Being the Suun

by J. A. Culican

  “You're in the old tunnels,” one of them said.

  One of the only things I knew about the mines was that the original entrance was near the base of the mountain, which meant the old tunnels ran deep below the surface. I remembered Luthair saying that Arun Phina was in the bowels of the mine. Did the man really have the bravado to assign me to the same position as the very man he knew I was trying to free?

  The cart only had room for me and one of my guards, so we piled in, the guard sitting behind the wheel, one hand on the brake lever. The other guard gave us a push, and we slid down the track, picking up speed as we descended. Even with my heart in my throat and my stomach flip-flopping, I tried to keep my eyes open to memorize our path and to search for entrances and exits and hiding places. I saw nothing of use, and a few minutes into our descent, completely lost my sense of direction. There were times when the tunnel became so narrow and the ceiling so low that I had to duck my head for fear of it being lobbed off before I even had a chance to see what Arun Phina looked like.

  As the track finally leveled out, the guard pulled on the brake, coming to a smooth stop in a depot of sorts.

  “Done that before, have you?” I asked him, my legs shaking as I stood and spilled myself over the edge of the cart onto solid ground.

  “Only every time I have to bring one of you assholes down here,” he said gruffly, his bushy mustache moving more than his mouth when he spoke.

  The depot was a tall, round cavern with several adjoining tunnels leading off in different directions, like the spokes on a wheel. To my left looked to be the mess hall, a wide, open space lined with long tables and benches. To my right, dark, quiet tunnels. Living quarters, maybe? There was no obvious way out except for the way we’d come. Even the ventilation shafts, tiny holes set high in the roof, were far too small for a person of any substantial size to squeeze through.

  “D’ahvol!” a man’s voice shouted, echoing across the cavern. Then, in my own language of Ahvoli, he said, “It has been a long time since I have seen one of my own.”

  I couldn’t believe it. Another D’ahvol in Barepost. The voice belonged to a towering, barrel-chested man whose long, narrow nose and squinted eyes made him look more like a mole than a person. But his size and his fair skin gave him away for what he was, no matter how unlikely it was to find him here.

  “Foreman Haklang,” the guard said, “in Iynian, if you please.”

  Haklang smiled wide, baring crooked, yellow teeth, and clapped the guard on the shoulder with a force that could have felled a lesser man. “Oh, yes, I please,” he said in Iynian, the common language spoken in nearly all countries. “I always please.”

  The guard turned to me, rubbing his shoulder. “This is the foreman. Down here, his word is law. For the next three days, you do as you're told.” He turned to Haklang. “No special treatment just because she's D’ahvol.”

  “Never.” Haklang continued to smile.

  I liked this one.

  The guard left, activating a pulley system on the track that dragged the cart back to the entrance.

  Haklang motioned for me to follow him. He outfitted me with the belt all the miners wore with metal hooks and holsters full of pickaxes and hammers, and a helmet that was slightly too big, the visor drooping down over my eyes.

  We entered a mineshaft, the only one with any lanterns lighting the stone walls, and used hooks and ropes to secure ourselves as we descended. I could hear the distant echo of hammers and men’s voices but couldn’t see anyone yet.

  “So, tell me, D’ahvol,” he said, slipping back into Ahvoli, I thought for the sheer pleasure of it. “How do you find yourself here?”

  I shrugged, the movement causing me to slip.

  He caught me with a hand on my arm and showed me how to use the ropes, not unfastening one until the other was secure. This was . . . harder than it looked.

  “Looking for adventure. Finding only trouble and monsters to slay for a pittance.” The Ahvoli words felt strange on my tongue, but I slipped easily into my native language. It felt like coming home.

  “Ah,” Haklang said, as if it made all the sense in the world. “I, too, came to slay monsters and wound up corralling them here, instead.”

  “Why do you stay?” I wondered if he was perhaps one of the criminals bound to the mines or if he was here voluntarily.

  “The pay is good.” He navigated a particularly steep decline and then reached back to help me. “Governor Luthair is fair. And I have found at my age that sometimes safety and security are preferable to adventure and fame.”

  I did not voice my disbelief because that was when the tunnel narrowed, and the rest of the miners came into view. The mineshaft was packed with men, all of them, I realized, likely criminals. They didn’t look like criminals down here, though. They looked like tired, underfed, defeated men working to survive. Their clothes hung off of skinny frames, and most of their arms seemed barely strong enough to hold a hammer.

  “We’ve been working at this seam of coal for years,” Haklang said. “I expect there are still years of work ahead of us.”

  We were both ducking, and I could reach from one side of the tunnel to the other without moving. It felt like the whole world was going to cave in on me.

  No one else seemed affected, slouched and crowded as they were. Some men hammered at the stone wall, tossing shining, black rocks into wagons. Other men moved the wagons to the belts that would convey the rocks to the waiting carts, while still others sorted out the bits of rock and debris. The carts would transport the coal to the surface, where it could be sold to residents of Barepost to power their lamps and stoves, or loaded onto ships and sold to other colonies on Bruhier or even other countries. Coal was not Luthair’s most lucrative export, but it might have been the most abundant. And watching over it all were dozens of guards in uniform, black masks covering the bottom halves of their faces.

  Down here, escape seemed even more impossible than it had in the cart on the way in. There was no natural light seeping in, no unexplored or unattended offshoot that would miraculously lead to the outside world. It was a maze of dark, narrow tunnels that led ever downward. The world beyond the mines had disappeared. I understood now why this was the worst punishment imaginable for criminals on Barepost.

  A clamoring noise interrupted the monotonous sound of hammers and axes striking stone.

  Haklang rushed forward.

  I followed, my head ducked low and my knees bent to make me fit in the mineshaft. There was a figure sprawled on the ground, his long, grey hair fanned around his head.

  “Bertol.” Haklang hurried toward the man but stopped short as someone else came into view.

  A guard stepped forward and swung a short whip at the man. The strap cracked against the old man’s back. “Get to work.”

  The old man groaned and tried to push to his feet. Another lash fell, this one opening a gash in the white shirt. Blood stained the fabric. I started to move forward but Haklang stopped me, his arm across my shoulders. I looked at him in disbelief. Was he going to do nothing? Was he going to stand there and watch an old man be beaten to death?

  “Bertol,” Haklang said again, this time loud enough for the man to hear. “Get up, Bertol. There is work to be done.”

  Another crack of the whip, but this time, the strap fell across a broad, muscled arm.

  “Oh, Yina, help us,” Haklang said under his breath, beseeching the Guardian for assistance.

  The muscled arm snatched the whip from the guard and tossed it aside.

  The guard shouted something, but the man attached to the arm crouched down over Bertol, ignoring the guard. He was as tall and wide as Haklang, but he had a brown tint to his skin and long black hair that was pulled back with a leather thong at the nape of his neck. His muscled back strained against his shirt, which was soaked through with sweat and coal dust, but his ears were what drew my attention. The tops of them tapered into sharp points, belying his elven heritage.

  This had
to be Arun Phina.

  “You will suffer for this, elf.” The guard was trying to push his way to them, but a small crowd had gathered to watch.

  Arun Phina didn’t seem fazed by the threats. He rolled the old man over. Haklang took tentative steps toward them. I followed, not sure what I was supposed to do. This was the man I’d come to rescue. Do? Don’t? He certainly looked capable.

  Arun grunted, kneeling beside Bertol and propping him up. “Was it another attack?”

  Bertol groaned in response.

  “Get him up,” Haklang said. “I’ll take him.”

  “Stand aside.” The guard had muscled his way to us now.

  I turned to him, drawing myself up as best as I could, blocking his view of Bertol.

  “Hi,” I said. “I’m Frida. I’m new here.” I held out my hand for him to shake it.

  He looked at it as if it were diseased. “Move, D’ahvol.”

  “Can you show me where to go?” I put a hand on his shoulder, trying to turn him away. “They haven’t shown me my post yet.”

  He knocked my hand away. “Move, or it will be your turn at the end of the whip.”

  “Which end?”

  He grabbed my wrist and dragged me forward. Still unused to being hunched over, I wasn’t able to get my balance back, so I toppled forward, hitting the stone hard with my bare hands.

  But when he’d gotten past me, Haklang and Bertol were nowhere to be seen.

  Arun Phina knelt there with the whip in his hand. “I believe this belongs to you.” He offered the handle to the guard.

  The guard snatched it from him. I thought he might hit him, but then he tucked the whip into a hook on his belt. “Half rations for the rest of the day.”

  When he returned to his post and the rest of the miners had resumed their work, I turned to Arun Phina. “I—”

  “You can take over for Bertol for the rest of the day,” he interrupted. His face held none of its former easy amusement. It was straight and serious.

  “Oh,” I answered, taken aback. “I can do that.”

  Using less than three words, he showed me how to sort debris from the coal before transferring it to the carts, and then left me to my work. The whole time, I’d wanted to tell him about Tsarra Trisfina and my mission, but he’d made it clear that I wasn’t to speak, only listen and work. I wanted to resent him, but I couldn’t, not after seeing what he’d done for Bertol.

  At what I assumed was midday, a boy of about ten years brought around packs of seeds and nuts with strips of dried meat for lunch. He was dark-haired and skinny, his face and clothes filthy and his feet bare. One of his eyes was covered with a black patch on which someone had drawn a Jolly Roger.

  “You’re Frida.” He handed me my package. It wasn’t a question, more like a confirmation.

  “I am.” I leaned on the edge of the cart, peeking inside the pack. Most of the other miners had stopped to take a break, too, and the sound of hammering had been replaced by the sound of murmured conversation.

  Arun was nearby, speaking to some other young men and ignoring me, his pack of food noticeably smaller than everyone else’s. Half rations, I supposed.

  “And you are?”

  “I’m Xalph. My da’s Haklang.” He stood there, watching me expectantly.

  “Is that so?” I gnawed at the strip of meat, thinking. “And your mom?”

  He shrugged. “Da says my ma was Lark.”

  I nodded at him as if it were an entirely possible idea for him to be born from the Goddess of Mischief. Instead, Haklang’s presence here suddenly made a lot more sense. I suspected he’d gotten some Barepost woman with child years ago in the course of his adventuring and been forced by honor and duty to stay, taking a job in the mines to support his unexpected family. I wondered if she’d left as my own mother had, and I felt a tenderness in my heart toward this boy. “I take it you’re particularly mischievous, then?”

  “Da says so, and Da’s always right.”

  I offered him a nut. “Is he?”

  He took it, crunching down on it “Well, Da says so.”

  I laughed.

  Xalph beamed at me.

  I got the feeling he didn’t get much attention down here. What would it be like to be a child of the mines, raised in the dark by criminals? “Can I ask what happened to your eye?”

  “Mining accident.” Xalph puffed his chest up like this was some badge of honor, something to be proud of. He pulled up his pant leg then and showed me how one of his ankles was twisted as if it had broken and never healed right. “A tunnel collapsed on me when I was just a lad.”

  “And what are you now? An old man?”

  His face grew serious. “I’d say anyone that’s been crushed beneath a mountain and lived to tell it cannot be called a lad anymore.”

  I had no response to that, so I just offered him another nut.

  He took it, considering me while he chewed. “I like you, so I’m going to tell you something secret. The governor has me spy on people sometimes for extra coin. He came this morning and told me to keep a special eye on you.” He pointed to his one good eye and smiled, baring small yellow teeth at me.

  I wasn’t surprised to know that Luthair was watching me, but I thought it was beneath even him to use a child to do it. “What are you supposed to tell him?”

  He shrugged his bony shoulders. “Everything you do.”

  “Well, you can tell him all about my sorting abilities.” I motioned to the nearly-full cart behind me.

  “I won’t tell him anything. But will you tell me what kind of trouble we’re about to get into?”

  Over his head, my eyes found Arun Phina. “The fun kind.” I wasn’t entirely sure I was telling the truth.

  Chapter 9

  The sorting work wasn’t hard, but it was tedious. Time crawled without the sun to mark the hours. I was glad when the bell finally rang and the miners began filing back toward the depot. Even that was slow-going, with everyone worn-out from the day’s work.

  Dinner was a lumpy slop that made Gerves’s stew look good and yesterday’s luxurious meals like a distant dream. But I was starving and had no problem lowering my standards. I ate it alone at the end of one of the long tables, mostly ignored by the others who seemed to know I didn’t fit in with them.

  When I was nearly done and considering licking the bowl, Haklang appeared at the mouth of a tunnel near the back of the dining hall. “Group A to the springs,” he announced.

  A group of men stood, including Arun Phina, and trailed into the tunnel after a guard. At the last minute, Arun turned to me.

  “You’re with us.”

  I tried not to look too eager as I dumped my bowl in the wash bin and scurried after them.

  Haklang led us through a tunnel, the air growing warmer as we walked. We emerged into another large cavern lit by rows of blackened torches on the walls. Here, rocks seemed to drip from the ceiling, making columns that dipped into a clear blue pool. Steam rose from the water, and water droplets gathered on the ceiling.

  “The governor started letting us have baths after complaints about our working conditions.” Arun appeared beside me.

  “Oh.” So he was talking to me now. “Very generous, that governor.”

  Arun was already moving up in the line.

  So just keeping everyone informed. How . . . thoughtful.

  A guard handed each of us a towel, and several of the men began to strip in the main cavern. I wanted nothing more than to plunge myself in the hot water and rinse off the grime of the day, but I wouldn’t do it with an audience.

  I walked around the spring to a series of small caves and ducked inside one of the mouths, finding my own private pool. Keeping my clothes on, I lowered myself into the water. It was scalding hot, but I didn’t mind. Crouching in the pool, my feet slipping on the slick rocks, I removed my shirt and pants and underthings, and scrubbed them beneath the water. Then I laid them on a hot rock nearby to dry before turning my attention to my dusty skin an
d hair. Holding my breath, I sank to the bottom and ran my fingers through my hair, glad I wore it fairly short even if it wasn’t the style. Most of the women in Barepost kept their hair in long braids down their backs. Even men typically wore it at least to their shoulders.

  I stayed there for as long as I could stand, until my lungs strained against my chest for breath. Pushing off the bottom, I burst through the surface, inhaling the warm, wet air in the cavern.

  “Oh,” came a man’s voice.

  Startled, I turned to see Arun Phina standing in the mouth of the cave, his eyes resolutely on mine, as if he knew that to drop them to any other part of my body would mean his certain death.

  Even still, I crossed my arms over my chest, feeling my cheeks flush. The D’ahvol were not necessarily a modest people, but I still didn’t want to go around baring myself to the first handsome elf I met.

  “I didn’t know where you’d gone . . .”

  “Well, here I am.”

  His wet hair dripped onto his shoulders, darkening his white shirt. “Here you are.” He cleared his throat and turned around. “Our time is about up. We have to clear out.”

  “I’m coming. Just give me a minute to . . .” I waved a hand at my clothes even though he wasn’t looking at me anymore.

  “Yes. Sure, of course.” His hand jerked as if he wanted to say something else, and then he left.

  If I thought I could get away with it, I would have sunk to the bottom of the spring and never come back up. Instead, I made myself get out and towel off. I dressed in my damp but clean clothes and made my way out to the main cavern where the rest of my group was waiting for me.

  Arun Phina, whose cheeks I thought were a little pink, did not make eye contact with me as we followed our guard escort away from the springs.

  This time, we were led to the sleeping quarters, which was really a series of small caverns packed with cots, some of them layered on top of each other in bunks. The men climbed into their cots happily and turned off their bedside lanterns, most seeming to fall into an easy sleep belied by their loud, rumbling snores. I found an empty cot on the far wall and sat on its edge, feeling too restless to really sleep. My thoughts were with Xalph and Haklang and Arun Phina, all of them trapped here for different reasons, serving the same sentence. Surely someone would wither and die down here, without the sun and the sea and the sky.