if she abandoned her baby and it was a female child then it might well end up exposed on one of the municipal dumps or left outside the city gates for the wild dogs to carry off. No, I couldn’t see Prentiss saving herself at the expense of her child.
