You kneel before the God-King. His golden body blazes in the harsh cold light, and you squint into the mixing bowl and stir the paste, a blend of gold dust and animal glue, with a small wooden paddle. And you wince. The bracelets on your arms are jangling. You’ve adorned them well for Him but you’ve failed to be considerate. He may dislike the sound. You glance up at His inscrutable face and stir, willing the throng in Revelation Court to chant more loudly and thus to cover your unseemly noise. He’s as still as a statue but you can feel his patience thin. The people have gathered for his annual address. This day is never easy. The interruption to His work is brief but it grates Him. You can tell. And the paste is ready. You dip the paddle and rise, smoothing out your dress, and your long lashes flutter as you peer against His glow. Miniscule cuneiform wedges spiral round Him and some of them are null. His skin is marred by hairline fractures. His right arm cannot move and He cannot turn His neck. He’ll want another body soon. You’ve scoured them already—the cleaning cloth is stained with the impossible golden rust. And you smear the fractures over. The crowd will be too far away to see them but the god deserves perfection. You flip the paddle and scrape away the excess paste. Then you set the paddle aside and wipe your brow and reach into your beautiful auburn tresses. Pulling a pin free, you trace the broken signs anew. You are the best but the work is slow. Each sign must be perfect or the enchantment will fail.

  The god’s ivory teeth begin to click. You’re moving too sluggishly. Your hands are tremulous. Withdrawing the needle lest it ruin your work, you shake the trembling fingers loose. To His great irritation. The clicking becomes a chatter. You take a breath and resume. Finish His arm’s final word. Then you exhale and he suddenly raises his hand and you flinch and the needle flicks a dollop straight into His eye. You prostrate yourself before Him, slapping the tiles with your brow and wetting them with tears. He was merely trying the hand. It holds your feathered braids and pulls you standing, and His leather tongue rasps against His teeth like a strop against a razor. “Look at me.”

  You look up at His unblinking eyes. Their pupils are made of lapis stone and their whites of bleached ivory—but for a single golden speck. He begins to chant.

  “Please, my lord—” But His song is a song of pain. Your jaw clenches and your spine bends as the pain flows screaming through and your limbs begin to spasm. Bracelets and anklets and rings fly off and clatter against the walls. You crumple to the wet stone sobbing. You’ve smudged the paint around your pretty eyes and torn your pretty dress. Soiled your pretty scent. The God-King kneels, and frigid fingers brush the tears from your face.

  “Blood of my blood. Know that I care for thee as a father cares for his daughter. I punish thee only so that thou may improve. This work is of the utmost importance. More than the falling of empires. More than the flooding of rivers and the leveling of mountains. That is why I hath entrusted it to thee.”

  Nodding, you swallow the tears. And someone knocks at the door. “I beg the God-King’s pardon.” Lilitu says. “His flock awaits.” It was she who had honored you with this appointment. It was she who had thought you capable. You lower your gaze. Shindar reaches and, ignoring His priestess, gently lifts your chin. His right arm hangs at his side. The words on his shoulder, the ones you just repaired, have rusted over again. The song of pain.

  “Stand up, my child” He says. “And finish thy work.” When your hands cease trembling, you patch the shoulder and wipe the fleck from his eye. “Good girl. Thou art dismissed.”

  You flee to your room and dive onto the bed and weep. Wipe your face with velvet. Your dresser is full of velvet covers and pillows and your platter is heaped with fresh fruit. Your jewelry box brims with gems of every shape and color. They had once belonged to someone else—some other girl, who deserved them. This day is never easy. You hear the God-King address His flock, welcoming the pilgrims to Shindara and reminding the Magi to uphold His Edicts, and you hide your face in the blanket and weep as you listen to the booming sacred voice.

  Root awakened shivering. He peeled his tongue from his sour palette and groaned. A voice boomed down upon his aching skull and it was not the God-King’s voice. Root felt his own skin. Clammy and nude. Touched his groin. He wasn’t Shindar’s bodyslave. He was a man in a dark cellar and he was not alone. He scampered away from a snorting and whimpering mass. Eyed the monster’s many squirming limbs. Shuddered as the voice above him boomed. “Good morning, I said!” It came from the glowing outline of a door. “Wake up, you laggards!” It was the herald Moushe. The latch clicked and the door creaked open, and by the rosy beam of light Root saw that the many-limbed monster was a pile of entangled men, naked and huddled together for warmth. The bandits Tal-Humche had captured. Long shadows enveloped them as men stomped down the stairs.

  The bandits were seized and so was Root. They were pushed up the stairs into a cramped warehouse, and from there taken outside into a hissing mob. Villagers gaped at him, muttering spells and clutching amulets and shielding their children’s eyes. He covered his manhood. One little boy, perched atop his father’s shoulders, blew a raspberry. Children began to scoop up stones and Root was shoved from behind. He and the bandits were driven through the mass. Steered through a line of grim-faced men and into the town square. Inside it, the herald Moushe stood upon a crate. He gestured his staff at the villagers pressing the cordon and screaming for blood and waited for all to hush. Root looked over the crowd at the open stables. They were vacant. Where was Tal? Root closed his eyes and strained to remember the night before. The feast was a haze. What commands had he given Ogri? Don’t change shape or do anything suspicious. Just act like a horse. Root cursed himself. The Chosen had left without him and they’d unwittingly taken a god. There must have been a mix-up. His stomach tossed and turned like a fretful sleeper. Root had been mistaken for a bandit. He racked his feverish mind for a way to convince the herald.

  “People of Whiterock.” Moushe said. “Before Tal-Humche departed I spoke to him. Asked how he had captured these scum, and I will tell you what he said to me. He was with the eastern caravan when he decided to venture a little, to see if he could get a final bit of hospitality before returning to garrison. During his travels, he happened across a homestead. The owner had been killed. His tools had been stolen. His harvest plundered. And after he’d given his killers the shelter of his roof!”

  The mob jeered. Eresh-Kigal, standing proud despite his nudity and his livid bruises, shouted over them, lisping words through his broken teeth. “If the man was dead, how could the Chosen know how he had treated us?”

  But the villagers drowned him out. They had ears only for the herald. “Tal-Humche tracked these bandits for two days and caught them on the third. One of the dogs nearly killed him,” he said, pointing his staff at Eresh-Kigal. “It feigned surrender and tried to stab him in the back!” And the audience erupted into a bloodthirsty clamor. Root’s skull throbbed. He cupped his ears shut and closed his glowing lids. Repressed the bile bubbling up his throat. He began to compose a speech. There has been a terrible misunderstanding. I do not know these men, and I am not a bandit. In fact I helped the Chosen capture them. I saved Tal-Humche’s life.

  Moushe shouted over the heckling mob. “But before we pass judgment on these criminals, let us praise the men who captured them! Let us praise Tal-Humche ket Urek, third prince of the Golden Eagle clan! Let us praise Mammo-Yhakko and the Chosen! But most of all, let us praise those whom they serve. Let us praise the gods-beloved Magi! Let us remember with every piece of bread, with every spoonful of oats, that men cannot eat stone. Let us remember that their grain feeds us, that their Chosen protect us, that without them we are surely doomed.”

  The crowd cheered—somewhat less enthusiastically than before, and Moushe waved his staff. “The punishment for travellers who commit violence against their host is death.” Villagers raised the rocks in their fists, but the herald stopped them with an upheld palm. “However, death is too good for them. And the Magus Bartoulme is merciful. He has purchased these worthless, walking corpses, and he shall force them to do what they have until now managed to avoid. Work. They shall work the quarry until deathless Ner’gal herds their spirits to the Undergloom—may he take his time!”

  Once the audience had finished their hooting, Root staggered forward to deliver his appeal. “There has been a terrible misunderstanding.” he rasped. “I do not know these men, and I am not a—” His insides suddenly churned. Instead of speech he spewed a crimson stream. Wine splashed the ground and chunks of roast pork slid across the wet earth and struck the herald’s toes.

  Villagers chuckled and gasped. Bandits sidled away. Moushe stepped out from the puddle. “This is good.” he said. “You will be vomiting by the day’s end, so you may as well get it all out now. I’ll even help.” And he thrust his staff into Root’s belly. He crumpled into the pool of vomit and stood up retching. Moushe stalked the line of captives. “Yes, this is good. It will help to illustrate a rule. For you slaves will work together, eat together, sleep together. And when one of you is rewarded, you are all rewarded. But when one of you is punished,” he said, striking the man beside Root. “You are all punished.” The herald hit another captive, the boy who had ridden the donkey—and then another, the one-eyed bandit leader. He stooped clutching his belly. The herald approached Eresh-Kigal and frowned. “Looking at you, I am sad to give this blow. But rules,” he said, slamming his stomach, “are rules.” The proud Wolf had prepared for this and, rather than doubling over in pain, he merely grunted. Moushe searched the crowd. “Fivefingers, step forward, if you will, and say something to these new slaves.”

  A chorus of cheers urged him on, and the old man limped slowly through the parting mass. He wore a belted tunic and a cap of corded wool. As he reached to adjust it, Root saw that half his fingers were nubs. Some shortened at the first knuckle and others at the second. They scratched his weather-bitten face and shaded his eyes, bright and deeply-set, scrutinizing the captives as though they were cattle at an auction. Appraising Root he frowned. Then he spoke, and his voice was shifting gravel. “Before you begin the day’s work—and your new lives—allow me to give you some advice.” he said, raising his palms. “Unsolicited advice, I know. You must understand that this work is hard. That you will suffer. And you must watch your mind. A thought will worm its way inside. It will say that you have nothing left to lose. That you can suffer no more. It will tell you to do some foolish thing. To commit some new crime. But as one who is old, as one who has had such thoughts, let me assure you. A man always has something to lose, and a man’s capacity to suffer is a well without a bottom.

  “But allow me also to give you some hope. I once was as you are now, back when good Moushe here was a slave called Eagle.” And the crowd chuckled at this reference to the herald’s long and sharply-hooked nose. “But now I am free. I have a beautiful wife and three healthy children, with a house that belongs to us. And I am overseer of Magus Bartoulme’s quarry. How, you ask? I did the work.” he said, tapping his temple. “I watched my mind.” And his eyes shifted to Eresh-Kigal. “I can see that some of you spit on me, in your thoughts. Just what sort of hope is it, you think, to become a disfigured old man? You think this way because you have not yet been humbled by the gods. But you will be.”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Fivefingers had a bucket drawn from the well and brought to water the slaves. Root watched while the one-eyed man, the bandits’ chieftain, drank first. He handed the bucket to his brother, who had his fill and, passing it by Eresh-Kigal, gave it instead to the boy. Root unpuckered his sour palette and waited for him to drink. He slurped for quite some time. Villagers occupied themselves with tunics and sunhats and bundled baskets of food. Their lunches. Then the boy wiped his chin and smiled. Glancing at the free workers, he chose between Root and the Gray Wolf and offered him the bucket. Eresh-Kigal reached, and as he did the boy let go too soon. It dropped to the ground and spilled. Root looked to the villagers. They were chatting merrily, and whomever he caught with his eyes responded with a scowl. He watched the puddle drain into the dirt. Eresh-Kigal retrieved the empty bucket and walked to the well, but a free man took it from him, and he was pushed back toward the other slaves. Together they were steered to the town’s gate and out into the mine.

  The quarry of Whiterock was a staircase going nowhere. Its gigantic steps had been cut from a bed of marble and its rails were perfect cubes. Off to the side was a canopy and a toolshed. The free men deposited their lunches in the shade and fetched their mallets and chisels. The overseer waited for them to emerge before he ducked inside. He returned with an armful of leather. Four dogskin caps, the traditional clothes of a thrall. He passed them out, and as he gave Eresh-Kigal his hat the Gray Wolf dropped it as though it were something dirty—and it was. Fivefingers hushed the grumbling quarry-men with a single raised nub and spoke. “Tell me, why do you refuse the slave hat?”

  “Because I am not a slave. I am Eresh-Kigal ket Irkalla, first prince of the Gray Wolf clan.”

  The overseer’s grin showed the gaps in his teeth. “Very well, my prince.” he said, gesturing to the canopy. In its shade a seat had been carved. “Please. Sit and take your comfort.” Eresh-Kigal narrowed his eyes at the marble chair. He approached it like a wary hunter and sat carefully down. The quarry-men looked from him to the overseer. “What are you laggards gaping at?” he barked. “Get to it!”

  Fivefingers paired each new thrall—except the Gray Wolf—with an experienced worker. Root’s guide was a lanky youth with an oddly high-pitched voice. “What shall I call you?” he asked. “Puke?” And he frowned at Root’s protruding ribs and his sallow cheeks. “Corpse? Ghola? No I’ve got it! You’re pale and bald just like a mole.”

  “My name is Root.” he said. “What should I call you?”

  His guide stepped back waving a hand in front of his face and pinching his nose with the other. “By Enlil!” he said. “You have the breath of a dog! I shall call you Dogbreath. Follow me, Dogbreath, and I’ll show you something.” He dragged Root to a patch of uncut stone. “Now pay attention.” he said, pointing to a straight line of charcoal. “This will be one side of the block.” And he held a chisel to it. “Take this and hold it there.”

  Root took the bronze chisel and held it in place as his mentor hefted a mallet. “Keep it straight and don’t move.” he said, raising the hammer high. It swung down and Root’s hand jolted and the mallet thudded stone. “By the gods, I told you to stay still!” And he glanced at Fivefingers. “The coward won’t stay still.”

  Fivefingers limped over, took the chisel from Root’s trembling fingers, and rested it against the line. The mallet was raised. Fivefingers didn’t even look. The mallet bounced off the chisel and he turned it slightly, and the pair repeated this again and again. Before long they had drilled a hole. The overseer gave Root the chisel and showed him where to place it, on the line and beside the first hole. The mallet’s shadow loomed. “Courage.” he said. Root closed his eyes and squeezed. The chisel jumped in his hand and his fingers went numb and he blinked, shaking the fingers loose. Then he turned the chisel slightly, as he had seen Fivefingers do. “Good.” the old man said. “Listen to Squeaker. He knows what he’s doing.” And the overseer shuffled off to inspect the other slaves.

  Once the charcoal line was dotted with holes, Root was sent for a bucket of water and a basket of wooden plugs. He did so gladly, gulping down his fill before he could be stopped. “Watch this.” Squeaker said. “Magi aren’t the only ones who can make miracles.” He hammered a wooden plug into each hole. Then he poured water into each plug and Root flinched at a noise like thunder. A thin chasm had appeared along the dotted line. Squeaker grinned. “The wood soaks up the water and expands, and forces the stone apart.” he said. “Now help me gather them.” Having popped out of their holes, the plugs were rolling in circuits.

  The pair worked on their block until the sun was high. Then a whistle announced the mid-day break and men put down their tools. Gathering beneath the canopy—around Eresh-Kigal, still seated upon his marble throne—they unpacked their bundles and nibbled at dried figs and barley cakes and joked. Their moods were elevated by the misery of the thralls who watched them eat. Root’s belly gurgled. Then the town’s gate opened and a portly old woman trundled out hefting a pot of clay. She set it down under the canopy, took the sunhat off her head, and wiped her wrinkled brow. “Thralls!” she barked. “Grab your bowls and gather.” Root obeyed. He waited last in line and peered over One-eye—who’d been easy for his mentor to name—at the woman’s pot. She lifted the lid. Root beheld the batch of barley gruel and licked his slavering gums. She dipped her ladle and raised it over One-eye’s bowl and halted at the sound of a whistle. Fivefingers. One-eye held his bowl out and the woman shook her head. He went to the overseer.

  “May I ask,” he said, averting his gaze, “why we may not eat?”

  Fivefingers looked at him as though confused. “Did you not hear what good Moushe told you? You thralls are to be treated as one. You did not work,” he said, gesturing to Eresh-Kigal, “so why should you be fed? Indeed, I see no reason for you laggards to nap through the noon sun either, with honest working men. No. Each of you go fetch a basket. Now! You will help clear rubble.”

  Moushe’s promise to the thralls had proven true. They were soon retching—not from indigestion, for their stomachs were empty, but from sheer fatigue. Over and over again Root shoveled loose fragments into his wicker basket, hefted it onto his shoulders, and staggered to the dump site. The mid-day sun warped the still air of the desert and scorched the barren earth. Scalded the skin of his bare neck and the soles of his feet. The quarry smelled like a wet dog. Sweat oozed through his hat and dripped into his eyes. He scooped at pebbles with torn and bleeding fingers. Rocks clattered by his ankles. The free men had paused their feasting to pelt him. He was slow. The others were slow too but he was slower. He heaved the basket up and nearly lost his balance. Then he took step after shaky step until finally he reached the dump site and, upending the basket, fell right along with it to the vast amusement of the crowd.

  “Now I understand why he took to thieving.” Squeaker said. “He’s genuinely incapable of honest work.” Root flopped over to his back and gulped dry air. He was not a thief. Heedless of the barrage flying overhead he squinted at the sun. It had barely moved. Ogri. he mouthed. Ogri help me. But he knew the god would not. A pebble struck his shin. Then a whistle pealed and the rain of stones diminished. “Chorba,” Fivefingers said, “make sure he lives.” A shadow held back the sun. The old woman squatted over Root. She spread his eyelids and clucked. Then she squeezed a damp rag over his face and moisture dribbled through his cracked and swollen lips and he sputtered. Creased fingers rubbed his throat as she cooed.

  He awakened to a heckling chorus. A heaviness pinned his head to the ground. The weight was a cool rag. He pulled it off his face and sat, and saw the free men jeering. A thrall had dropped his basket and approached the Gray Wolf, who was still reclining in the shade. “You’re killing us.” One-eye rasped.

  Eresh-Kigal’s face remained impassive under the eye’s hateful glare. “Can’t you see? They want to pit us against one another.”

  “I don’t care. Get up and work, now.”

  The Gray Wolf stood from his chair and fixed the man with a haughty look. “Make me.”

  And the freemen whooped and hollered and hushed each other, eager to catch every word. One-eye stepped even closer. “Work.” he said. “Or I will make you.”

  His nose was nearly touching Eresh-Kigal’s chin. The prince drooped his eyelids and made his voice drawl. “If you were going to,” he said, “you would have done so already. But you won’t. Because you are a coward.”

  Free men began to shout their wagers. “A copper deben on One-eye!”

  “With even odds? Just look at the prince. He’s already half dead!”

  “One-eye isn’t exactly in fighting shape either. And Prince is the bigger man. Look at him!”

  “Fine, fine. A deben at even odds.” And others joined in, urging the slaves to fight. Eresh-Kigal’s nose wrinkled at One-eye’s rancid breath. He clenched his fists. His knuckles whitened. Then the single eye averted and, to the hissing of the disappointed crowd, he turned tail and trudged toward his basket. The freemen contented themselves by tossing pebbles at the lagging slaves. Before long they could only wriggle in the dust like worms.

  Root drifted in and out of sleep until a whistle woke him. The sky was a crimson haze. The sun had nearly set. Fivefingers announced the work-day’s end and gathered everyone for the walk back to town. He limped over to Eresh-Kigal. “My prince, I see now that you’d rather not be a slave.” the overseer said. “Very well. You are free.” His mangled fingers pointed out into the barren land. “Farewell. You no longer belong to Whiterock, and you shall not be forced to return.” And with the others he left Eresh-Kigal behind. The prince soon caught up with them. Fivefingers looked as though he were surprised. “Do my eyes deceive me? My prince, you seem to prefer slavery over freedom!”

  “The choice is a false one.” the Gray Wolf said. “Not a choice between slavery and freedom, but between slavery and death. No one can survive the Barrens without food or water.”

  “I see.” Fivefingers said, nodding slowly. “So not only do you expect freedom—though you are a criminal—but you expect supplies for the journey as well. Tell me, my prince, why you are owed this. Did I sire you? Are you my bastard son?”

  The free men laughed and Eresh-Kigal bristled. But he had no reply, and when the others continued their journey to Whiterock the Gray Wolf followed them. Both he and Root walked apart from the other slaves. In town, they were given gruel and scrubbed clean and then they were locked in the cellar. And there they slept.

  Root stirred to the sound of heavy breathing and the scraping of skin. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness. A mass of flesh squirmed. The bandits were fighting—if worms could fight. One-eye straddled Eresh-Kigal while the others pinned his arms. He thrashed and bucked and was ridden like a horse. Then One-eye set his weight down and put his hands around the Gray Wolf’s neck. Root crawled on his elbows. He saw a pair of feet. They belonged to the boy who had spilt the water. He was holding Eresh-Kigal’s arm. Root grabbed the boy’s foot and pulled, and other foot stomped and his nose cracked and his eyes watered and blood streamed down his chin. He held on and crawled over the kicking feet. Rested his weight on the boy’s ankles. Reached to pry at his hands. They grabbed Root’s fingers and the boy suddenly turned, mounting him and pinning his wrists. Root struggled. The boy’s scalp burrowed into his chin, and he saw over the wriggling mass Eresh-Kigal’s arm. It was free, and the elbow sprang like a scorpion’s tail into One-eye’s face and he scrambled like a stung weasel. His cheek had split and blood was streaming down. Root grappled with the boy’s wrists. His own were weak, both collected by a single hand. The boy raised the other in a fist. Root closed his eyes. Nothing happened, and he opened them and saw Eresh-Kigal pulling the boy up by his hair and shoving him into his friends. The Gray Wolf offered Root a hand. He scrambled up and they stood together, leaning against a wall. Root’s nose could not breath, and blood dripped from it into his open mouth. Across them One-eye and his brothers glared. Eresh-Kigal massaged his throat. “Whatever you do.” he rasped. “Do not fall asleep.”

  The next morning, Eresh-Kigal joined the others in work. The quarry men named him Princess and, chuckling amongst themselves, guessed by his bruised throat and Root’s broken nose and One-eye’s split cheek that the slaves had finally managed to reach an understanding.