Talia was having a bad day. She’d thought otherwise just this morning, but there was no doubt now. Things had gone from good to bad to worse. The funny part was that if someone had asked if she could pinpoint where exactly the switch had occurred, she wasn’t sure she’d really be able to say.
Had the trip to the market been the mistake? Maybe. Or perhaps her mistake had been in staying late at the workshop, engrossed in her work, thus forcing her to make a detour— but no. No, that was going too far back. Talking back had been the tipping point then, surely, when the Bleeder goon had gotten way, way too close. Slapping him when he groped at her hip, definitely. Then there was running into a dead-end alleyway, smashing the thugs into the walls with magic, running from the crime scene and running straight into a squad of mage hunters subsequently followed by running away from said mage hunters. Maybe the running was the problem. That must be it, she thought.
If I get out of this alive and free, no more running. Running is clearly the root of all evil and should be avoided at all costs. Only sedate, old granny speeds from now on, yessir.
Unfortunately, the ‘alive and free’ parts of that thought were crucial, and even more unfortunately, the group of four, black-cloaked and lightly armoured mage-hunters hot on her trail would most certainly object to at least one of those things.
Whether that was ‘alive’ or ‘free’ remained to be seen.
Thus, the running continued, past the grey stone huts of the Low Quarter and into the cramped alcoves and tunnels of the slums, far from the warm light of the arcano-sun. Sweat dripped down Talia’s brilliant carmine hair into her face, down her back and stuck the heavy fabric of her pants to her aching legs. Her breath came in ragged bursts, heaving her slight, wiry frame as she pulled from her dwindling reserves of stamina.
If I live through this, I’ll never complain about Orvall’s workouts ever again. So please Wyrr, let me live through this.
She looked back, catching a glance of her pursuers as they bullied their way through the tight tunnels of the slums. The more curious of The Warren’s inhabitants poked a head or an eye out into the corridor to observe her flight, only to quickly retreat behind filthy curtains and ramshackle doors once they caught sight of the soldiers hounding her.
The squad was close enough now that she imagined she could feel their breath on the back of her neck, could almost hear their call for her to stop and get on her knees. To submit, be shackled, and then condemned. If she did, and they didn’t just execute her, then the mage-hunters would bring her into the High Quarter, seat her, bound, gagged, and blinded before the Magistratum. The magisters would converse and decide if she was to serve in the Upper Reaches—feeding the arcano-sun her mana, day in and day out— or the Mines, blasting apart rock and goblin and deep-dweller alike. Even if she were lucky enough to be posted in a noble house, feeding their arcano-tech and serving at their whims, the end result was the same. Inevitable servitude. Inevitable madness. Inevitable death.
Nope, not me. They’ll have to run me down like an orakai in its warren.
Talia pushed harder, taking a sharp right and then a curving left, hoping to shake the mage-hunters off of her, or at least get some room to breathe.
Her thoughts raced.
Hysteria bubbled out from her lips as if the mage-madness had already begun to take hold. Fear mixed with adrenaline and boiled into a toxic panic in her chest. Her citrine eyes shot left and right like those of a cornered beast, settling on a larger tunnel where the greasy light of torches glowed faintly. Behind her, the sounds of pursuit grew louder.
Shit.
Talia broke into a sprint, praying to any and all listening that it wasn’t a dead end.
Reality disappointed her.
After a short hundred-metre dash, she skidded to a halt before a sheer drop into a yawning abyss. The viscid black of the Maw stretched out below her, darkness staggering in terraced cliffs of grey stone down into gaping emptiness.
Carefully, Talia approached the edge, leaning out and looking right. Hoping to all that was holy that she might spot a ladder or stair of some sort. If she could find a way through the upper levels of the ravine, then she might just be able to double back and make it home to the Middle Quarter. Old accessways and staircases riddled the upper levels of the Maw where it bisected Krazgorad in two. If she could just—
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Too late.
Talia heard the mage-hunters slow as they approached, breathing hard; they realized that she was trapped. The young woman refused to turn and look at them, peering down into the abyss with a look of despair.
“There now, girly, chase is over. Stand still and this’ll be over before you even know it,” said the group's lone woman.
Talia stayed silent, frozen. Thoughts of her bleak future seeped up from the hole before her. She imagined her life from then on. Chained, forced to expel her mana for the good of the city, even as it hollowed her out.
Drove her mad.
The hunters, seeming to take her silence as acceptance, moved up slowly behind her, chains clinking gently.
“That’s it, lass, no sudden movements and we can all go home tonight,” one calmly said.
Not me, I’ll be locked up, in chains for the rest of my life until I lose my mind and they put me down like a rabid musklop.
“Listen to ‘im girl,” said another, “no need for anyone to die ‘ere. We know t’was an accident. Bleeders ‘ad it comin’ if you ask me, filthy gangers. But we gots to take you in anyhow. Law’s the law ya’see.”
Panic welled up in Talia’s chest, her heart beating hard enough to bruise her ribs. She tugged her thoughts away from the memories. The splatter of blood on stone. A leering, gap-toothed grin shattered into a permanent rictus by a telekinetic blast that nobody in that alley had expected.
I killed them. I have magic. And I killed them with it.
The lead hunter was right behind her now, walking slowly so as to not frighten her off. As if she was a wounded animal.
He put a hand on her shoulder, his grip firm, pulling her away from the gap. From the corner of her eye, Talia glimpsed the orange glow mage-shackles, a pair of runed, black, steel gloves that would cut off her Gift before she even truly understood it. Something in her chest pulsed and she snapped, spinning around to face her would-be jailers
“DON’T TOUCH ME!”
All at once, a wave of force billowed out around her, sending the three mage-hunters further back in the tunnel to the ground, and the one next to her flying towards them. She sagged, as if boneless, then stumbled.
Once, twice, and then fell forward.
Into the Maw.
----------------------------------------
When Talia woke, the first thing she registered was the scent of shit. It coated her tongue and her nostrils like a layer of putrid grime, soaking into all of her senses. The second thing she registered was pain.
Pain everywhere, radiating down her back into her pelvis, a pounding headache and a bundle of pure agony lodged in her knee. She whimpered, choking on the foul odours as the first tears sprung from her still-shuttered eyes.
And then something beneath her moved.
Adrenaline throbbed through her limbs. She flailed, pulling herself up and out of the pile of refuse, scrabbling on hand and kne—
“Ahhh! Fuck!” she sobbed as her injured knee landed on hard stone, twisting, and sending a jolt of sparks up her spine. Fear and pain warred as she propelled herself away from the now wriggling mass of feces, dim blue light from luminescent moss illuminating huge, squirming worms digging through the pile. She shuddered.
The warreners must use the Maw as a shit shute.
It had saved her life. Just a few metres to the left or the right and she would have shattered every bone in her body. Instead, she had fallen into a mound of crap three times taller than she was.
She sighed, propping herself up against the nearest wall and taking stock. Her back and hips hurt, but she could still move, and nothing felt broken. Her left knee throbbed painfully but she couldn’t see or feel any broken bones, so probably just a bad sprain. She had a hard time telling if she was cut anywhere, what with being coated head to toe in shit, but infection was a problem for when she was safe.
Her satchel was lost somewhere in the muck. Looking at the horrifyingly moving pile, Talia shuddered again and wrote the bag off as a loss. Her coin purse had somehow managed to remain at her belt, along with the leather case that held her gas mask.
She thanked the gods for small blessings.
That’d be just the thing, survive mage-hunters, then a thirty-metre drop, only to die to a gas eruption from the Maw.
Talia took a deep breath—only to violently retch as the smell rushed up her nostrils. Disgust helped push away the encroaching shock and she fumbled for the tie to her cloak, using the side that had been pinned to her body to wipe herself off as best she could, as pointless as the task was.
When she’d gotten as clean as could possibly be expected, Talia discarded the caked garment and groped around blindly, rummaging through a pile of pristine—relatively speaking— trash. She managed to pull out a long, only moderately curved length of drearwood, as well as a long strip of oily cloth, which she leaned on and draped over herself, respectively. Propping herself up, one hand on the wall and the other gripping her improvised crutch, she made her way further along the upper terrace of the Maw, towards the light of the arcano-sun, hanging from the cavern ceiling above Karzgorad, far in the distance.
It was going to be a long walk home. Orvall would be worried sick by now. She sighed, taking the first step on an hours-long journey.
Best not to keep him waiting.