Siegestone: Book 1 of the Gemstones and Giants Trilogy

by E. S. Maya

  “Now,” Noth said, as she passed the bucket to Goggles, “our last task for today is to assemble your mining teams. There’s five recruits to a team, so choose carefully. They’ll be the boys you work with for as long as you’re at Camp Cronus.” He glanced sideways. “Ain’t that right?”

  “That’s right, boss,” one of the fifth-years answered.

  “You’ll be responsible for each other’s yields when one of you is sick or injured,” Noth continued. “You’ll see each other’s ugly face every morning at chow. Hell, if you’re lucky, they could even be your way out of camp.” As his yellow eyes swept over the first-years, Safi tried her best to appear small. “There’s fifty of you fatherless bastards, so we’ll need ten volunteers for captains, who will be solely responsible for their teams. You’ll get a pay raise, too. Team captains, step forward!”

  A handful of first-years stood quickly. Others walked over with hesitation. Safi entertained the idea, being captain of a team. But being a miner was hard enough. She kept her bottom planted firmly in the grass.

  The tenth boy to stand was Wulf. He took his time walking to the boulderstone, standing at the end of the lineup.

  “We’ll go down the line,” Noth said. He grunted at the first boy. “Make your call, recruit.”

  The team captains chose the strongest, fittest boys first. Boys who had come to Blackpoint for reasons other than a lack of food in their homes. When it came Wulf’s turn, he clicked his tongue and nodded at Stiv, who, with a great smile, leapt to his feet and joined him.

  Safi scooted closer to Goggles. He wrapped his arms over his knees. She did the same. “Think we’ll get chosen soon?” she whispered.

  Goggles shrugged. “We’ll all get picked eventually.”

  The next round went by, halving the crowd to twenty-one. Wulf clicked his tongue at Goggles, who climbed to his feet and walked away without so much as a word.

  And Safi was alone. She was certain that no one would choose her until the very end. That meant Wulf, Stiv, and Goggles would be stuck with the only girl. No other choice, she supposed, except to be the one who holds her friends back. She shut her eyes and lowered her head, listening to the boys call out to their teammates.

  Safi prayed to the Titans, to God, to anyone who would listen, even to old sleeping Cronus in the distance. Don’t let me be last. Anything but last.

  Eleven miners left, the weakest of the weak. Ten scrawny boys and an even scrawnier girl. It was Wulf’s turn now, and she couldn’t bear to look. She kept her head down and her eyes shut. Someone was clicking their tongue. Then, a sharp whistle.

  Two nearby boys shook her to attention.

  Safi peeked opened one eye. Over at the boulderstone, Wulf and Stiv were waving their arms. They were smiling, too, and looking straight at her.

  Beaming, Safi staggered to her feet and ran stumbling over. She thought to give Wulf the biggest hug of his life, or at least the biggest hug that a girl like her could muster. But the other boys were watching, so she offered her hand instead.

  Wulf gave her a firm handshake. “Welcome to the team.”

  “Thanks,” Safi said. When he let go, she pressed her hand to her heart.

  Stiv stepped between the two and threw his arms over their shoulders. “I told him not to do it, but Wulf couldn’t say no. Promise not to let us down, Blondie.”

  After the other first-year mining teams had finished choosing their final members, a single boy remained seated in the sparsely-grassed field. Safi watched him climb to his feet. His cheeks were dark and gaunt, and the seams of his work shirt sat halfway down his arms. As Wulf and the boys took turns greeting him, she felt her heartbeat quicken. How hadn’t she noticed him sooner?

  She reached out to shake his dark, trembling hand.

  The hand of a fellow Abed.

  22

  Matters of Strength

  The recruits awoke each morning and, under the watchful eyes of the fifth-years, spent their days beating themselves back down again. At night Safi curled in a ball, her body hurting in ways she never knew it could, and in places she never even knew existed.

  The kitchen girls kept Raven almost exclusively on knife duty. When needed she tended the serving counter, testing the effects of her batting eyelashes and sultry-voiced impressions. This continued until Matilda snagged her by the apron and dragged her to the back for a good talking to. Raven was far more careful after that—careful to not get caught.

  Rebecca worked long hours in the tailory. She spent her evenings sitting cross-legged in bed, continuing her work out of a small wooden box she kept hidden between her mattress and bunk frame. For hours her long, precise fingers sewed together colorful scraps of fabric. The girl of Resmyr continued her absentminded work until lights out, and sometimes, Safi noticed, even after.

  By the end of the workweek, the first-years were beat. It may have been the steady diet of three square meals a day, or perhaps the constant help from Wulf and Stiv, but, somehow, Safi survived. Even her boots found compromise, the mud-stained cowhide shaping to her blistered feet.

  Blessing Day came. Safi had planned on spending the day in bed, but, once again, Raven was shaking the sleep from the poor girl’s bones. “Go away,” she groaned, pulling her blanket up to her forehead. Daylight filled the barracks for once, a nice change from the blue of morning.

  “Something’s going on,” Raven grumbled, tugging at each of Safi’s toes. “Saw some girls walking off with the boys, up towards the Titan…”

  “Who cares?” Safi swiped her hair off her pillow, burying her face in its warmth. “Wake me if Cronus gets up. Otherwise, begone!”

  Raven traced a fingernail across the underside of Safi’s feet. They made a hasty retreat underneath her blanket. “I think I might’ve seen Wulf with them.”

  Safi opened her eyes. For a moment she stared at her pillow. Then she leapt out of bed. “Let me get dressed.”

  Safi sat at the edge of her bed, smoothing her dress down her thighs. After a week of work shirts and overalls, it felt good to dress like a girl again. Rebecca sat on her knees behind her, combing the knots from her hair while she laced her work boots tight.

  Raven paced impatiently before them. Finally, she threw up her arms. “Would you two make haste!”

  “The Titan isn’t going anywhere,” Safi said, then winced. Rebecca’s hands were anything but gentle. “Besides, I can’t go out with my hair looking like this.”

  Raven cocked her head. “Blondie, no one cares about your hair.”

  “I care,” Safi said, knotting her leather bootlaces. “And you don’t know that.”

  Rebecca glowered at Raven over the top of Safi’s head. “I care too.” With Safi’s hair adequately tamed, Rebecca rose from the bed and went to put her comb away. Returning from her bunk, she looked over the girls with a frown. “I’ll have to make us some nicer Blessing Day clothes. Perhaps after payday next month.”

  “Yes, yes,” Raven said, ushering them towards the barracks door. “Worry about it next month!”

  Safi spotted a handful of boys outside, taking the north road out of the Fivers’ Camp. The three of them followed at a distance, passing crudely built storage shacks, piles of lumber, and mounds of gray dust. Then the warden’s oasis came into view, and what a view indeed. She would sooner spend the day frolicking in the grass than whatever had Raven all riled up.

  They walked on, keeping a good distance from both the meadow and the Cronus’ left foot. Safi rubbed the chill from her arms as they passed beneath its shadow. The sole of the Siege Titan loomed perilously high, looking like it could fall over at any moment.

  Looking down, Safi found her hands clinging to the skirt of Rebecca’s dress.

  Rebecca wriggled free and showed her a stern smile. “A tough Titan miner like you is afraid of a wall of rocks?”

  “Or the dead body of an ancient god!” Raven said, throwing up her palms in the fashion of a traditional Abedi prayer.

  “That’s offensive,” Safi
said, smacking the girl on the arm. “Who even taught you that?”

  Raven’s hand flew to the stinging spot. “Just a week with the boys and you’ve become so violent!”

  “Never heard you complain about violence before,” Safi teased. When Raven’s head was turned, she poked at the bandage patched over her left cheek.

  Raven made a shrieking sound somewhere between pain and laughter. “I’m gonna tear every blonde hair from your head!”

  Safi burst into a run, screaming with laughter every time Raven, who chased close behind her, slapped at her left wrist, where the tattooed Blackpoint emblem remained sore against her skin.

  “Wait for me!” Rebecca cried, swinging her arms and striding after them.

  Safi looked up, feeling smaller than a bug as they turned the wide, rounded corner of Cronus’ left foot. They raised their hands to their foreheads, for the morning sun was blinding. Then, as they walked between the Siege Titan’s mountainous feet, she narrowed her eyes and gasped.

  Two great pillars lay sideways across the horizon, starting from the dust and reaching into the sky. Here were the stone legs of the giant. They joined at Cronus’ torso, a pair of converging mountains, and together framed two sides of a triangular orange field.

  Beside her, Raven and Rebecca appeared to be just as astonished as she was. They paused their step, for several hundred Fivers’ Camp boys were pooled at the center of the field. The crowd seemed to shimmer with each slight movement of their matching blue work shirts.

  Sharing uneasy looks, the girls took a moment to tidy themselves and continued into the field.

  Safi counted boys of many sorts, hailing from across the Northern Kingdoms. There were red-haired Resmyrans, and Anderan brunettes, and Serks, whose yellow eyes dotted the crowd. There were blondes from her home kingdom of Andolas, and Sovereign Coast boys, whose sun-kissed skin stayed tanned forever. And more, boys whose kingdoms she couldn’t begin to imagine.

  There were also plenty of boys she hadn’t seen at breakfast. Boys from the north side of camp.

  “This way,” Raven said, leading them towards a long brick wall atop of a gentle hill, a few hundred paces from the crowd. Safi noticed that the wall was part of a once larger structure that now lay scattered in ruin. Across its length, an audience of girls sat in attendance.

  Suzy, the second-year from kitchen crew, hopped down from her perch to greet them. She eyed Safi’s mining boots, poking out from beneath her dress, and grinned. “Survived your first week, did you?”

  “Just training so far,” Safi admitted. Behind her, the crowd burst into cheers. “What’s going on down there?’

  “Sword fighting. Happens every Blessing Day. The boys beat the stones out of each other, while we of the more civilized gender sit back and watch.” Suzy held up an iron Blackpoint sovereign, more the size of a penny, really. “Smart recruits make a bit of coin, too”

  “Swords?” Raven raised a finger to stroke her chin. “Ain’t that a bit dangerous?”

  “They’re wooden swords,” Suzy explained, “but they have been known to break a finger now and then.” Freckled arms swinging, she led them to an open section of wall with enough space for the four of them. “Have a seat.”

  Now Safi could see everything. At the center of the crowd was a crudely-formed circle, its boundary defined by a rope that ran through six wooden pegs. Inside, a fight was underway. A pair of boys circled one another, swords poised to strike.

  The fighters collided, and their wooden swords met hard. They clattered back and forth in rapid succession. A parry was made, and a counter-attack followed. The victim dropped his sword, then himself, clutching his wounded elbow.

  Safi cringed as Raven grinned beside her.

  Rebecca’s hands flew to her face. “How awful!”

  “Point!” shouted a round-faced boy, nearly tripping over the boundary rope as he scampered into the sword ring. Spanky was his name, Suzy explained, a fifth-year known to all the recruits of the Fivers’ Camp. He dropped to his knees before the injured recruit. “Can you continue?”

  The boy’s hand remained on his elbow as he staggered to his feet. He took one look at his opponent and shook his head no.

  “Then the round is over!” cried Spanky, shrill voice piercing the roars of the crowd.

  Further down the wall, Matilda shrieked uncontrollably alongside a troop of older girls. Safi leaned forward to look. The fourth-year was smiling, and her cheeks were wet with tears. “Come to mama!”

  “What’s with her?” asked Safi.

  “Must’ve won a big bet,” Suzy said, chuckling lightly. “Normally your paycheck doesn’t change much, aside from the yearly raise. But you can win it big here if you’re lucky enough—and smart enough. Shave a few years off that sentence.”

  Raven scoffed. “I got twenty-five and Safi does too. It’d take a hell of a sum to matter in the long run.”

  Coming into sorts, Rebecca lowered her hands and folded them over her knee. “Better twenty-four than twenty-five,” she said. Safi nodded to that. The less time she spent at Blackpoint, the better. Still, she wasn’t sure gambling was the best idea. Better to find a Siegestone and be done with it.

  Rebecca raised a long arm and pointed towards the sword ring. “Isn’t that one of your boys, Safiyas?”

  Shoulders back and chest puffed high, a bareheaded boy was pushing his way through the crowd. The boundary rope snagged at his boots, but that did little to slow him from strutting into the sword ring.

  “That’s Stiv!” Safi said, leaning forward so hastily she almost threw herself from the wall. “He’s fighting on his first Blessing Day!”

  “Don’t worry,” Suzy said, resting a clammy hand on her wrist. “They’ll set him up with someone fair. Another first-year.”

  Down in the sword ring, Spanky began beating his knees like a drum. “Stiv, hailing from the Kingdom of Berrider! A first-year going for a fight on his first week at camp! Such bravery, such courage! Are there any first or second-years who dare stand against him?”

  Stiv tapped Spanky on the shoulder. A look of surprise came over the announcer’s face. Stiv set his hands on his hips and cleared his throat, addressing all the recruits in attendance. “I’m making a challenge.”

  “You’re what?” said Spanky.

  “He’s what?” cried Safi.

  Stiv knelt to retrieve a wooden sword off the ground. He twirled it twice in the air, then lowered its tip to the crowd. The recruits parted the way, as if Stiv had cut the crowd itself. One boy remained in the sword’s path. He stood with feet shoulder-width apart, and his thumbs were hooked in the belt of his trousers. Beside him grinned a healthy, curly-haired girl who had no qualms standing amidst the boys.

  Raven slapped her forehead. “The fool! He’s challenging the recruit foreman?” She turned to look at Safi, but the seat next to her was empty. Safi was gone.

  Shoulder first, Safi pushed her way through the maze of broad backs and swinging elbows. She couldn’t imagine how much these boys had eaten to grow so big. Then her foot caught someone’s toe, and she found herself flat on the ground. A work boot came down on her fingers, and she screamed and began punching the boy’s ankle until he lifted his foot.

  Scrambling to her feet, she heard Spanky’s voice over the murmurs of the crowd. “You sure about this, pal? That’s the recruit foreman you’re pointing at, and he ain’t exactly first fight material.”

  Stiv ran a hand down the back of his shaved head, lowering it into a fist. “Give him a sword.”

  Noth shrugged at Spanky. “Can’t say you didn’t warn him.” He kissed Hannah on the cheek, much to the girls’ delight, and started towards the sword ring.

  Safi fought her way through the crowd as the announcer went over the rules. The sword fight continued until either of them scored three points or admitted defeat. Each clean hit was worth a point, but slashes only—no thrusts allowed! Titans forbid someone pokes an eye out.

  Iron chimed like spilling water as the
fifth-year bet collectors made their rounds. The odds, she gathered, were not in Stiv’s favor. Finally, she found Wulf at the front of the crowd, the only serious face in a sea of smiles and laughter.

  Safi met him with her throbbing hand tucked into her armpit. She meant to tell Wulf to stop the fight, that Stiv was surely fighting Noth for her sake, and that this was all very silly and foolish. But by the time she opened her mouth to speak, the announcer’s voice roared over them.

  “Begin!” Spanky cried, tumbling over the boundary rope as he made a hasty exit.

  Safi wrenched her eyes from Wulf and put them on the sword ring. The recruit foreman stood at the center, sword held loosely at his side. The fifth-year’s posture was unwavering. Stiv, on the other hand, carried his sword like a woodcutting axe, ready for the morning chop.

  Noth made of a show of dusting off his shoulders as Stiv sidestepped around him. “I have to give it to you, Berrid,” the recruit foreman said. “You’ve got guts.”

  Grinning, Stiv flicked out his arm to brandish his sword. “Save your compliments for the girls, Serk. If you can still speak after I’m done with you.”

  Noth laughed easily as the crowd cheered all around him. Safi and Wulf shared a look. Both of them rolled their eyes.

  Noth was still laughing when Stiv took a great leap towards him. Gasping, Safi found herself clutching Wulf’s elbow. The boy of Berrider flew sideways through the air. He drew back his sword in two fists and swung for the fifth-year’s head.

  Noth ducked low, and in one smooth motion brought his sword across Stiv’s midsection. The blow sent him spinning, and then crashing into the ground. The girls clutched their eyes in horror, while the boys tossed back their heads and groaned. Wulf punched the air in frustration, and Safi let go of his elbow to bite her fist. Over at the wall, Rebecca buried her face into Raven’s tiny, trembling shoulder.

  “First point to the recruit foreman!” Spanky roared, bringing his hands together uncontrollably.