by C. J. Archer
"Do most people agree with you?" Meg asked.
"Aye, but there are some descendants of the old noble families who want to see the monarchy restored. Problem is, there ain't no one to put on the throne. None from the royal line, anyway. They were all executed."
"Did the king have children?" Kitty asked.
"Two sons and a daughter, none of age. General Nox executed them all, and the queen too."
"How awful."
"He had to do it or they'd always be a beacon for monarchists. As long as a member of the royal family lived, they had someone to put back on the throne. It would have led to more wars. But without a descendant, there was no one to rally behind. He did the right thing, General Nox. I know it sounds cruel to you, ma'am, on account of you being from a country that still has a monarchy and you also being a woman, but sometimes difficult decisions have to be made for the greater good. Freedland's been peaceful since the revolution. We've still got our problems, but at least we've got out freedom."
It was a sobering thought and not one I wanted to contemplate. The killing of innocent children for the “greater good” seemed just as tyrannical as the king's actions. But Sander would never believe it.
He must have sensed our discomfort, because he assured us the executions had been done kindly and swiftly. "They were beheaded at the same time so the queen never witnessed her own children's deaths. He was a fair man, General Nox."
"He was a ruthless revolutionary," Meg shot back.
"No, ma’am, he was not. He was a reluctant revolutionary. He didn't want to rise up against the king, but with the people growing restless, he knew he had to take command or there'd be a massacre of poor folk, with his men carrying out the massacring. He was the only one capable of stepping in and taking charge. He did a fine job too. He's remembered fondly here in Freedland, ain't he, Mark? Shame the current high minister and the other candidates can't be more like him. They could learn a lot from General Nox's legacy about fairness and standing up for the weak and downtrodden. He'd be shocked by the high taxes we have to pay now. He'd be investigating where our taxes go, that's for sure. We could do with another leader like him."
Kitty looked unconvinced by Sander's enthusiasm for the man who'd overthrown the monarchist system, but Meg listened intently. Of the three of us, she was the most revolutionary minded. She believed in fairness for all. I would remain neutral. For one thing, Freedlandian politics was none of my concern, and for another, history wasn't always remembered with accuracy even by those who'd lived through it. General Nox may have been a wonderful man, or he could have made sure he was remembered that way by ordinary folk like Sander. Blood River and Lake Torment did not receive their new names because the revolution had been without loss.
It took some time to reach the mine but not as long as I expected. "It's closer to Gull's Wing than I thought it would be," I said to Sander as he assisted me down from the back of the cart.
"It allowed the guards to live in the village. We didn't need separate housing at the mine." He indicated the burnt bricks of a chimney and fireplace at the edge of a grassy area at the foot of the hill. Blackened bricks marked the outer wall's foundations. It had been a sizeable structure. "That's all that's left of our dining hall, weapons room, and the warden's office. It was destroyed in the fires set by the prisoners."
He went on to explain that the grassy area where we now stood had once been barren wasteland. The constant back and forth of prisoners pushing their carts between the mine's mouth in the side of the hill to the spoil heap some distance away had removed all vegetation, but it was now regenerating. He looked pleased as he surveyed the area with his hands on his hips, like a farmer surveying his crops.
"And where did the prisoners sleep?" Kitty asked, looking around.
"In a barn over there." Sander pointed to a burnt patch on the earth. There was no brick fireplace or foundations, no rubble or any sign that a building had once occupied the space except for the scorched ground.
"All of them?" Meg asked. "Men and women together?"
"Aye. It weren't a good idea but there was no money to build a second building."
"Have the bricks been removed?"
"What bricks?"
"From the fireplace." Meg indicated the surviving structure from the guards' building.
Sander's face pinched. "I'm sorry to say, ma'am, but there was no fire for the prisoners."
"Not even in winter?"
He shook his head.
"That is outrageous!"
"It was a prison mine, ma'am." Sander sounded pained.
"Dogs are treated better than that."
"You've got to remember, they were sent here to die. Many of them were the worst criminals. They offended over and over. They thieved and raided; they raped and bashed. Some, like your husband, might have been here on account of an unfair trial, but mostly they were here because the regular prisons weren't punishment enough."
Kitty folded her arms as if she'd felt a sudden chill. "A swift execution would have been kinder."
Meg looked to Max who was regarding the mine entrance. "But it wouldn't have given them hope," she said. "Where there is life, there is hope of survival, of freedom."
I took her hand and squeezed.
Sander lit the torch he'd brought with him and led us into the yawning hole cut into the side of the hill. The wheel ruts from the carts were clearly visible in the earth, as were the pick marks from the tools used to carve out the tunnel from the rocks.
"Only prisoners who could be trusted were given tools," Sander explained. "But even then, they were not positioned close together and there was one guard for every three prisoners. It's why I can't understand what happened that night. How did the prisoners get the better of the guards?"
"They outnumbered you," I pointed out. "And they were desperate."
"Aye, but they were exhausted and weak from hard work and lack of food, and there were always a lot of guards on duty. If a prisoner struck a guard, he would have been easily caught before he could hit another. Like that Hammer fellow I told you about. He never got a chance to attack again after he bashed Carlos."
Max glared at Sander. "Maybe that's because he only wanted to hurt Carlos, no one else. Carlos must have done something to make him mad. He must have deserved the bashing."
"We'll never know for sure why Hammer did what he did, and we'll never know how the prisoners managed to escape. At least they were all caught and executed. It would be a real worry if they were still out there somewhere."
Max rested a hand on his sword hilt and continued to glare at Sander's back as the former guard moved further into the tunnel. Meg clutched Max's arm as if afraid if she let him go he might attack Sander.
I watched Sander with less animosity than Max. The guard surprised me with his kind attitude towards some of the prisoners. But what surprised me even more was the doubt in his voice as he talked about the escape. He suspected something was amiss.
"Did the women do the same work as the men down here?" Kitty asked.
"The stronger ones did." Sander indicated the walls of the tunnel on either side and above. Wooden supports had been put in place in some parts but it was mostly just bare rock on all sides including the ceiling and floor. "Some picked at the rocks, some hauled it into carts or pushed the carts out." He pointed at the rectangle of light at the tunnel's entrance. "But many women did other chores."
Kitty looked at the rocks at her feet. "Like cleaning?"
"Some cooked meals for the guards. We ate in the hall. They all wanted that work on account of getting access to food."
I ran my hand along the wall, feeling the divots and gouges from the picks. It must have been back breaking work. I wouldn't have lasted long in here, nor would many of the female palace servants. While some were quite robust, many were not. That meant quite a few had been cooks. Surely too many for the number of guards stationed at the mine. They must have performed other duties.
"What about the other wom
en?" I asked.
Sander forged deeper into the tunnel and we had to hurry to catch up. Meg slipped on a rock in the dark and Max caught her before she fell.
"Slow down," he growled at Sander. "You're the only one with light."
Sander stopped. "Sorry. Forgot I had women with me this time. Usually it's just men who want to come in here."
"Speaking of women," I said. "You avoided my question. What did the other women do who weren't cooks but were not strong enough to work in the mine?"
Sander studied the rocks above his head and sighed deeply. "You don't want to know, ma'am."
"I do."
"No, you don't. Besides, I don't want to tell. That's a chapter best left untold."
He moved off again, slower, but we did not immediately follow. Sander might not like telling us about that chapter, but we could all guess what the remaining female prisoners did. They'd been used by the guards as whores.
Kitty suddenly sat on a boulder, as if her legs could no longer hold her. "I've seen enough."
Meg sat with her but shot to her feet again when Max fell back against the wall, bent over from the waist. His breaths came hard and fast as if he couldn't breathe. Yet the air in the tunnel wasn't too stale this close to the entrance.
She put her arm around him and appealed to me. "Josie? What's wrong with him?"
"The maids…" Max managed to whisper.
He didn't need to say more. We understood. He'd become friends to many of the servant women. Thinking of them here, forced to pleasure their captors…it was abhorrent.
"He needs air," Sander said with authority. "It happens to some who aren't used to it." He led the way back outside. "I reckon we rest for a bit then go back in. You haven't seen the end yet."
"We'd like to leave," I told him.
"You don't want to see where your husband worked, ma'am?" he said to Kitty. To Max, he added, "Or your brother?"
"No thank you," Kitty said with a shudder.
"Did they work near each other?" I asked.
"Aye, along with Hammer and the prisoners he became friends with. I remember Leon used to follow Hammer around like a dog. Wherever Hammer went, Leon went. I reckon he was too scared of the other prisoners to leave the side of the one man who protected him. Same with another fellow whose name I can't recall now. Scrawny lad, couldn't have been more than eighteen. He cried day and night when he first came. Hammer took him under his wing and made sure he got through the nights. Soon enough, he was put on the tools too. They all were, except Hammer was never given a pick or hammer again after the incident with Carlos. He had to work with his bare hands or push the carts. The warden no longer trusted him with tools."
The scrawny lad must be Quentin. Sander had mentioned almost all the men in our little group, as well as Leon. They must have all kept together in the mine, keeping close to Dane for protection and assistance. The only one Sander hadn't mentioned was Balthazar.
"The elderly prisoners must not have lasted very long in the mine," I said.
"Few old folk were sent here," Sander said. "Dangerous crimes are a young man's game." He wagged a finger at me. "There was one who lived and survived here for some time, but that's only because he was treated better than the regular prisoners."
"Why is that?" I asked, although I suspected his answer would be because Balthazar was a priest.
"He was made assistant to the warden. He kept the accounts, wrote reports, that sort of thing. He worked in the warden's office and ate the same as the guards. He even slept in the warden's office when it was too cold to join the other prisoners. He did important work and wasn’t a threat."
"What did he do to get himself imprisoned here?" Kitty asked.
"Don't know. He had a blunt tongue and he wasn't afraid to tell folk what he thought of them. I reckon he offended the wrong person. A powerful person. Someone who wanted to shut him up good and proper. This place is effective for taking a man's voice away."
We emerged into the sunshine, blinking and shielding our eyes from the harsher light. It was a welcome sight nevertheless. The tunnel walls had begun to feel too close. At least we could enjoy the sunshine. The prisoners would rarely have seen it. Only those pushing out the rubble in barrows came outside. The rest spent their waking hours in the mine, the darkness kept at bay only by torches. Not even rats lived in such degradation.
Sander extinguished the torch in the dirt and looked back at the mine's entrance. He sighed and shook his head before turning away. "I still don't understand how it happened."
We followed him to the cart without responding. It was not a conversation any of us wanted to engage in.
"The escape," Sander said, as if someone had asked. "It was real strange. Not just how it could have happened with so many guards on duty, but where they went. Gull's Wing is the closest village to the mine, but there are others not far away and farms too. But there wasn't a single sighting of the prisoners."
"Perhaps because they were caught quickly," Kitty said as she accepted Sander's help onto the back of the cart.
Sander went to help Meg, but Max wedged himself between them and put his hands to her waist to lift her up. He did the same for me too, before giving Sander another glare.
Sander didn't seem to notice. He was already heading back to the driver's seat. "That's the thing. They weren't caught immediately. It was weeks later when the village crier read out a declaration from the justice minister that all prisoners had been captured and executed. It didn't say where they were found."
"Perhaps in a cave?" Kitty said.
"There ain't no caves and no hiding places that weren't searched in the weeks following the escape. The authorities combed the woods, farmlands, desert and mountains, and found no sign of them. Not even a footprint." Sander turned to Max. "Not until much later, when they all should have died from starvation anyway. Yet they were all alive enough to be executed. Don't you think that strange?"
Max shrugged one shoulder and urged the horses forward.
Sander grunted. "Well I think it's strange. So do many others. The rumors got us all thinking."
"What rumors?" I asked. At Meg's glare I put up a finger to ask her to trust me. I suspected Sander might lead us somewhere we wanted to go.
"Now, I'm not saying I believe in it," Sander said. "It's just something to consider. I trust our authorities told the truth. Don't go thinking I don't trust the official word, because I do."
"But?" I prompted.
He sighed and swiveled on the seat to look at me. "But it's real unlikely that they survived that long, and left no evidence of where they hid. It's no wonder there were rumors that magic helped them escape."
"Magic?" I echoed, doing my best to sound surprised. I laughed for good measure.
Sander laughed too. "It's silly, I know. Magic ain't real. Some still believe it though. Zemayans and some of the fools in the village, mostly. Course, some of us wondered if magic was involved at first. It was a real popular theory there for a while."
"Why not anymore?"
He shrugged. "It's not something most folk think about now. It happened months ago."
"Yes, but it was quite a major event in your lives. Particularly yours, Sander. You clearly still think about it."
"Every day," he murmured.
I inched my way up the cart to sit near him. "Do you have reason to believe magic could have been involved? Is there some evidence of it?"
He huffed a laugh. "Magic doesn't leave evidence or it wouldn't be magic, would it? No, I don't believe. Like I said, some do. Idiots and Zemayans."
It was the second mention of Zemayans in regards to magic. Freedland was so far from that foreign land that it was a surprise he knew magic was akin to Zemaya's religion. "Have any Zemayans been here to look at the site?"
His face lit up with enthusiasm, as if he'd been waiting for me to ask. "Just one. He asked all sorts of questions, even asking me what the prisoners dug up the day they disappeared."
My breath hitched. The Z
emayan knew about the gem. "And what did they dig up?"
"Just the same thing they always dig up. Rocks."
"What else did the Zemayan ask?"
"Nothing. He wanted to look at the mine. He went all the way, deep into the tunnels. Real superstitious, he was." Sander indicated his chest area. "He wore dozens of necklaces with colored beads on them and teeth hanging off them. I reckon they were charms to ward off evil spirits on account of the way he clutched them the further in we went."
"Did he do anything in the mine? Did he perform a ritual or some such thing?"
"He just looked around, real careful, pushing over rocks and checking underneath. He asked me how so many prisoners could just disappear without a trace, but I couldn't give him an answer. Later, I heard he'd been asking questions around the village too."
"I know a Zemayan," Max said. "Back in Noxford, there's one. Killen, his name is. Was that him?"
Sander stroked his beard. "He was from Noxford, that part I remember, but I don't think his name was Killen. It started with a T." He continued to stroke his beard then suddenly clicked his fingers. "Taaj. That's it. His name was Taaj."
Telling the others what we'd learned from Sander was the most difficult conversation I'd ever had. I thought we should do it separately, but Max wanted to do it with all of us present.
"We're in this predicament together," he'd said as we drove to the inn after taking Sander home. "We should face the truth together too."
Quentin, Theodore and Erik met us in the inn's stable yard. They'd seen our approach and couldn't wait any longer to speak to us. Max assured them they'd get answers inside.