“Not you, friend,” the guard smirked, unpleasantly, then raised his eyes.
“Orders from up above. You don’t get one of these, not today, at any rate.” He
moved the line along and then gave the pick to a prisoner further down the
queue.
“How do you expect us to work then?” Bruno demanded. “With our bare hands?”
“You learn fast,” the guard replied, sarcastically. “With your bare hands. The
ones with the picks hew the ore, the rest of you gather it up. With your bare
hands.”
Stefan counted the guards he could see. There were four of them positioned
around the space where the prisoners were collecting their tools. There was a
chance that they could overpower them. But only a slim chance. And once they
were free, they still had to find their way out of the mines. The only way that
Stefan knew to do that was through the long climb back to the surface, back the way they had come.
“Even if we could get our hands on a pick we’d be lucky to make it,” he told
Bruno, shaking his head. “Once we started to climb out of here they’d have us
caught like rats.”
“Then our best hope rests with Rilke,” Bruno said. “Which hardly brings me
comfort.”
“Nor me,” Stefan agreed. “But at the moment that may be all we have.”
“What are we digging for anyway?” he demanded of the guard. “If I’m going to
break my back in the service of Sigmarsgeist I’d like to know why.”
“Metal ore,” the guard replied. “To be forged into steel in the furnaces
above.”
“How much are you expecting us to dig out?” Bruno asked.
“You’ll dig till you drop,” the guard told him. “And then some. Here,” he
thrust a sack into Bruno’s hands. “Get a move on.”
The line pushed forward, marched briskly on into a linking galley on the
other side. The heat, and the reek of the bodies pressed in all around him, was
overpowering. The guards were herding the prisoners through as quickly as
possible, but progress along the galley was still slow. The floor of the mine
was slick and wet, treacherous underfoot, and the threat of a roof-fall looked
ever present. Despite the order to stay silent, sporadic conversations broke out
once more, as prisoners planned hopeless escapes, or offered prayers for their
gods to intervene on their behalf. A voice spoke, somewhere right behind Stefan.
“You can believe them about the ore if you want,” the voice muttered. “I
reckon there’s more to it than that.”
Stefan turned in the confined space of the passage, and glanced over his
shoulder. In the flickering half-light cast by the tallow lamps he could just
make out the features of the man standing a few paces to the rear of him. He
remembered that sallow, knowing face. It was the man he had spoken briefly with
whilst they were waiting to be sent to work on the walls. He looked pale and
ill, but for all that still exuded a stubborn air of survival, a refusal to give
in.
“I shouldn’t be here,” he reminded Stefan. “They owe me. It’s a
misunderstanding.”
“You said as much yesterday,” Stefan responded. “And something about how you
came to be here.”
The sallow man grinned, but there was bitterness in his smile.
“The tattooed one,” he said. “Damn him to Morr. A blessing that turned out
to be a curse, he was.”
“He’s lost his mind,” Bruno observed, not without some sympathy for the man.
“I’m not so sure,” Stefan replied. He wanted to hear more of the man’s story,
but he was too late. The prisoners were being separated out into two work
parties. Stefan, Bruno and about a dozen other prisoners were taken down a
passage to their right, their new companion taken off in the opposite direction.
Stefan caught a brief glance of the flaxen-haired Norscans, towards the tail end
of the second work-gang. The bigger of the two men turned, as if sensing
Stefan’s eyes upon him. He smiled at Stefan, his face registering neither warmth
nor humour. Stefan met his gaze for an instant, then, as the guard’s whip
cracked down, he turned away, following Bruno and the others toward the seam.
One less problem to contend with, for the moment at least.
The guards forced the pace as far as they could, but, bent almost double in
the half light of the subterranean tunnel, progress was still barely more than a
crawl. After about ten minutes the passage opened wide enough for the men to
stand upright. Here more guards waited for them and extra lanterns had been set,
but there was still barely enough light to work by The far wall of the chamber
had been hollowed out from digging, and hewn stone lay stacked in great piles to
either side. One of the guards indicated Stefan and Bruno and several others,
the fittest and strongest amongst the gang.
“Don’t stand there staring,” he barked. “This is what you’re here for. Those
that have picks, use them. Those that don’t, use the tools Sigmar gave you. I
want at least six sack-loads of ore out of every man today. You others can start
carting the loads back to the head of the mine.”
Stefan waited whilst the man ahead of him struck at the rock-face with his
pick. The first strike jarred against the solid rock, and made hardly any impact
at all. The second dislodged a fist-sized fragment of stone, and the third
another piece of about the same size. Stefan and the others moved in, and
started to pull out the fragments loosened by the work of the pick. The interior
of the mine was already roasting; a hot, stinking pit starved of both light and
air. It was going to be slow, exhausting work.
But Stefan’s sallow-faced friend might have been wrong about the purpose of
the mine. There was certainly ore here, about half the stone quarried out was
flecked with a silver metal that shone with a dull lustre in the light of the
lanterns. But, for all that, it looked like a poor return. Mining enough ore to
fill even half a dozen sacks would take an eternity.
They worked for perhaps an hour under the unwavering gaze of the guards. A
good part of the stone quarried out was useless, and at the end of that time
Stefan had managed to fill barely half a sack. At some point the guards must
have decided that the seam had nothing left to offer. New instructions were
issued, the gangs were reassigned a second time, and Stefan and Bruno found
themselves separated.
Stefan and five others were led away, deeper into the mine, to where—he
assumed—the ore-seam might be thicker. The men squeezed through another tunnel
barely big enough to accommodate their bodies, and emerged into a lower chamber
that was smaller and darker than the first. By now Stefan’s body was drenched in
sweat, and his throat parched dry. A flask of water was produced and thrust into
his hand, and Stefan drank, gratefully.
It was now so dark that Stefan could barely make out who else was in the
chamber with him, or how many. He stumbled, momentarily losing his footing on
the slippery granite floor. When he grabbed out to steady himself, a shower of
loose rock and stone fell down around him, peppering his face and shoulders. It
wouldn’t take much for the whole mine to collapse in on itself, and a man could
easily end up buried alive.
Stefan looked around, his eyes still battling the gloom, trying to orientate
himself. The voices that had been around him a moment ago had dropped away. He
had the sudden, disorientating sense of being alone inside the dark cavern of
the mine chamber. Then, out of the silence, a voice quiet but clear called out,
“Over here.”
Stefan’s first thought was that it was Rilke. He didn’t recognise the voice,
but it had been in his mind ever since they had entered the mine that Rilke had
promised to find them and help them escape. Perhaps this was part of that plan.
He couldn’t be sure either way, but took a step forward all the same. Somewhere
in the space in front of him, someone moved, emerging out of the shadows. He
still couldn’t make out the figure ahead of him, and he certainly hadn’t seen
the second, closing in behind.
And he didn’t see the knife coming at him until it was all but too late.
Anaise looked upon Zucharov, fixing him with an unblinking stare.
“Don’t delude yourself,” she told him. “Your surroundings may have changed,
but you are still a prisoner.” She paused, reflecting on her words. “You are
still
my
prisoner.”
Alexei Zucharov returned her stare with his own cold, unblinking gaze.
Through him Kyros looked upon the Guide, appraising her with a disdain that he
would never confuse with pity. How haughty she was, how proud. How greatly he
would enjoy the mighty fall of Anaise von Augen, once her work was done and her
purpose spent. But to do that he must win her trust. Kyros would see her drink
from the bottomless cup of Chaos, drink with a thirst that could never be
extinguished, then they would see who was the prisoner, and who the guardian of
the keys.
Anaise had had Zucharov brought to the chamber of the high council. The
guards had stood him in the centre of the circle of the council, the dozen
places now all empty. Anaise circled slowly around the man who, she had decided,
would become her personal slave. In truth, he excited and appalled her in equal
measure. Although his body was clearly still that of a mortal man, the sinewy flesh and terrifying musculature reminded
Anaise more of an ogre than any human creature.
Then there was the tattoo. The dark, fluid bruise covering Zucharov’s left
arm, crawling its way slowly up towards his face as if possessed of some malign
existence of its own. It was hideous, disfiguring, yet at the same time a work
of wonder. Zucharov knew that Anaise was both repelled and yet excited by it. He
sensed her longing, her desire to touch the tattoo, to feel the blood flowing in
the images beneath her fingertips.
Anaise reached out her hand, then drew back. “The pictures on your skin,” she
said, curtly. “The pictures of Sigmarsgeist, of my brother Konstantin and me.
It’s all a trick. How is it achieved?”
Zucharov moved his lips, and the words flowed from him. Slow, awkward at
first, but sonorous and clear. They were his words, but they were orchestrated
by Kyros.
“It is no trick,” he intoned. “My flesh is become a mirror to the truth. It
reflects all that has come to pass, and all that will.”
“If that is true,” Anaise replied, fighting to hold her excitement in check
“then you can show me what the future holds for me, and how I am to achieve it.”
“That future is not yet foretold,” Zucharov told her. “Your destiny is there
to be shaped, and for you to choose how to shape it.”
“What choices do I have to make?” Anaise demanded.
Zucharov’s face folded into a semblance of a smile that faded almost as
quickly as it had appeared. “You may choose to ally yourself with me,” he said,
slowly. “But I serve no mortal being. I shall not be your slave.”
“And you shall not be my equal, either,” Anaise retorted,
indignantly. “What
makes you think you can bargain with me for your salvation?”
“Tal Dur,” Zucharov reminded her, Kyros turning the words carefully upon his
servant’s tongue. “Tal Dur, and the knowledge that will allow you to claim the
prize that is your right. To allow you to rise above the failings of those
around you.”
“Such as?”
“Your brother,” Zucharov replied. “Konstantin. There is weakness within him.”
“My brother is a righteous man,” Anaise replied, her anger in that moment
genuine and impassioned. “Sigmarsgeist owes him everything. He is its creator,
its inspiration.”
“And the architect of its ruin,” Zucharov continued. “You owe him nothing.”
Anaise rose up, her face a mask of practiced fury. Around the room, guards
drew their weapons, anticipating the command. A tense silence hung upon the
council chamber. “You are deluded, and a liar,” Anaise announced. “The corruptions
of Chaos have rotted your mind.” She looked around at the guards, then,
dismissed them with a curt sweep of her arm.
“Go,” she told them. “Leave us. This creature is no threat. His body is
weighed down with iron, and his mind is enfeebled. Go about your business, you
are dismissed.”
The guards exchanged glances, wondering perhaps if they had misunderstood the
Guide’s orders. When Anaise said nothing more, but simply folded her arms across
her breast, they began, one by one to file out of the chamber. Only when they
were gone did Anaise seat herself again.
“How dare you defile my brother’s name in their hearing,” she began. “You
claim yourself worthy of my trust, yet at the first opportunity you seek to
undermine me. I should have set my men upon you like dogs.”
She glared at Zucharov, her expression a studied mask of angry grandeur. Yet
the mask was fragile. Beneath its surface was a curiosity, and an aching need
that she already found hard to deny. “You spoke the name of Tal Dur in their
presence,” she added, with less certainty now. “You are not worthy of my trust.”
Kyros was in no hurry to have Zucharov answer.
“It is those others around you that you cannot trust,” he said at last. This
is the time of change. The time for old ways to be swept aside, for a new order
to be forged. I shall guide you to Tal Dur, and I shall show you how to use its
power/
“I have no need to be taught the ways of power,” Anaise retorted. “I know how
to use it well enough.”
The smile rose again on Zucharov’s face, slow and faintly mocking. “You do
not,” he said. He held his hands up in front of his face, the heavy irons
glinting in the light. “You think this is power,” he said. “You think this is
captivity.” Zucharov flexed his wrists, tensing his muscles against the
shackles. The iron fastening groaned then suddenly snapped apart. The shattered
links sprayed across the floor of the chamber. Zucharov lifted his unfettered
arms into the air in a moment of silent triumph.
“It is not.”
Anaise flinched, involuntarily, at the sight of the chain ripped open so
effortlessly, but she held her ground, and her voice betrayed none of her
anxiety. “Are you trying to intimidate me?” she asked. “Perhaps you think you
can escape from this place at will?”