It was early morning, the sun not yet risen over the desert horizon, when a man arrived at our newly completed gate. He was dressed in rags, his feet unshod and bloody, and between breathless gasps he gave his name as Osuli and explained that he had run all night from the mine and brought news for Reva.
I left my labors at the palisade and half-carried the limping man to the tent where Khalim worked, and then went to fetch Reva. After she spoke with Osuli, she summoned me from the palisade and Aysulu from the stables, and the disciples of the Dragon Temple from their work around the camp. We gathered in another tent, around a hastily constructed table and a map of the area inked on the skin of an animal.
“The prisoners are in the mine,” Reva said. “Your companion, Heishiro, is with them, along with everyone else the guard arrested at the end of the festival.”
Jin nodded thoughtfully. “Heishiro would not willingly perform manual labor,” he said. “The circumstances must be dire. Do you have a plan to get all of them out?”
“It will be difficult. The mines will be guarded. I could sneak in during the change of the watch; take some of you with me and leave a few outside to ensure a clear escape and provide a diversion if necessary. We may not be able to rescue everyone, but a larger force would surely be repelled.”
“I shall go,” I said. I considered Heishiro a friend, and he had been captured while helping my escape from the city. It was the least I could do for him.
Aysulu also volunteered, as did Jin and Yanlong, with Hualing agreeing to remain behind to keep watch and guard the camp. We would leave after midday, arriving at the mine in the early evening as the watch was changing and the workers beginning to return to their homes. We would have to find our way back in the dark, and any lights we carried would lead Phyreian guards or the tribe of reavers back to our camp. The palisade was all but complete, and the trench around it dug, but the towers where archers and spell-slingers would stand in the event of an attack were far from finished.
“If we can only save a few, we should be able to navigate our way in the dark,” Reva said. “If we can rescue many, we will have to risk being followed. Too many will get lost if we don’t have lights.”
We dispersed and returned to our work for the morning. I sharpened the last few timbers for the palisade, while others stood them in their places. By the time we were called to our midday meal, the palisade stretched around the camp, from one side of the cave’s mouth to the other, a defense without gaps.
I was admiring the handiwork of the last few days when Khalim found me.
“I want to go with you,” he said.
“To the mine?” I asked. “It will be dangerous.”
He nodded. “I know. That’s why you need me. If everyone held prisoner there is in as poor a condition as Osuli, you won’t get them out without my help.”
Khalim was right. There would be injuries, and once clear of the mine we would have to move as quickly as possible to avoid being followed.
“Reva won’t like that idea very much,” I said.
“Of course she won’t.” A look of annoyance crossed his face. “But she’ll listen to you.”
I believed she would at least hear my council, even if she decided not to follow it. The truth was that I had been included in most of the plans, while Khalim had not; as much as she maintained that he was the most essential of all of us to her cause, she was content to let him remain in the medical tent until the time came when she needed him.
I did not fully disagree with her. I would have rather Khalim stay where he was safe. But was he ever truly away from danger, even here? The Ascended’s Serpents flew no banners and carried no torches. If they had found out where the camp was located, they could be on their way even now with poisoned daggers meant for Khalim, and we would have no forewarning.
The strongest desire in me was to keep him close. I could protect him better if I was not half a day’s walk away. Looking at his face, I could see his longing to choose for himself where he went and what he did, having been sent hither and yon by both gods and men for the past several weeks—and indeed, for much of his life. That was something I knew well, and understood keenly. I had once chased my own destiny on the icy ocean at the end of the world.
“If that is what you wish, then I will speak to her on your behalf,” I told him.
“Thank you,” he said, and he kissed me and went back to tend to the people under his care. Most of them would rejoin the others by the end of the day, and those that didn’t would be well by the next morning.
Reva was less than amenable to the idea of Khalim accompanying us on this rescue mission, but she did see the value of healing all those who might be injured before we fled back to the camp. “Very well,” she said. “But if anything happens to him, it will come out of your hide.”
I agreed. If something were to happen to him, Reva’s wrath would be the least of my concerns.
And so, the six of us walked out of the gate as the sun began to slip from its zenith. In the east, a few clusters of riders disturbed the red desert, and some carried banners I knew belonged to the Lion and Wolf. They had not gathered in their numbers yet, as far as I could see, but it was only a matter of time before they were once again a mighty and terrible force. Soon, the trees grew thicker as we journeyed down the mountain, and anything beyond them was obscured from my eyes—just as, we hoped, we would be hidden from anyone on the plain should they chance to look more closely.
Summer was just beginning to turn to autumn, the few leafy trees that grew in such dry soil showing traces of gold among their green boughs. Here, there would be a long stretch where the days shortened by an hour and the mountain winds cooled, followed by a brief and tempestuous season of rain. There would be no weeks of darkness this far south, and certainly no snow. I needed no reminder that I was far from the lands of my birth, but I felt the strangeness of this strange land deeply then.
The trees thinned again as we reached the foothills, and we ducked into the brush to walk parallel to the miners’ path to the Iron Mountain. Then, for the first time since arriving in Phyreios, I laid eyes on the mine itself.
It was a gaping hole in the mountain, black as a winter’s night. Miners appeared at its mouth carrying sacks of earth or pushing carts, and they vanished again into the darkness when their vessels were empty. A pair of stern-faced guards stood on either side of the entrance, leaning on their spears.
Reva mussed her hair and rubbed reddish dirt on her face. She removed her cloak and concealed a pair of daggers, one in each boot. With a bit more earth and a stoop to her posture, she looked indistinguishable from the men and women that went to and from the mine.
After a brief discussion, we agreed that Yanlong would accompany her, similarly covered in dirt, while Jin, Aysulu, and I would remain outside, to watch for reinforcements and fight our way in, should it be necessary.
That left Khalim.
“I’ll be the most good to you inside,” he argued. “We may have to flee quickly. And I’ll be useless out here.”
Reva’s dust-streaked face contorted into a frown. “I don’t like it, but you’re right. Carrying an injured person will surely be noticed. But you must stay beside me, do you understand? I can’t protect you if you are separated from us.”
“I understand.”
He was given the same application of dirt, and the three of them crept to the pile where the miners were depositing their burdens and fell into line behind them. The guards barely looked up as they passed, and soon they disappeared into the black pit.
My heart sank as I lost sight of Khalim. I wished that I had tried to persuade him to remain with me.
Worry must have been evident on my face, because Aysulu rested her small hand on my shoulder. “He’ll be all right,” she said. “Reva wouldn’t let anything happen to him.”
And so we waited. The sun sank behind the mountain, turning the land a soft orange. The mine disgorged a few spear-carrying guards and then a few more miners. I watched each face, looking for one I recognized, but they were each unfamiliar.
Four more guards came up the path from the city in a loose line. They, too, entered the mine and went out of sight.
Moments passed, each of them a long winter in itself. It was not yet fully dark, so I knew it could not have yet been an hour, however long it felt. I checked my axe and my javelins, not for the first time since the others had gone.
From the depths of the mine came the sound of an iron bell, dissonant and clamorous. The guards by the door looked up and grasped their spears.
Someone had raised the alarm.
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