MARKS- Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

The good thing about his hand being over my mouth is that it makes it hard to breathe. The stench of sewage surrounds us, trapped by the rounded walls we bend over and walk through. I take small breaths through the guard’s fingers only because I have to. He has me pressed in front of him, and if I stopped moving my feet he’d probably just lift me higher off the ground and carry me wherever we’re going.

Where are we going?

Mera’s words echo in my head: You’re being watched. They know your name.

Maybe he has a hidden trove of stolen gold and wine down here. Maybe his buddies will be waiting for us when we reach wherever we’re going, and they’ll share me as if I’m no more than plunder their position affords them. We are lost in darkness in the tunnel. The only way out I know is back where we came from. If I can get loose, maybe I can make a run for it.

That’s a big if. This guard is well built and bulky, as solid as a work horse.

I throw my weight into my arms, testing his strength, and in a split second his elbows collapse tighter into me. No way I’m getting away from him.

We’ve turned left twice now. Left, left. I repeat the sequence of our turns over and over in my head. When the time comes to run, I need to be ready. We turn right, and daylight spills down the tunnel. Another way out. My heart drums inside me. The light grows bigger and a few stench-covered breaths later, I can see the end of the tunnel, grass and sunlight beckoning from the other side.

The guard halts, his grip tightening on my arm. He presses his mouth close to my ear. “I’ll keep hold of your arm, but I’ll drop my hand from your mouth if you promise to be quiet. You scream and I’ll make you wish you hadn’t. Understand?”

I nod and, true to his word, he drops his hand from my mouth. He steps in front of me and pulls me forward. We walk to the end of the tunnel, and he releases my hand and pushes open the grate. He looks around and jumps out, and before I can think to turn and sprint the other direction, he reaches for me. His large hands come around my waist and he pulls me to the ground. Then his grasp of iron is on my arm again and we’re moving.

Minutes pass, a blur of color and sound. Wind whistling through pine trees. The creaking of oaks which don’t succumb so easily to the breeze. The steady crunch of this huge ogre’s feet as he trudges along, taking me God knows where.

A forest spreads in front of us, across from a cornfield. I peer over my shoulder, where the King’s castle and city lay behind us. We weave through the cornfield, and the memories churn up inside of me, but don’t flesh to life. My mind is too wound up on fear to allow them entry today. We’re in the forest soon enough and the guard pulls me along. I try to take note of things we pass, but nothing stands out: brown trees that all look the same; patches of sunlight I can glimpse through the trees. A small hut was visible when we first exited the sewer - the owner of the fields we tore through? - but that’s it. I rack my brain for any rumor I’ve heard about slave trade or selling girls for money. That can be the only thing he has in mind for me.

The sound of water cuts through my thoughts. It gets louder, and when we round a hill, water spreads out in front of us. A river. Think, Gretta! Two rivers converge along the King’s city. One flowing to it, and one away. I study the current of the river, pulling its waters away - away from the King and from home. The River Alden. We’re south of the city. Tall bluffs push out of the ground to our left, towering over us. The river bounces over rocks and turns sharply here before heading farther away from the city.

The guard halts behind a tree and pulls me close to his side. His tunic brushes against my arm, the fabric jarring against my wrist. He scans our surroundings, taking his time, checking for who knows what. Witnesses who can testify to whatever bad thing he’s about to do, I guess. As if it would matter. He’s a guard. He can do anything.

With me.

To me.

Saints help me.

When his patient search reveals nothing, he tugs me forward again. We parallel the river. He pulls me over the rough stone embankment instead of farther away where the path is easier to walk. Where it is made of mud and would leave our footprints behind. Maybe it’s a smuggling ring he’s involved in. We’re downriver; they could get things out of the city and to here easy enough.

Is that why he has me? I glance at my arm, tight in his grasp, grateful that my sleeves are still buttoned and pushed down. He can’t see my marks. He doesn’t know I’m Lyran. The guard moves behind a thicket and darkness drops on us once more.

“Duck,” he says.

I barely register his words before a low ceiling looms in front of me. I drop to keep from whacking my head. Rock walls surround us, a fortress not unlike the King’s black castle. The darkness is relieved by firelight.

Firelight?

"Flash,” a voice calls out.

“Lightning,” the guard responds.

A tall man appears out of the shadows. Firelight flickers against his face. He’s older than me, his brown pants and faded blue shirt telling me nothing about their intentions for me. He studies me then turns his attention back to the guard. “Another one?”

The guard shakes his head. “Not exactly.”

He yanks me forward before the other man can respond. We head down a dark tunnel. He’s dragging me into a pit. To do what? Kill me? Rape me? Would one be any better than the other? My breaths are shallow and fast, and my heart beats so loud it’s all I hear. I don’t want to die like this. I don’t want this to happen. I don’t want the King to have me. Even if it’s just through the hands of this guard. He can’t have everyone else and have me, too.

I throw my weight to the ground. The guard stops and reaches for me.

"No.” I yank my hand hard, but it doesn’t budge from his tight grasp. “No!”

The guard wraps his massive hands around me and lifts me to my feet. “Just a little further.” He puts his hand on my back and pushes me forward.

A little further to what? Death and agony? The King himself could be hiding down here, waiting to finish the horror he started seven years ago when he first started killing Lyrans. A crime ring. A swell of drunken guards. An underground brothel. A twisted sacrificial cult in whose fire I’ll burn. A tremble starts in my stomach and shoots through my limbs. Light at the end of the tunnel bounces off the rock walls. The cave opens up at the end to an enormous room – one filled with people.

Men sit around a fire talking. Two women stir something in a pot set over the flames. One of the women looks up and sees us. She straightens and says something to the man sitting closest to her. He snaps his head to us and stares straight at me.

The man steps toward us, but a little girl runs ahead of him. “Ward!” she cries. She runs full force and the guard drops his hand from my arm just in time to pick her up. I wrap my arms around myself and take a step back.

The man reaches us and looks at the guard. “We weren’t expecting you until Monday night, Ward.”

The guard, Ward, nods to me. “Had to get her out.”

The woman approaches and looks at me. “What’s your name, dear?”

Dear? I look from the man to her. “Gretta.”

"Welcome, Gretta,” she says. She looks at my dress. The bottom hem is coated with mess. Sewage has seeped into my shoes and each step my toes squish between things I don’t even want to think about. She looks back at me. “Come, we can get you cleaned up.”

She takes a step back, but I stand rooted in place. What is this? The woman’s green eyes soften and she lays a gentle hand on my arm. “Don’t worry, you’re safe here.”

I stare at her hand on my arm. The arm the guard had just clamped his hand on. My breath is caught in my lungs. I’m safe here? They don’t know I’m Lyran. Or think I’m Lyran. No smuggling ring, no being sold. There are women and children here. Air still won’t find its way into my lungs. The woman squeezes my arm and I look up. Bits of her blonde hair have fallen from where she has them pinned at the nape of her neck. She smiles, and her lips are pink like berries or the underside of a baby bunny. Her brows furrow as she stares at me. I look from her to the guard. He doesn’t have his hands on me. Nothing’s happened.

I turn back to the woman and burst into tears.