by E. S. Maya
Raven gritted her teeth, thumbs and forefingers dancing. “If you’ve got time to complain, at least use both hands!”
Safi pursed her lips in frustration. The enforcers would be there in minutes, and the bundle of straw on her pillow would fool the fifth-years for only so long.
Grimacing, she drew forth her wounded right hand and thrust it towards the knot.
Raven paused her picking and snatched up Safi’s wrist, eyes bright with concern, and pulled at the tips of her bunkmate’s gloved fingers.
Safi winced as the mining glove slipped away from her hand.
Raven sucked air through her teeth. “You’re bleeding.”
Safi held up her right hand. Her palm was smeared with blood, drying in large segments. It looked like the cracked shell of a hard-boiled egg. “It feels better than it looks,” she lied.
“Well it looks like bloody murder!” Raven said. “We’ve gotta get you fixed up.”
“I’ll be all right,” Safi said, though the tone in her voice suggested otherwise. She continued to pluck at the knot, both hands this time.
Raven reached to still Safi’s fingers. “I’ll go and wake Becca. She’ll stitch you up easy.”
Safi shoved Raven’s hands away. “Do I look like a pair of trousers? I said I’ll be fine.”
Raven opened her mouth to protest, then closed it with a frown. “It’ll scar over,” she warned her.
Safi glanced at the scar on Raven’s cheek, and smiled. “Then it’ll scar over.” Then she made a serious face and returned her hands to the rope. “Now help me get this knot loose.”
Not a minute later, the knot slithered to life in their hands. Safi drew out the rope as Raven coiled up its length, bundling it under her armpit. The woodcutting axe crawled through the dust all the while, and when it came within reach, Raven used the butt of its handle to push herself up to her feet. “The hiding stone,” she said haggardly.
They shuffled about Lazar’s Crossing, Safi dragging her feet, Raven making a crutch of the woodcutting axe, searching the vague and moonlit shapes of the Siege Titan’s once-mighty arm. Through sheer chance, Safi came upon the hiding stone first. She raised a work boot and toppled its elongated form.
At the wave of a hand, Raven came hobbling over. She dropped the rope and woodcutting axe in the hole, nearly tumbling in behind them. Then she shrugged off her cape, stuffed it on top, and stepped around the Titan stone to lift it back into place.
Meanwhile, Safi jogged back for the winterwood. The log felt light on her shoulder. She gave the bark a smack with her good hand, and the sound was crisp and satisfying. “Now,” she said, returning to Raven’s side, “where exactly do we put this thing?”
Moonlight shimmered on Raven’s slick, breathing face.
Safi waited a dozen breaths more. “Raven!” she said, turning sideways to face her. The log narrowly missed the Anderan’s ducking head. “You do have a place to put this.”
Raven swiped the sweat-soaked hair from her forehead, then started towards the Fiver’s Camp. Safi adjusted the log on her shoulder and fell into step beside her.
“The plan was to leave it at the woodcuttery, over in the craftsman’s district.” Raven raised a finger to stroke her chin. “Got a boy there. Met him in the stockades. Where’d do you think I got that axe from?”
“Raven,” Safi said seriously. “Where are we going to hide this?’
“Titans ass, Blondie!” Raven said. “I don’t know! Can’t make it to the woodcuttery. Can’t leave it in the field. Can’t put it anywhere.”
“You don’t suppose it would fit under our bunk bed?” Safi teased.
Raven’s left cheek twitched.
“We’ll leave it out past the camp boundaries,” Safi proposed.
“No time, and someone would spot it at daybreak.”
“How about…” Safi looked up at the stars. Tonight the Titan constellations shone brightly in the night sky. “How about in the chow hall?”
Raven snorted. “Might drive Matilda stone-crazy when she sees it.”
Safi stretched the fingers of her wounded right hand. Matilda was one of the last girls she wanted to cross, but what other choice did they have?
“Let’s do it,” Raven said, sounding a little too excited for Safi’s liking.
“Do you have the chow hall key?” asked Safi as they began their jog back to the Fivers’ Camp.
“No,” Raven answered.
“Then how do we get inside?” asked Safi, to which the Anderan grinned.
“It’s easy,” Raven said. “You just have to climb through the window.”
It was not the usual knocking at the barracks door.
This was louder, heavier, a knock made not with the knuckles, but the bottom of a full-weighted fist. The sound sent Hannah stumbling out of bed, barefooted and half-asleep, digging through her bunk chest for the key.
By the time she stepped into the antechamber, the door had received ten knocks more.
Hands shaking, Hannah unlocked the barracks doors for whoever waited outside. Over her years at Camp Cronus, she had learned that visitors only arrived at this hour to address matters of utmost importance.
The double-doors flew open, catching Hannah by the shoulder. The head girl landed sprawling across the floor. From her back, she watched as five grown men strode into the barracks antechamber. Four wore red, one wore white.
“Head count,” said Vice Warden Arnalus at the trembling Berridian girl.
Climbing onto her feet, Hannah scurried into the main room, where a number of recruits were rousing themselves from sleep. She hurried to the second closest bunk from the door, shoving the girls awake.
“Get up,” she growled. “We’re doing a full count.”
Nestled in the bottom bunk, the fussy blonde whimpered as she felt around for her eyeglasses. “This early in the morning?” She peered up at Hannah, then towards the yellow-eyed Serk who stood scowling in the center of the room. Had it been daylight, Hannah would have seen the color drain from the fussy blonde’s face.
“Of course, ma’am!” said the cat-eyed brunette from the top bunk. The pair of fifth-years scrambled out of bed as Hannah approached the vice warden, struggling to keep a straight face. She shivered as she fought the urge to cower in the large man’s presence.
The fussy blonde and cat-eyed brunette each took half of the room. They began peeking under blankets, brushing aside disheveled hair, checking bed after bed for its designated recruit. They paused occasionally to nod at the head girl and flash an upturned thumb. Continuing on, they finished the room’s sides and convened on a bed bunk sitting opposite the barracks’ antechamber.
Here was a pair of troublemakers well known to the fifth-years, a miner and a cook. The first-year sleeping bottom bunk—Safiyas was her name, the cat-eyed brunette remembered—had her blanket pulled up to her forehead. Her thick blonde hair was strewn all over her pillow.
“Suspicious,” said the fussy blonde, raising a finger to fix her eyeglasses.
“It’s a chilly evening,” said the cat-eyed brunette, “but not that chilly.”
The fussy blonde pinched the corner of the first-year girl’s blanket. In one smooth motion, she swept it away from her face.
Safi blinked open her eyes, squinting up at the older girls. “Morning already?” she croaked.
The fifth-years looked at one another, then back at Safi. They shook their heads no and returned the blanket over the first-year’s forehead.
They did not see the small bale of hay, clutched tight against Safi’s stomach. Nor did they see her miner’s uniform, stained green with the grass of the warden’s oasis.
Standing on their toes, the fifth-years checked on Raven, who was seemingly fast asleep. “All present,” the cat-eyed brunette called to Hannah.
Hannah spun on her heel towards Arnalus, back straight, eyes forward, hands closed at her sides. “All present, sir!”
“Yes, I heard them the first time,” said the vice warden. Han
nah’s jaw trembled. Her throat fought down a whimper.
“I told you it was a pair of boys,” said one enforcer to another.
“Has anyone left the barracks tonight?” Arnalus asked. “Any latrine breaks?”
“No, vice warden,” Hannah answered. Outside of her fellow fifth-years, few girls had the courage to ask permission. “The barracks has been locked up all night.” Then, wanting to impress the second-in-command of Camp Cronus, Hannah continued, “May I ask what this is about, sir?”
“You may not!” barked one of the enforcers
Sparing not one more word, Arnalus turned towards the exit. His long white cape swung through the air, slapping Hannah across the chest. The enforcers fell into formation, marching out of the barracks, leaving its double-doors open behind them.
Hannah blundered after, standing stiffly in the doorway until the men had disappeared into the night. She locked up the barracks and stomped barefooted back to her bunk, confused, and then furious that the men of Blackpoint would treat her, the head girl of the Fivers’ Camp, in such a disrespectful manner!
Crawling into bed, she pressed her face into her pillow and screamed.
Soaking with sweat, Safi fought the urge to allow her smile to grow into laughter. She hugged the bale of hay, the head of her makeshift self, knowing how close she had come to being caught, and knowing, from the excitement coursing through her body, she wouldn’t catch a wink of sleep for the rest of the night.
54
The Ocean and the Goldfish
They arrived upon the Craftsman’s District late into the second shift, enjoying the afternoon music. Blacksmith’s hammers rang out like bells, beating metal into more useful shapes. Blades drew across worktables, slicing cowhide apart like paper. Tailory girls worked side by side, shrinking ceiling-high mounds of blue and brown fabric.
Safi wore one of their creations now, carrying the dust of a full day’s work in the Titan mines. Beside her walked Raven, whose wrinkled hands remained tucked in the pockets of her food-splattered trousers.
She looked up at Safi and smiled. “It kind of brings back old memories.”
Safi scoffed, though she reckoned her bunkmate was right. Yet the road seemed narrower than before, the buildings smaller, and, most surprisingly of all, the boys quieter. She looked back at the summits of Cronus’ mountainous feet, those ten massive toes that brushed the vermilion sky. “It sure is prettier without all those black carriages at the roadside,” she said in a conciliatory tone.
Raven snorted. “Not exactly the word I’d use.” She perked up, tugging at Safi’s shirtsleeve. “Get close. We’re only a short distance away.”
The girls slowed their step as they entered the Craftsman’s District’s busiest stretch, where boys carried loads larger than themselves, heaving and hauling in from every which way imaginable. Safi could just picture herself tripping someone up, sending the whole camp to a screeching halt. Raven, on the other hand, navigated the boys, and the occasional girl, with a casual gait.
Safi met eyes with a passing recruit and dropped her gaze to her ground. She wondered if her reputation had reached this part of the camp. Here in the Craftsman’s District, where recruits worked not by age, nor gender, but occupation. Recruits from the North and South Camp alike.
If they hadn’t known about her before, they certainly knew now. At Raven’s suggestion, she’d left her helmet behind in the barracks. Her golden hair danced in the warm autumn wind. Soon boys were outright staring, elbowing their fellow recruits from their work to hurry and come take a look.
“We’re turning just about every head in the place,” Raven said.
Despite her flush cheeks, Safi smiled. Then she remembered this wasn’t the sort of attention any self-respecting girl should be smiling about, and she began to wonder who had invented that rule. Certainly not the warden of Camp Cronus, nor her mother, and especially not Raven, who basked in the eyes of the staring, jeering, funny-face-making Craftsman’s District boys.
Sighing, Safi peeked over her shoulder. A hundred paces behind them followed a trio of first-year miners, going all but unnoticed by the recruits of the Craftsman’s District. Also unnoticed was the log they carried underneath their elbows, its pale bark sheathed in a layer of orange dust.
She watched as Stiv, Jabbar, and Goggles turned off the road, climbing up a wooden ramp and disappearing into a building. “They made it into the woodcuttery,” she said, fixing her eyes ahead.
Raven whistled appreciatively. “Already talked to my guy. He’s waiting for them inside.”
“Your guy?” Safi exhaled through her nose. “How’d you get a boy from the stockades to agree to make a sword, anyway?”
“The same way you get boys to do anything,” Raven said, batting her dark eyelashes. “You’d be surprised what a little persuasion can do for a girl.”
Safi gaped at the Anderan, if just to get her eyes off the staring recruits. “Is that so?”
“The promise of a little Blackpoint play money helps too.” Raven’s scarred cheek rounded into a grin. “Or a lot of it.”
Safi hooked her thumbs under her leather suspenders. “I don’t feel right about you spending all this coin on me.”
“Never complained before,” Raven grumbled.
“Raven—”
“Raven nothin’!” The Anderan girl brought out a hand to wipe her face, then her trousers, then stuffed it back in her pocket. “You just worry about whipping Noth in the sword ring.”
Safi looked around, making certain no one was listening. She leaned close to Raven and asked, “When will it be finished?”
“Blessing Day,” Raven answered. “We pick up the sword on Blessing Day.”
On Blessing Day, Safi wore a dress. She and Raven ate a hearty breakfast, then made their way north to attend the morning sword fights.
As they passed beneath the shadow of Cronus’ left foot, Safi peered into the warden’s oasis. There, past the blur of the fence, she searched the grass for any sign of the winterwood they had cut down last week.
“Gone!” Not only was the broken crown missing, but its splintered trunk had been dug up as well. “Completely gone!”
“Figures,” Raven said, snickering into her fist. “Word ain’t gotten around about no tree being stolen. Must be too embarrassing for the warden to admit.”
They made haste to the sword ring and climbed the hill and arrived at the old stone wall. The girls looked to be in poor spirits, for another section of the building had collapsed, leaving behind a pile of weathered gray bricks.
Safi and Raven walked the length of the wall in search of open seats and familiar faces. They found Matilda and Suzy near the end, seated on a low perch. The head of the kitchen looked at the Raven and sighed, but it was Safi she jutted her chin at. The fourth-year’s wide forehead glistened in the sunlight.
“I don’t suppose you have anything to do with a you-know-what showing up in my kitchen?”
“No, ma’am!” Safi said, reaching for her suspenders, but finding the flimsy straps of her Blackpoint red dress. “I mean, yes ma’am. Well…”
“Matty!” Raven slapped the fourth-year across the knee. “You shut your mouth about any you-know-whats.”
Smiling, Matilda reached over and gripped Raven’s ear in two fingers. It took Safi a moment to realize she was pinching hard. “I don’t care about no mischief or tomfoolery y’all get into, but if you ever pull a stunt like that again, I won’t go to the enforcers. I’ll whup you raw myself.” She let the Anderan go and patted her firmly on the cheek. “We good?”
“Yeah, we’re good,” Raven said sourly, rubbing her bright red ear.
The four of them turned and listened as Spanky called for the first fight to begin. The fifth-year announcer skipped laps in the sword ring, rousing his sleepy audience for a morning of wagers and combat.
“Scoot,” Raven told Suzy, as she and Safi hiked up their dresses and stuffed themselves between the older girls.
A pair o
f second-years stepped into the sword ring, and the match was soon underway. Safi paid close attention. When she had watched the sword fights before, it had seemed like little more than a pair of boys beating each other on the head with sticks. Now she could see the game. The angles at which they held their swords, the mistakes in their footing, and the precision, or lack thereof, in their attacks.
As the fights went on, Safi and Raven began to whisper,
“Three points ain’t long. Makes boys fight strong instead of smart.”
“You never showed me any stances like that.”
“Just look at the fool, Blondie! No brains, all muscle.”
“That Berrid looks like he knows what he’s doing.”
“I’ve seen you hit harder than that.”
“His elbows are wide open. Hit them. Hit them!”
Suzy leaned back to look at Matilda, shaking her head in disbelief. “You ever see rookies strange as these two?”
Matilda chuckled so hard her belly shook. “Not in all my years in camp.”
Safi heard Spanky shout that the final match was soon to begin. Noth stepped into the sword ring without his name being called. The announcer walked circles around him, pointing at the crowd, calling for any boy brave enough to step forth and challenge the recruit foreman.
“Is there anyone here with guts? With courage? With honor?”
At the urging of his teammates, a fourth-year boy found himself stumbling into the sword ring. A wooden sword was thrust into his hands, and before he knew it, Spanky was screaming, “Begin!”
Before his opponent could gather his wits, Noth pounded his sword into the boy’s left arm. The fourth-year hollered with laughter, much to the amusement of his teammates.
Safi frowned. “Just look at him. Noth’s so strong that no one takes him serious anymore.” She rested her chin in her palms. “He’s untouchable.”
“I don’t know about that,” Suzy said. “I sure wouldn’t mind touching.” Safi glared at the second-year, and Suzy flinched, giggling nervously. “Whoa now, rookie!” She placed a freckled hand on Safi’s forearm. “You know I’m just fooling.”