Dead and Buryd

Chapter 3: Absent from the Guard

Already late for her promised appointment with the Belsa, Georgianna hurried along the tunnel towards the underground settlement. The guard in the black line, leading in from one of the wider tunnels, had stopped and searched her thoroughly as she’d passed. She’d called in Georgianna’s arrival via a tampered Adveni radio, and even after having received the all-clear, had been dubious about letting her past. It was only when she mentioned Lacie, the Belsa marshall’s adopted daughter, that the guard had apologised for the inconvenience and sent her on her way.

The Belsa had been around almost as long as the Adveni had been in power. Forced into servitude by the invading race, many Veniche had tried to fight to reclaim their freedom and their planet, Os-Veruh. As more people died in the continued fighting, it no longer became an option to stay within their tribes. Those who fought joined together, tribal rivalries pushed aside to rebel against their conquerors. Even a decade after the arrival of the Adveni, the Belsa received new rebels each season. Veniche men and women who arrived in the city of Adlai and wanted to fight, or who needed protection that their tribe could not offer.

The darkness was strangely comforting, and it wasn’t odd for Georgianna to feel safer in the dark tunnels than she did above ground. Up there, everyone could see her and could question her. Down on the lines, the people who needed to know her already did, and those that didn’t know her didn’t ask questions. No one asked unnecessary questions down here. It was safer if they didn’t know the answer.

By the time the lamps began filtering light across the worn tunnel floor, Georgianna was in her stride. Moving swiftly and purposefully through the settlements, she smiled and greeted those she knew and nodded curtly to those she didn’t. Though well-known, she would not dare insult those that she didn’t recognise by snubbing them. The Belsa demanded respect; she knew that, especially as she wasn’t officially one of them. She didn’t train or stand guard. She was never sent out to scout Adveni movements. She was, to most of them, just one of the medics who occasionally patched them up.

The old tunnel car stood at the end of one of the collapsed lines, its sliding door held open by a broken knife blade wedged into the bottom of the metal run. From inside, a light flickered, and as she came closer, she could hear the low murmur of voices.

She barely paused between banging her fist on the metal shell of the car and heaving herself up through the open doorway. Standing up straight, she glanced both ways down the car until her gaze settled on the two men inside. One of them was already looking at her. His cold eyes narrowed for a moment, refocusing before a smile parted his thin lips, bringing a softer look to his square jaw.

“Marshall Casey!” she greeted with a cheerful wave, stepping further into the car.

Glancing briefly at the other man, the marshall pushed himself to his feet.

“Beck!” he corrected in a low, gruff voice.

Georgianna laughed.

“But you are the marshall! Always will be.”

Beck rolled his eyes as he lifted a large hand and patted her cheek, plastering her wavy hair to her tanned skin.

“Whatever you say,” he agreed with a reluctant shake of his head. “Looking for Lacie?”

She nodded, turning to look at the rest of the car. One portion was cornered off, a thick burlap sheet hanging from where it had been nailed into the ceiling some time before. Behind it, she knew stood a bed lashed together from old car seats and a trunk of clothes that belonged to Beck’s adopted daughter, Lacie. Unlike the other times Georgianna had climbed into the car looking for her, the sixteen-year-old had yet to stick her face out from behind the makeshift wall.