D. MacHale - Raven Rise

“Gloid,” I said.

“What?”

“Never mind. Keep going.”

“There was no medical care. My legs ached, but they didn’t have anything to give me for that. I think their theory was they’d feed me for as long as I stayed alive. If I survived, fine. If not, nobody cared. There were plenty who weren’t as lucky as I. Sometimes it was somebody lying right next to me. The only way I’d know they were gone was that their bodies went stiff. And cold. That’s how close we were to one another. I could tell when they got cold. The Flighters would drag them off and replace them with somebody else who didn’t stand much of a chance either.”

“What did they need you for?” I asked. I wanted to get off the subject of death.

“I got my first clue when we were visited by a man. My vision wasn’t good, especially there in the dark, but I could tell that he was tall. And clean. Whatever he was, he wasn’t a Flighter. I don’t know why, but the guy frightened me.”

“Saint Dane,” I said.

Loque sat forward in surprise. “You know this man?”

“What did he do?” I asked, ducking the question.

“He spoke to us. To all the sick and injured. His voice was cold, Pendragon. That’s the only way I can describe it. He was talking to people who were in agony… a step away from death. Yet he showed no compassion. Who is he?”

“Somebody you don’t want to mess with. What did he say?”

“He told us the only reason we were being kept alive was to be used as workers for his project. He said it didn’t matter to him if we lived or died, but if we lived, we were going to work. If we weren’t prepared for that, he told us to die quickly and make room for others.”

My heart started to race. Project. What could that mean? Saint Dane was up to something. I tried not to let on to Loque that I had just stepped onto a road leading toward panic. He was dealing with enough.

“Did he say what the project was?” I asked, trying not to let my dancing nerves show.

“Not right away. That was the last I saw of him for a long time. I survived, obviously… and healed. Every second was torture, but my strength slowly returned. It was a miracle I didn’t contract something deadly, or become infected, or get sick from the garbage they fed us. The pain never went away, but it subsided. My eyes stopped burning, and I had partial vision. It was better than nothing. I think that if I were totally blind, they would have stopped feeding me, and I would have been finished. They didn’t want blind workers.”

“Did you find out what the project was?” I asked.

I wanted to hear about Loque’s recovery, but the fact that he was lying there in front of me meant that he had survived. I was much more worried about what Saint Dane was up to.

“Eventually I could stand and walk,” he said. “It was painful, and it took a long time for the stiffness to go away, but at least I was mobile. I didn’t want anything to do with that heartless guy and his project, so my plan was to try and escape. I figured I wouldn’t be put to work until I was fully healed, but I was wrong. As soon as they saw that I could get around, they pulled me out of there. At first I was relieved. I figured nothing could be worse than that hellhole. I was wrong.”

Loque took another sip of water. It was tough being patient. I needed to know what was going on in Rubic City. I sat quietly, waiting for him to drink and get the energy to continue.

“It’s a mine,” Loque finally said. “I think they’re looking for precious gems or minerals. It’s the only thing I can think of. There were hundreds of Flighters underground, digging through rock and rubble. There was no air and little light. They pushed me into this hole and told me to dig. With my hands. There were no tools. No shovels. I took my place in line behind other Flighters who were in worse shape than I. There was barely enough room to move. If you backed away or tried to rest, one of the supervising Flighters would beat you with a heavy stick. It was grueling, mindless work. My hands bled. They didn’t even tell me what I was looking for. None of us really knew. We were just told to dig. And dig. I got to the point where I wished I hadn’t survived the crashing glass, because I felt sure I would die in that claustrophobic mine.

The only thing that kept me going was the hope of escape. I organized a group of Flighters. They may be savages, but they’re not dumb. They knew they would die down there. Our chance came one evening during the rest period. There was always a short window when the guards changed shifts. It was the same every night. We weren’t watched during those times. That’s when we made our escape. There were six of us. We found our way to the surface of the city and ran, before the next shift of guards showed up. I told them I had a ship in the harbor, and if they could get me there, I’d help them get away.”

My heart sank. “The ship wasn’t there, was it?”

“No,” Loque answered. “The Flighters helped me get through the dark streets to the harbor, but the pilgrim ship was gone. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. You all thought I was dead. There was no reason for the Jakills to wait for a ghost.”

I knew I was going to have to tell Loque the truth about how the Flighters attacked the ship and sank it, killing most of the Jakills. But that would have to wait for another time.

“The Flighters had another idea. They told me about these small, fast ships that had been sitting near shore since before they were born. Nobody knew where they came l from or why they were there. They brought me to a long pier, under which these boats were supposed to be stored. They told me there were thousands of them. When we climbed below, we saw that only a few remained. But that was okay-we didn’t need many. We boarded three, two of us on each. They seemed easy to control. I sat on the back of one ship, waiting to head out to sea and wondering if I should bring those Flighters to Ibara. Turned out I didn’t need to worry. The attack took care of that.”

“Attack?”

“The Flighter guards came after us,” Loque answered. “I thought they would try to recapture us, but I was wrong. They didn’t want us back. I think it was more about making an example of us, so none of the other slave workers would try to escape. I didn’t even know they had found us until the shooting started. They blasted us with these guns, probably the same kind of gun that destroyed the stained-glass wall. Two of the Flighters were hit instantly. Their ship exploded. I never saw them again. The other ship started off and it too got hit. The Flighters dove off at the last second. They may have survived. I don’t know.”

“And your ship?”

“The Flighter at the controls nearly got away. A shot was fired.” Loque fell silent. I knew he was remembering the moment, and I didn’t think it was a happy one. “The guy took the blast head-on. It knocked him clear off the little ship as if he were made of paper. It was horrible.”

“So you took the controls?”

“It was all I could do. Between the dark and my one good eye, I could barely see. But the instinct to survive is strong. I stood at the controls and did what the Flighter had done. The small craft lurched and took off. It was so fast. I wasn’t sure what direction I was going, except that it was away from the city. All around me there was cannon fire churning up the water. The farther away I got, the less accurate their aim was. In a few minutes I felt confident that I had gotten away. I was the only one.”

“Then you had to find your way back here,” I said.

“I used my navigation skills from working the fishing boats. I thought I was going in the right direction toward Ibara, but I didn’t know for sure. I was still weak, and after a few days of intense heat, I didn’t have anything left. I couldn’t stand up anymore, which meant I couldn’t control the boat. All I could do was lie down and go to sleep. After all I had been through, I didn’t have the energy left to keep going. When I closed my eyes, I was convinced it would be for the last time…until I heard your voice.”