Ash and Ambition

by Ari Marmell

  Slaves. Nycolos was no fool, regardless of what his fellow captives thought. He’d known these vermin for slavers, known since he’d been taken that he had value only to those who traded in muscle and flesh. Nonetheless, hearing the word nearly set him off once more. It was only an iron-willed effort, one that nearly had him breaking out in a new sweat, that kept him still.

  “If I’d let them harm us, or starve us, you’d have lost just as much,” was all he said.

  “You wouldn’t have starved.” The bald head shook. “You’re strong, stronger than you look.”

  Nycolos ignored the almost accusing sideways glare from Smim.

  “Assuming that doesn’t pus up and kill you with infection,” the slaver continued, pointing at Nycolos’s chest, “you’re worth any two or three of these sorry creatures. So you got one more chance. One. Step out of line, though, and you die ugly. Understood?”

  Patience. Let them have their meaningless victory. Patience…

  “I understand.”

  “Good.”

  Nycolos saw the blow coming, squeezed his fists tight against every instinct he had, and allowed it to land. Pain burst through his jaw—though less than the bald slaver might have expected—and he crashed back against the wagon before slumping to the earth.

  By the time he’d hauled himself to his feet, the examination was concluded and the other slaves were being marched back into the cage. Biting his tongue and refusing to acknowledge Smim at all, Nycolos followed.

  The wagon did not, however, lurch back into motion, not immediately. After a brief argument up near the horses, several slavers returned to the rear and entered the cage. Eyes darting nervously about them, they moved to stand over Nycolos. While one kept careful watch on the other prisoners, the second knelt and produced a few lengths of ratty bandage and a small handful of crushed leaves. These he mixed with a splash of water from a skin at his belt, then slathered it roughly across Nycolos’s chest without so much as a word.

  Nycolos wondered if he was supposed to feel something beyond the caustic pain of contact with the infection.

  No act of kindness, this. They’d just told him he was their most valuable piece of cargo; surely this was nothing more than protecting an investment. Still, if the salve did any good at all, Nycolos didn’t care why they’d provided it.

  Was it stinging, burning, a bit less? Or was that merely hopeful imagination? He sat still and focused on nothing else as the wagon once more wobbled and shook across the Outermark.

  It kept him from dwelling on the other wounds, the wounds to his pride—those he’d already suffered, and the many more he knew must lay ahead.

  ___

  Her name was Justina Norbenus, his was Rasmus. Nycolos knew that much from eavesdropping on the conversation between slavers and, presumably, their clients.

  He knew, too, that he hated them, and not merely because they prepared to purchase him like some low beast of burden.

  While the slavers had been of mixed ethnicities, boasting every tone of skin and hair, these customers were all of a single type. Even had their pallid, patrician features not been sufficient to announce their nationality far and wide, the cream-hued drapes with colorful trim they wore pinned over one shoulder—hers burgundy, his robin’s egg blue—and certainly their names, were a dead giveaway.

  Ythani.

  In his disdain for that nation’s aristocracy, Nycolos stood in accord with the majority of southern Galadras. Opportunistic, sycophantic, and bullying, Ythane remained the only human state to retain its fealty, into the modern age, to the fey of Tir Nallon, and their so-called Bronze Emperor.

  The thought brought Nycolos up short, as he stood waiting for his own examination. Could a true denizen of that declining inhuman empire see through him? His transformation was absolute, but unnatural; would it deceive equally unnatural sight? The mountain fey, with whom he’d had occasional dealings, would be unlikely to penetrate it, but the elves of Tir Nallon were a more uncanny, more uncertain thing.

  It probably wouldn’t matter. The rulers of Tir Nallon rarely appeared in the company of their human vassals. As elven focus and appetites turned ever inward, they left Ythane largely to its own devices.

  Nonetheless, the possibility, however slim, made Nycolos nervous.

  “Start with that one.”

  Several slavers marched toward Nycolos from the opposite side of the wagon, Justina and Rasmus in their midst. Their bald leader gesticulated wildly, doubtless boasting of the slave’s strength and value. Inspection of the “livestock,” to ensure the buyers received their coins’ worth, was about to begin. Nycolos, for all that the notion of being bought and sold was abhorrent to him, found himself grateful to be getting it over with.

  “He’s injured.” Justina Norbenus’s voice was taut, upper crust with a bit of an accent Nycolos could only assume was Ythani.

  “As I warned you, Lady Norbenus,” the slaver reminded her. “But with a bit of treatment—”

  “It’s far worse than you led me to believe, Sanish. You cannot possibly expect me to pay full price for damaged merchandise.”

  Deep breaths. Don’t react.

  “He’s quite strong. He’ll make a good worker.”

  “Are you?” It took Nycolos a moment to realize she addressed him directly, now, since she couldn’t be bothered to look him in the eye. “Are you as strong as Sanish claims you are?”

  “I don’t know. How strong does Sanish claim I am?”

  Now the aristocrat did glare directly at him, with something less than amusement in her expression. The bald man—Sanish, apparently—flickered swiftly from murderous glower to sickly smile. “As I said, he can be a bit mouthy. But he’s learned his lesson about disobedience or causing trouble.”

  Oh, have I?

  Justina snapped her fingers, then pointed imperiously at a pile of stones that must have been placed here, at the edge of their camp, specifically for this purpose. “I want those in the wheelbarrow. Given that you seem incapable of keeping either your mouth or your injury shut, you had better be quite strong indeed.”

  Swallowing his disgust, Nycolos swiftly and efficiently loaded the rocks. It took some doing—the task didn’t come nearly as easily as it might have, had he been willing to resume his earlier strength—but he was winded only a little by the time he finished. “I could do even better,” he noted, returning to his spot by the wagon, “if I could get this wound properly treated.”

  The woman nodded, more to Sanish than to him, and moved on to the next slave. Rasmus—seemingly some sort of bodyguard or lieutenant to Justina—snarled something unintelligible at him before following.

  Nycolos ignored him, instead examining the mining camp that would apparently be his home for a while. Built up against one of the peaks of the northern Outermark Mountains, the structures were surprisingly roomy and well constructed. Logs were carefully slotted together to avoid shifting or drafts, and the roofs were evenly shaked. Smoke curled languidly from several chimneys: Cooking fires, to judge by the aroma of meat lurking within. Some sort of stable or corral stood nearby, its presence betrayed by the smell of horse and horse-leavings, but from this angle it must have been concealed behind one of the other buildings.

  Of the few people moving to and fro between those buildings, most were clad either as Justina and Rasmus were, or wore sculpted breastplates and greaves, and carried spears. The bulk of the slaves were doubtless asleep, and probably confined to the mines themselves, rather than the more comfortable quarters enjoyed by camp personnel.

  The observant prisoner couldn’t help but note that the guards made a regular practice of looking up, into the darkening night sky, as well as around. Clearly these Ythani weren’t careless, whatever else might be said of them. They’d heard and taken seriously the rumors that a colony of wyverns hunted the peaks of the Outermark.

  Nycolos knew well it was more than mere rumor—though the wyverns spent most of their time further south. If they were here now, he won
dered idly, could I convince them of who I am? Or would I die as just another few mouthfuls of prey?

  Hardly the most pleasant way I could possibly go, but surely among the most ironic.

  “…for the whole lot of healthy ones,” Justina was saying as she and the slavers wormed their way back into Nycolos’s attentions.

  Sanish, despite his nod, was frowning. “In what coinage?”

  The woman looked at him as if he’d just asked the color of her unmentionables. “Ythani dinar, of course.”

  “It’s just, not everyone is entirely happy about taking—”

  “Silver is silver.”

  “This is a mine! Couldn’t we—?”

  “It’s not a silver mine,” she reminded him with a sneer.

  “Well, what are you—?”

  “Ythani dinar, Sanish. Take it or leave it. You’ve been good to work with, but you’re hardly the only slaver.”

  “Fine.” He chomped each word from the others like jerked meats. “You have a bargain.”

  “I’m so glad. Rasmus, please take our new workers to their pallets. Oh, Sanish?”

  The bald slaver grunted.

  “If you’re going to kill the rejects, please take them further from camp. We had real problems with carrion eaters and vermin last time.”

  Nycolos scarcely turned his head at the gasps and cries as a handful of prisoners were separated from the rest. Of course some would be deemed inappropriate for mining work, and it couldn’t possibly be worth the slavers’ time to transport them all the way back across the Outermark in hope of another buyer. Poor fortune for them, but not anything he—

  “Master?”

  A whisper, scarcely audible even to him, but enough. Now he did turn, tensing as Smim was shoved into the smaller group. Standing upright beside the others, it was clear why he’d been rejected. Although tall for one of his people, Smim only came up to about the ribs of the man beside him.

  “The goblin is far stronger than his size suggests,” Nycolos called out.

  Rasmus spun, a short bullwhip seeming to unfold from nowhere in his fist. “Nobody told you to speak, slave!”

  Justina, at the same moment, snapped, “I’m not paying good silver for a goblin.” Revulsion dripped from her voice, so thick Nycolos was surprised it didn’t form into a puddle large enough to slip in.

  What now? Nycolos couldn’t fight the lot of them, wasn’t willing to risk his life for his servant—not without some reasonable chance of victory. Yet standing helpless while his only companion was wrested from him was intolerable. What should he—?

  It was Smim himself who saved him the trouble. “If I might be permitted to offer up an argument on my own behalf?”

  The humans stared. “And now he’s mocking us with his speech!” Rasmus accused.

  “I assure you,” the goblin protested, “it is most certainly not with my speech.” Then, before the taskmaster could work through that one, “If my elocution seems formal to you, it is only because I learned the human languages with which I’m familiar from…” A quick, subtle glance at Nycolos. “…a teacher and master who insisted on being addressed thus.”

  Nycolos had always felt the precise decorum was his due, but now he felt a touch of embarrassment over it.

  “I don’t care how you talk—” Rasmus began, but a gentle cough silenced him.

  “Very well, goblin,” Justina challenged. “Convince me.”

  “For one, my frame allows me to work in spaces that might be excessively confining for a human of comparable strength. Of greater import, however, is my sight. You require workers for a mine? I can see far beyond any of your human laborers, and in greater detail, with only the faintest torch- or candlelight.”

  The noblewoman leaned in, whispering to her lieutenant. “Yes, that might prove useful,” she acknowledged after a brief exchange. “Rasmus, have two of the men take him into the mountain to prove his claim. If he’s telling the truth, we’ll buy him. If not, Sanish won’t have to kill him.”

  Nycolos watched Smim marched away, relieved not to lose his only ally.

  Then Justina’s guards gathered around, leading the slaves at an awkward shuffle into the mines, and relief faded to the last thing on Nycolos’s mind.

  Chapter Two

  “Cart!”

  Nycolos muttered something vile under his breath and wrestled with the wooden frame, forcing the conveyance to rotate on protesting, grinding wheels. Had the tunnel been wider, he might have had an easier time with the various maneuvers his new duties required of him, but their Ythani masters saw no need to “waste” the labor required to enlarge the mine. After all, the narrow confines weren’t inconveniencing them overmuch.

  I’d have been wiser to make a poorer showing of my damn test.

  In order to best make use of Nycolos’s obvious strengths, without putting a pickaxe or other potential weapons in his hands, they’d expanded the loading and hauling of rocks from test to task. It was his responsibility to clear away the rubble his fellow slaves left behind in their search for more valuable ores. Hour after hour, for days now, his life had consisted of pushing the damn cart up and down uneven tunnels of sagging and poorly buttressed roofs, pausing only long enough to load up here or empty out there before making another pass. The almost ebony hues of his skin were concealed beneath a patina of sweat-matted dust, and he had discovered the delightful twin experiences of blisters and calluses for the first time in his life.

  His chest wound, at least, had been treated—adequately, if not well—and might have begun to show some signs of healing had his labors not constantly aggravated it. The lessening of the pain was more than countered by the frustration caused by his knowledge that, if they’d just give him some time, it might be far better still.

  Between that, the exhaustion, the constant hunger, and the overall humiliation, Nycolos’s mood could best be described as “borderline murderous.” He’d found swiftly that he was best served keeping his mouth shut and speaking as little as necessary, lest he come out and accidentally say something he’d soon regret.

  It was an attitude the guards appreciated just fine, and if it didn’t earn him any friendships among the other slaves, at least it didn’t earn their enmity either. Most of them had, early in their captivity, felt similarly. Nycolos, in turn, felt no particular animosity, and even a faint sense of camaraderie and shared purpose, with his fellow captives.

  “You! Rock boy! Hurry it up!”

  Well, with most of them.

  Nycolos stabbed a rancorous glower at the speaker—a grizzled “veteran” of the mines, one slave among a handful who were given small clubs and no observable duties Nycolos had yet seen, who snickered with one of his companions—and made a small show of stacking more broken stone into the already overloaded cart.

  “Sorry about that.” Keva, a wiry worker of mixed but light-skinned heritage and no obvious nation, shrugged an apology, then waved his heavily scarred pick over the heap of rubble his efforts had left scattered about. “I told them I didn’t need this cleared away yet, but…” A second shrug.

  Nycolos grunted noncommittally. Then, more because his fellow slave seemed to expect it than because he had any desire for conversation, “I’d have had to get around to it eventually, one way or the other.”

  It was Keva’s turn to grunt, and then the smaller slave went back to pounding at the wall, half-stumbling a step with a chorus of small clatters. He wore a pair of rusty manacles around his ankles, long enough to let him work but restrictive enough to occasionally get in his way—and definitely enough to keep him from running. Perhaps one in three or four slaves were similarly restrained. Nycolos guessed they all had escape attempts or some other disobedience in their past.

  He started to turn away, grappling again with the cart whose high-pitched screeches of protest echoed in the cramped mine in way that the flatter impact of steel on rock did not. Those efforts were interrupted, however, by the appearance of Rasmus himself, followed by a pair of buc
ket-toting slaves. “Water break! Ten minutes!”

  Nobody actually dropped their tools—that could only bring trouble—but they laid them down swiftly and sat or leaned against the rocky walls, catching their breath, wiping feebly at perspiration and dirt, waiting for the buckets to reach them.

  Perhaps spurred on by the low hum of other conversations, Nycolos decided now was as propitious a time as any to learn more of his new—however temporary, he swore—home.

  “Collaborators?” he whispered to Keva, aiming his chin at the older slave who’d summoned him earlier.

  “More or less, yeah. Prove yourself trustworthy, and just maybe you get guard or oversight duty instead of rock pounding. Or hauling,” he added.

  “Hmm.”

  “The old man you talked to is Veddai. The, uh, ‘collaborators’ don’t have a rank structure, but if they did, he’d be near the top. Been watching over us for a while, now.”

  Nycolos felt his brow furrowing. “There are an awful lot of guards here,” he noted. “Surely more than necessary just to keep us from being troublesome.”

  It was the taskmaster, Rasmus, who answered as he approached, whip dangling with a deceptively gentle sway from his belt. “Rival miners in the area. And they wouldn’t treat you near as nice as we do.”

  “That… seems odd,” Nycolos objected, trying to couch his doubt in more delicate terms than he felt. “Surely this mine isn’t producing so much ore as to make a raid worthwhile. Besides, shouldn’t the guards be outside the mine, then? An attack’s not going to come from—”

  “Shut your mouth and mind your own duties, slave! Unless you want to go without your water ration this afternoon.”

  Nycolos clapped his lips together, but his mind was racing. Not only was the lie obvious to anyone with a brain in his head, but he couldn’t shake the suspicion that Rasmus had no good reason for the deceit. He just enjoyed even so petty a display of power over his captives.

  “Gnomes,” Keva breathed, leaning in. “I know it sounds insane, but—”