Lionel worked the fields on Duke Romulus's land.

  It wasn't the labour that hurt him. He had worked before. Helped his father gather grain. Pulled weeds with his mother. Fetched tools while Mikhael cut wood. Work was simple. You did a thing, and it was either done or it wasn't.

  Here, he could do the same thing twice and be told both times it was wrong.

  There were two taskmasters.

  The first was tall and thin, with a limp in his right leg. He barked orders in short, clipped sentences, always standing just behind you, close enough that Lionel could feel his breath on his neck. He liked things straight. Rows. Lines. Edges. He believed there was a proper way to do everything and that everyone should already know it.

  "If I just watch more, I will learn it," Lionel told himself as he straightened a sack on his shoulder. "If I learn it, he will stop shouting. He will leave me alone."

  The second taskmaster did not shout. He smiled. That was worse.

  He was broad and soft around the middle, with hands that had not worked a field in years, or ever. He walked between the workers with his hands folded behind his back, humming tunelessly, his eyes always moving. His voice was always soft, but the whip moved fast when it came from his hand. He did not explain himself. He would nod at something one moment and strike for it the next. What was acceptable in the morning might earn a lashing by afternoon.

  Lionel had not figured either of them out.

  He tried. Watched. Imitated. Stayed quiet. It did not matter. One morning he was told his hands moved too slow. Later that same day, too fast. His posture, his footing, the way he turned his head, all of it seemed wrong depending on who saw it and when.

  The welts came quickly. His back burned every time the shirt brushed against it, and it hurt more to lie flat than to stay upright. He started sleeping on his belly, arms curled tight beneath his chest. Every breath reminded him of the things he could not afford to get wrong again.

  He did not speak much. Not because he had nothing to say, but because no one asked. The other fieldhands were older, dull-eyed, and used to silence. Some nodded at him. One passed him a strip of cloth to bite down on when the pain made it hard to breathe.

  But none of them spoke.

  No one asked about Mikhael.

  "So, he really is gone," Lionel thought. "Even here, he is just mine. No one else cares."

  He did not know where his brother was. Only that he had not seen him since they were separated. Only that when he looked at the tower beyond the fields, black and tall and silent, something in his chest sank. He thought about calling out. But he did not. He worked. He kept his head down.

  Every night, he tried to dream himself somewhere else, back at the house. Even those parents would have been bearable, if Mikhael were there. "With him," he thought, "I could sleep on the street and still be fine."

  Lionel did not cry anymore. Not because he had nothing left, but because there was no space for it. The days were filled with commands, footsteps, and the whisper of rope sliding through dirt. The fields did not wait for grief. The cold did not care. The men with the whips did not ask questions.

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  The work started before the sun cleared the trees. Pulling roots. Hauling stones. Stacking crates with hands that shook from cold and from lashes. They fed them, but only just. The food was thick and grey, like it had been boiled more times than it had ever been cooked. Water went round in dented metal cups. No names were spoken. Not by the guards. Not by the workers.

  Lionel learned quickly to watch the other slaves. They did not speak much, but they moved like they had memorised every danger. He copied what they did. He learned where to stand to avoid the second strike of the whip, and which taskmaster hated eye contact more than noise.

  Still, it was not enough.

  Some nights he dreamed of Mikhael.

  Not his voice. Not his face.

  Just his hand.

  Reaching. Holding. Warm.

  But Mikhael was not here.

  At night, when the fields finally emptied and the tools were locked away, the workers returned to the quarters. They were nothing more than long wooden sheds with dirt floors and thin walls that did nothing to keep the cold out. But inside there was still breath. Still warmth. Still people.

  They sat in clusters, huddled more from habit than comfort, whispering stories from better days, trading scraps of food, pressing aching backs against the walls. No one laughed. Sometimes they smiled. That was allowed. Sometimes.

  Lionel sat near the edge of the room, close enough to feel the others, far enough that he did not have to speak. He had bruises under his shirt, blooming dark across his spine, and his shoulders ached in a way that made breathing feel like work. Someone beside him passed half a crust of bread. He took it without looking. Chewed slowly. Tasted nothing.

  The door slammed open.

  The quiet snapped in half. Boots stomped in, heavy and uneven. A voice followed, too loud for the space, thick with drink and something meaner than tiredness. One of the taskmasters. The shorter one. The one who never shouted when he whipped you, only smiled.

  "Too loud," he growled. "I do not remember giving any of you leave to chatter. Seems the day's work was not enough to tire you. Maybe I should have worked you harder."

  Everyone froze. The whispers vanished like smoke.

  The taskmaster stumbled a step, took a long drink from the flask in his hand, then wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve. His eyes swept the room like a man searching for a place to put his anger.

  Then he pointed.

  "You."

  Lionel's breath caught in his throat.

  "Stand up."

  He stood.

  The taskmaster came closer, swaying a little, his boots too loud on the hard floor. He stopped just in front of Lionel. The smell of wine hung off him like sweat.

  "You forget to bow?"

  Lionel did not move.

  The silence pressed harder than any whip. Everyone was watching, even if their eyes never left the ground. The taskmaster leaned in, smiling. His teeth were yellow, his lips cracked.

  "Bow."

  Lionel's legs stayed locked. His hands clenched into fists at his sides. He remembered Mikhael. Not his face, not even his voice, just that moment in the courtyard. Romulus in front of him. The seal forcing him down. Mikhael had not gone willingly. They had needed power for him. They had needed the seal. They had needed to break him.

  Lionel wanted that. Just once. To not bend.

  His back flared, a hot line of pain across half-healed welts. The last lashing had left him awake for two nights, breathing in short, sharp gasps every time the fabric touched skin. He was not Mikhael. His strength was smaller. Quieter. Slower.

  "Bow? How can I bow? Mikhael would never have bowed to the likes of him."

  The pain sharpened, bright and immediate.

  "But I am not him. He would have taken every strike and still stood proud. I cannot. I cannot take it again. It hurts. It hurts so much."

  He bowed.

  Slow. Shaking. Not deep, not quick. But enough.

  The taskmaster snorted.

  "That is more like it. If I hear even a whisper tonight, I will whip it out of all of you."

  He turned, took another drink, and walked out, slamming the door behind him.

  The silence did not leave with him. It settled heavier than before. No one spoke. Not to Lionel. Not to each other.

  He stayed there, bent at the waist, until someone's fingers brushed his sleeve, a small, hesitant touch, gone as quickly as it came. He straightened by inches, then crawled back to the corner and lay on his side, curled tight, eyes open.

  He hated himself for bowing. For letting the pain decide. He hated the thought of the look Mikhael would have given him if he had seen it. He hated knowing it had cost the taskmaster nothing.

  He had not stood up for himself.

  He had not stood at all.