Element Rebirth

2. Alliance?

I couldn’t stop thinking about him. My head was reeling and it felt as though grandmother had been messing with my head. Were her stories getting too out of control for me, even though she passed away years ago? Am I going insane from the burning fumes of coal in the underground? I didn’t know.

Wrapping the firm cloth around my mouth, I cringed at the cotton rubbing into the scratches along my mouth and chin, stinging me from its itchy surface. Reluctantly, I made my way down towards the line of slaves in my shift, each being handed a pickaxe each. I took mine automatically, gripping it with calloused hands as the burning heat slowly started filling my eyes and warming up my face.

In the lower levels of the mines, the black coal burned from the active dragons, Hunters who could no longer return to their forms other than as a dragon. On the third level below where I worked were the caverns: disobedient slaves were either whipped to death or sent down here where the dragons burned them to death, surrounded and pelted with flaming coal.

I snapped out of my reverie and took up a place at a jagged wall of black stone and started heaving away at it.

My thoughts wandered back to the boy. Was he here in the mines with me? Did he take a night shift with me? Where did he work? Could I find him? If I did, would I have the courage to confront him?

The loud chink of the pickaxe against the rocky walls constantly rang in my ears as I hammered away, watching pieces of strong crumble at my feet, coating it in black dust.

It was amazing how well-informed the Hunters were of our mortal realm before they came to invade – they weren’t as stupid as they were brawny as I thought, strangely enough. There was no other way they could possibly know about coal mines.

Waking up on the small musty cot was like every other morning – only thoughts from last night flooded my mind.

Serving Venator for the first time then seeing that boy with the light and the floating water? Who was he? Where did he work as a slave? Obviously in the kitchens or as a server, possibly a miner too if he worked on the higher levels.

I grunted, rolling out of the cot with a painful back and numb toes and fingers. Five in the morning was always too chilly for my liking. Well I thought it this early considering I could barely see the sun through the cracks of the weak hut.

Other girls ranging from six to twenty lounged around me in their cots, murmuring to each other and themselves like usual. The dreary atmosphere made my shoulders sag as I snuggled into the thin rags and watched my breath cloud up before my eyes.

Before I knew it, the scalding heat of the kitchen was burning every inch of my exposed skin, cooks and servants running amok, desperately trying to prepare an extravagant breakfast for the Hunters.

“Terra, take this plate!” someone yelled at me then a burning dish of ceramic was placed into my calloused hands.

I cringed at the heat then sped out of the kitchen doors before anybody else could thrust some more hot food against me. Other server girls and boys were rushing past me, carrying steaming hot food that none of us humans would ever dare to touch.

I stared at the plate of thick sizzling bacon wistfully, knowing I’d get caught immediately if I were to even touch it.

Looking away I ran faster to the dining hall and sure enough, half-naked Hunters were entering the room, looking dreary as always. I avoided eye contact, carrying my plate of food to the centre of the hall where a massive table adorned with feast of food lay before me.

Just as I laid the plate down, another slave across the table from me added to my plate of bacon with his own. I lifted my gaze and for the briefest of moments, our eyes met.