“Harsh.” I cringed, but followed it with a laugh. It was almost nice to think about Leader Graham and all of his hair-brained plots to make the dwellers more like the sols. Life had been much simpler then. “I snuck into Topia, and then one of the gods, specifically the god of Chaos—Rau—hit me with this weird smoke ball of light, and I think it did something to me. Also, I stabbed someone, but it was an accident. And I met this cool slave named Jeffrey. You would have liked her. She was a stickler for rules. I’m pretty sure we become Jeffreys when we die. Just saying. I mean, it makes sense. They’re only half of what we are. It’s like the Creator plucked them on their way to death and then set them in Topia, where they would have to continue to serve. For eternity. So when Teacher Marcks told us that dwellers are destined to be slaves, and have no further purpose outside of their slavery, he really wasn’t kidding. You know what happens when a Jeffrey does something bad? They get sent to a banishment cave. They’re bound to it. They turn into these creepy, twisted, shadowy things, and they just … amass. There must be thousands of them in there. Maybe more. Holy shit. I didn’t have time to think about that until now—”
“You can stop rambling; I’ve processed the first thing you said. Mind telling me why you snuck into Topia?” Emmy’s tone was dry, almost sarcastic, but there was a hint of hysteria to it.
“Well, technically, I didn’twantto. The Abcurses made me. They wanted me to steal a cup.”
“Who did the cup belong to?”
“Someone called D.O.D.?”
It was too dark to see Emmy’s face, but she was frowning so hard now that I could almostsenseit.
“There isn’t a god by that name, Will.”
“Yeah, that’s what Jeffrey said too. Oh, wait … Jeffrey said something about a Sacred Abil and the Trophy of Stavlini, or Stavriti, or Stav … something.”
“Staviti?” The hysteria in Emmy’s voice was definitely becoming prominent now. “The Trophy ofStaviti? You stole the Trophy of Staviti?”
I clapped a hand over her mouth, trying to muffle her shriek. “No!” I answered reflexively. “Or yes. Kind of. Maybe. Why?”
She gave a muffled answer, and I realised that I was still holding my hand over her mouth. I pulled away, allowing her to speak again.
“You don’t know who Staviti is, Willa? Seriously? You couldn’t pay attention in class even forthatmuch?”
“I knew it sounded familiar,” I grumbled, feeling defensive. “Is it the god of … um … food or something?”
Emmy groaned, her head making athuddingsound as she knocked it back against the door. “It’s the Creator. The Original Creator. Staviti. AndSacred Abil?He’s the god of Trickery.Definitely not someone you want to be messing with.”
“I didn’t want to mess with any of them.”
“And yet … you stole from the Creator. Tricked the god of Trickery. Stabbed someone. Probably someone important. Probably the god of Vengeance.”
“Do you think they know it was me?”
“Of course not. You’re a dweller from the seventh ring of Minatsol.” Emmy suddenly launched herself onto me, hugging me tightly. “I’m so relieved. You’re alive. You’re … what was happening back there in the dining hall? And why the hell are we in a supply closet?” She drew back from the hug, a hand still on my arm. She shook me slightly, as though she’d be able to dislodge the answers from me by force.
“Rau’s magic. It knocked me out, and then when I woke up, there was this pain …” I touched my chest, rubbing my fingers over the muted thud of pain that was still present, even now, though it was no longer trying to rip me apart. “The further away from the Abcurses I go … the more it hurts me. If I’m touching one of them, I don’t feel it at all.”
“You need to tell them,” she hissed out, panic riding her tone. “Maybe they know—”
“They were there. They saw it happen. I don’t want to tell them about this; it’s enough that they can hear some of my thoughts, and that I have to follow them around during the daylight hours. I don’t want them to find out that I need to be around themfor the entire sun-cycle. I don’t even want to be around them all the time. I’m sick of them. I never want to see them again. Except Aros; he smells nice. And Rome, because he’s so strong I’m pretty sure not even Rau can get past him. I don’t need the others. Except Siret. I’m pretty sure he hates me, but he’s really good at catching me like just before I face-plant into something. But theothers, I don’t need them. Not at all.” I paused, my brow furrowing, my mouth pursing, and then I quickly blurted, “Except Coen and Yael. Coen is really good at making decisions, and if I leave out Yael he’ll probably hunt me the hell down and haunt me—”
“That’s all of them,” Emmy interrupted smoothly. She didn’t sound panicked anymore. Now she sounded like she was trying not to laugh.
Eleven
After Emmy snucksome food into my closet, she disappeared to finish her chores. Chores which I had no chance of doing, unless one of the Abcurse brothers decided to help me out with them. Instead, I sat in the dark, picking at a plate of normal dweller rock-bread, my chest thumping painfully. When the world grew so quiet that I would have been able to hear a bird squawk from the forest, I knew that night had fallen.
I opened the door a crack, peering out. I looked one way, and then the other.
All clear, Soldier!The stress was reversing my mental development back to the games I used to play with Emmy when I was only seven life-cycles old. I’d had some kind of sick fascination with the Minateur patrols, and I’d pretended to be one of them for a full life-cycle, constantly arresting Emmy for walking too fast, or too slow, or too normally.
Slipping down the corridor was difficult. It felt as though I had left my internal organs back in the closet, but just before the pain became unbearable, I reached the bathing chambers for that floor of dorms. I ran inside and slammed the door behind me, locking it securely. The faint drip of condensation echoed all around me, and steam assaulted my face, driving me back against the door for a moment. My senses were on overload, screaming out against the pain of being so far from the Abcurses. I fought my way past it, pushing off the door and heading into the steam. The wooden boards beneath my feet were damp and warm, sending comforting heat right up to my belly, somewhat easing the way the rock bread was now turning around, threatening to come back up.
I had no idea what to expect from the bathing chamber, since the dweller chambers were in the dungeon, and the water ran cold. Up here, there seemed to be a series of rooms to walk through. A bathingexperience.I entered the first room by passing beneath a wooden archway. There were several wooden cubes, all empty. I stared beyond the room, through the next wooden archway. All that was visible was a fine mist, a spray of water that rained softly down from the ceiling. I guessed that the cubes were for the sols’ clothes. I quickly whipped off Rome’s shirt, stuffing it into the cube, and then I lost my boots, using one cube for each boot, because …why the hell not?Next, I tore off Jeffrey’s slave garb, flicking that onto the floor, because I broke into a sol bathing chamber and therefore I was a rebel of the worst kind. Might as well start acting like it. I stepped through the next archway, passing into the fine mist of water. It caressed my skin so softly, dripping condensation over my body.
The water was very lightly scented, almost too lightly to detect. It must have had some kind of magical property, because I couldfeelit stripping me of dirt and stress. I pulled my hand up before my face, squinting at it in the dim light of a few wall sconces. The grime was running out from beneath my fingernails, dripping right off my hand. I blinked, bending over to check my feet. I was sure I had never been so damn clean in my entire life. I was pretty sure I had beenborndirtier than this shower was now making me. Maybe it was taking a layer of skin off. Was that healthy? I had no idea.
Also … I probably needed to re-think that last thing that I just thought, because babies weren’t all that clean right after birth.
