My feet shuffle after Tug into a labyrinth of food stands behind the regular slave cages. Men fry meat dishes in breadcrumbs and brown powder. Sellers move around with nuts, teas, and berries. I wander blindly, the spicy smells making me nauseous. I have abandoned him. He didn't turn around because he no longer counts on me. He's stopped believing I can save him.
We climb steps and clang across a metal walkway. I glance at the smoke roiling above us, glimpse the network of cages suspended overhead. Tug pushes me into a chair and sits down beside me.
A man arrives with a tray of mint tea, pine nuts and a long, cone-shaped object. He places a cloth beside Brin. In red on the cream linen, as though written in blood, is the number five. I stare at it. For a second, I cannot rip through the emotional haze to grasp its meaning.
Tug's look brings me back from the numbness. I clench my teeth, and take in where we are seated. The eating house is made of metal barriers and arched walkways, reminiscent of a mammoth monster skeleton. Bounty hunters with greedy faces and satisfied sneers guzzle the offerings laid on their tables while they wait. Wealthy men in bear furs press cone-shaped objects to their starward-gazing eyes.
I slide the cone-shaped eyeglass off the table, and hold one end to my eye and the other skywards. The glass magnifies the platforms above the food maze. Our position is ideal for viewing the caged children. As I adjust to one-eyed vision, a girl with sparkling gold and green irises, wearing a frilly dress, comes into focus. Her hands clasp a shiny purse. She stares forward, motionless. She is terribly young, three or four years from her eyes changing. My airway closes making it harder to breathe, a sensation intensified by the cooking smoke.
The girl has been dressed like some rich person's pet toy. Perhaps for a spoilt daughter to play with, until she is six or seven and can be used for more treacherous tasks or be resold. I bite my inner cheek, anger flooding back. When I spot the number five painted across Kel's new blue tunic, the crush in my throat leaves me choking. Suddenly, the eyeglass is being ripped from my hands. It disappears inside the bulk of Tug's furs.
"Draw any more attention to yourself," he says, "and I'll lock you back in the room until this is over."
I have attracted the gaze of a man sitting by a table three feet away. He appears neither old enough, nor wealthy enough to be a buyer, neither brute nor mercenary enough to be a bounty hunter. I catch his eye for less than a second, but it is long enough to worry he might have realized I am no boy. I twist away and grab a handful of nuts before Tug or Brin can stop me.
Making Tug suffer is not enough. He and Brin didn't snatch the three-year-old girl dressed like a doll. They aren't responsible for turning us into fugitives, for the hundreds of Uru Ana families hiding in the Sea of Trees, for the thousands more working in the tundra mines until they die of exhaustion. I will get my revenge on Tug, and I will kill the man that buys Kel if I have to, but every low-life scum who has sat in this dive, should know the fear of the children they trade here.
Pa's voice rings in my head. "Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the courage to do what we ought." His answer when I once asked why he didn't resent Kel and me, or more importantly our mother who never told him about her Uru Ana blood until I was born, for taking so much away from him.
Pa's answer had annoyed me and seemed evasive. But now his words seem apt. Someone ought to fight back, breed fear into the bounty hunters roaming the outland forests, attack the tundra mines. If the Uru Ana want freedom, they have to start thinking like they're free. Stop running and hiding.
Minutes pass, the attendant serving our table goes to and fro with folded pieces of cloth. From the conversations that ensue, it is apparent the two cloths Brin receives are offers for Kel. Tug is in no hurry to accept, but Brin is keen to do business and leave.
An image appears in the now-time, so clear it eclipses all the muddy snatches of memory swirling around the Pit and rouses me from my brooding.
A fire crackles in the hearth of a humble stone home. He crouches in front of it, furs wrapped around his linen shirt, warming himself. An old man sleeps on a thin mattress nearby. Beyond the window shutters, pale light skims the horizon.
He opens his fist to examine two gold rings. One, a signet ring with letters and symbols around the ruby center and symbols on the thick gold band, the other a hawk's head embedded in emeralds. He tosses them in his palm as though considering their significance.
I sit up straight and squint sideways to see the owner of the memory. Surprise shakes off all sullen exhaustion. It is the young man who noticed me earlier. Except now he holds the eyeglass to his face, which gives me a chance to take in his appearance. Bushy eyebrows, a whiskery growth of beard, greasy hair cut to his shoulders. He is not watching the Uru Ana cages, but directs the magnifying lens into the crowded Pit, tracking a guard.
As though sensing me, he lowers the viewing glass. I turn away at once. But in the mind-world I reach for him and am plunged into a desolate landscape much like a vast forest ravaged by pest or fire. I startle and retreat.
His mind reminds me of my mother's when, six weeks before Kel's second birthday, we woke to find she did not know who we were. The memory loss is an effect of the ancient Carucan ceremony of rebirth sometimes performed before the hibernation. If enough mist berries are consumed right before the long-sleep, it is said the soul travels through the spirit-world to return cleansed of all that ails it.
In my mother's case, she didn't forget her music or her dancing, her friends, the home she grew up in, the picnics and lakes and swimming. She didn't forget meeting and falling in love with Pa. She only forgot Kel and me.
But this man seems to remember almost nothing of the nineteen or twenty years he lived before waking a fortnight ago. I have never seen such total obliteration of memory brought on by the spiritual cleansing.
My heartbeat speeds up in anticipation. The odd whiskery beard and greasy hair resemble a disguise. The rings are those of a nobleman. I make sure no one is paying me any attention and slip back into his mind.
He stands in a washroom, examining a deep wound across his chest. It is a scar like a scimitar knife or a new moon.
"It is ready," a voice says. An elderly man with clouded eyes and long silver hair stands reflected in the washroom mirror. The young man lifts the linen shirt back onto his bony shoulder, concealing the scar. The two gold rings now hang on a leather cord around his neck.
"Are you sure I gave you no other details of the attack on my escort?" he asks.
"I joined you," the old man answers, "only three weeks before the long-sleep, and we talked very little. You said the Kingdom believes you are dead in the attack, and it would be better if they continued to believe it. You spent most of your time with the Carucan priests in prayer, preparing for the ceremony of rebirth, and did not wish to speak of it further."
Tug's pinching grip and his low growl bring me back to the Pit. "Are you sick, boy?" he sneers. "Do you need me to take you outside?"
I shake him off, feeling momentarily disorientated. My eyes dart to the young man. Prince! I remember how the King's officer had found the Prince's escort dead. The soldiers were searching for the missing Prince only three hours from here. Obviously, they did not imagine his royal highness could be in the Hybourg, mingling with the scum and maggots of the most depraved town in the kingdom. Which leads to the question, what is he looking for here?
A guard hands the Prince a sealed note. The Prince of Caruca opens it, his expression turning grim. Coin passes between the men. He folds the note and stands to leave.
"Yes, I'm sick," I mutter. "I need fresh air." Tug scrutinizes me. He knows I was desperate to come to the Pit and wouldn't leave Kel without an excellent reason.
"Fine," he says, dragging me to my feet. Giant fingers press hard into my arm. He leans over and says something to Brin. Thrown by Tug's news we are leaving, Brin shifts on the metal seat and folds his arms. He is not happy. Mostly, I expect, because he does not like me being alone with Tug. He thinks I am casting spells over Tug's mind.
Tug thrusts me forward through the crowded food stalls and we make our way to the exit. In the mind-world I follow the Prince, trailing the distinctive shape of his blighted memories.
Brin will not accept an offer without Tug's approval, and the guards will remember us, so we should be able to get back into the Pit.
As we move through the dingy, fetid tunnel, I make a silent promise. I have never cared for the Gods, but if crossing my path with the Prince of Caruca is their doing, I vow to them I will not waste this surprising opportunity.