Kid awoke to the taste of stale vomit and a pounding headache. He groaned as he lifted himself from the soft linen of his bed. It felt as if somebody were using his head as a drum. Even the candlelight seemed too bright as he opened his blurred eyes. the scent of wine immediately set his stomach to roiling. He thought he was going to puke again but managed to hold it in. He coughed into the sleeve of the fresh shirt Marc gave him after the initiation.
The first thing he did after was take a bath. He cleaned the soot from his body, watching with disgust as crisp flakes of dead, singed skin fell from him. The water burned like all hells and, after the bath, he’d found the skin where he’d crawled on his forearms was a reddish mess of seared flesh. His fingers were covered in deep gashes from his climb, the flesh an angry red. They more resembled demonic claws than the hands of a human boy.
After he emerged and had clothed himself, a woman in a mask shaped like an owl tended to his wounds. She had smeared an ointment along the worst of his burns that soothed the pain in his flesh. Then she wrapped bandages around his arms and hands. It hurt to move his hands but they still worked and for that, he was beyond grateful. Marc had told him that the best cure for pain was a jug of wine. Admittedly, his memory faded away after that.
Kid let out a deep breath and began to feel woozy on his feet. He sat back down on the bed beside him and looked at his surroundings, taking in the two dozen bunkbeds crowding the small room. There was barely enough room to move between them. Kid considered going back to sleep. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had the chance to sleep in an actual bed.
Instead, he rose to his feet, fighting the light-headedness that followed. He stumbled his way between the beds, struggling not to bump into any of the men and women still sleeping. He unlatched the door of the room and slipped into the hall. Wherever he was, there were no windows. The floor was cold stone like one would find in a castle. The wall and ceiling consisted of thick wooden boards. Every twenty paces a large wooden pillar, reinforced with iron brackets dominated the center of the wide hall. Several sons stumbled down the corridors, the smell of drink hanging heavy in the air about them. Some wore their masks while others had them hanging at their belt. Kid unconsciously felt the mask on his hip. The blood was still sticky. A chill ran down his spine and for the second time today he felt he might puke.
With little to no sense of where he was, Kid turned right, down the hall. Branching corridors went off in all directions, giving it the feeling of a maze. A loud sound came from down the hall. The noise drew Kid’s attention and he followed the periodic thwacking.
It grew louder as he neared one of the branching halls. He followed it toward an open door. He could now hear the distinctive twang of a bowstring accompanying the thwack. He peeked his head inside to see a very long, narrow room. A rack filled with dozens of longbows lined the walls. Marc stood in front of them, slowly drawing one of the great bows. Marc’s forearms strained with the weight as he drew the string to his ear. The wood creaked and bent towards him before snapping back with tremendous force as Marc released the arrow.
Kid’s eyes flashed across the room, following the arrow as it pierced a straw target in the shape of a man fifty paces away. It went so deep the fletching had disappeared into the target. Kid’s eyes widened. He’d never actually seen a longbow be shot before.
As Marc reached for another arrow, he caught sight of Kid watching. “You’re up early. I’d have thought the drink would keep you down til midafternoon.”
“There are worse things than feeling queasy. How early is it?” Kid asked.
“Morning. But the sun hasn’t risen yet. I’m rarely able to sleep more than a few hours these days. Too many dreams.” Marc nocked another arrow and drew the string, grunting with the effort of it. He released it. Kid watched the arrow slam into the head of the dummy. Marc rested the stave on the ground and leaned against it. “You’ll understand soon enough.”
Kid’s hand brushed the mask resting against his hip and Marc’s eyes flashed down to it. “Then again, maybe you already do. The things we do are not meant to be easy Kid.”
A chill ran down Kid’s spine. “Then why do we do them?”
Marc locked eyes with Kid. “Nothing worth doing is ever easy. The price of grain is measured in silver. The price of freedom is measured in blood.” Marc’s eyes drifted down to the mask. “That,” he said, “is to make sure you never forget.” Marc ran a hand along the wood of the bow stave. “You impressed me the other day. The easy thing, even the smart thing, would have been to stay silent. But you opened your dumbass mouth and made a stand.” Marc chuckled. “I like that.”
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“I didn’t do it to impress you.” Kid pulled the mask from his belt. “And I don’t want to pay your price.”
Marc raised an eyebrow. “If you did it to impress me, I’d have let Hilda kill you.”
Kid swallowed.
Marc looked at the ground for a long moment before continuing. “So, you don’t want to pay the price? Have you ever considered the cost of doing nothing?” He walked up to Kid. “When you stand with me the price you pay will be measured in the blood you spill and the life you give.” Marc’s brow furrowed. “But if you stand by and watch, the price is paid by those you let die, by those you turn your back on.”
Marc’s eyes gleamed in the firelight. “My father formed the Sons the day the war ended. He asked me to join him, if not for his sake then for the sake of the brother I’d lost.” Marc shook his head. “I was like James back then. I told him no. Then I watched a month later as they gave him his wings.”
Marc’s hands tensed around the wood of his bow. “That night, I went to end his suffering. His bones were shattered. Puss seeped from his wounds. A pool of blood surrounded his cross. The man was barely conscious but when he saw me his eyes met mine. Do you know what he said to me?”
Kid shook his head.
“He said, ‘You let this happen’”
Marc’s gaze was so intense, Kid didn’t dare breathe.
Marc raised his bow. “Then I lifted this bow in the air and shot him in the heart. I only wish my brother had returned in time for that night. It might have changed him.”
Kid looked down at the mask in his hands. Its vacant eyes glared back at him. Dread seeped into his heart.
Marc sensed his fear and pulled his own mask from his belt. It was shaped the same as Kid’s albeit larger. “Do you know what this means?”
“It means I’m part of your clan?”
Marc nodded. “Yes, but also so much more. There are four clans in the Rills, each descending from one of the mythic heroes of our past. Ours is the youngest and that mask you hold links you to Gareth Sorrowsbane.”
“As in the Sorrow men?” Kid asked. He had seen their ships on the horizon in the past, catching stray merchant vessels. Watching such scenes had been a rare pleasure growing up.
Marc nodded. “Yes, those who worship the Reaper as the Lady of Sorrows. They used to call her the Lady of Victory and that name was once justified. We were a shattered people, split into petty kingdoms by the clans. When the Islanders came, we were divided and individually we fell. Those were the dark years, much like the time we are in now.”
Marc ran a hand across his face. “It was Gareth who united the clans and fought the insurgent war that drove the Islanders out of the Rills. He burned their ships and slaughtered every single one who dared set foot on our shores. So many of them died that they renamed their goddess the Lady of Sorrows and from then on, we grew to call them Sorrowmen. Seven sorrows for the seven islands, one for each horror Gareth inflicted upon them.” Marc grinned wolfishly.
“Gareth founded the wolf clan and was elected the first king of the Rills. An honor that cycled between the clans until Venar came. Our people have a history of occupation, but if there is one thing we are known for, it’s gnawing the boot on our throat. Someday we’ll make them bleed.”
Marc put a hand on Kid’s shoulder. “I want you to be by my side that day Kid.” Marc pulled a dagger from his belt. The steel gleamed in the torchlight. “I meant to give this to you last night. Every man needs a weapon and you’ve earned this one.”
Kid tentatively took the hilt in his bandaged hand. The familiar weight settled into his palm. He remembered how easy it was to slide into a man. He grimaced. Nothing worth doing is ever easy. Kid looked up to Marc. It was hard to meet the man’s eyes, but Kid forced himself to. “How will we make them bleed?”
Marc grinned. “Come, I’ll show you.” The man pulled the string from his bow, letting the wood relax, and placed it with the rest. Kid followed him as he left the room. Marc turned into the main hallway and led Kid past several of the large, wooden supporting columns.
“Where are we?” Kid asked.
“The Sons headquarters beneath the Outwalls.”
“Beneath?” Kid asked, “So your underground movement is literally underground?”
“Our movement,” Marc corrected, “And the irony isn’t lost on me.”
Kid smirked and followed Marc deeper into the complex. The man made an abrupt turn down a side hallway, coming to a stop before an iron-banded, wooden door. Kid waited while Marc reached into his pocket and pulled out a key. He pushed it into the lock and twisted, opening the door with a click. Marc heaved the door open and walked inside.
Kid followed and stared with wide eyes at the vast room. It had to be at least ten times the size of the Dancing Bear and was filled with weapons. The gleam of rows and rows of steel arms reflected in the light of several low hanging chandeliers. Huge crates were stacked along the edge of the room and when Kid looked into one he saw it was filled with chain armor. This armory was big enough to field an army.
“We have a dozen more just like it,” Marc said.
“I thought only the Forgers guild made steel?”
Marc smiled. “Who do you think made the Forgers guild?” Marc chuckled at the stunned look Kid gave him. “Maybe ‘made’ is the wrong word. Our members are heavily invested and a good number of the smiths have gone through the same ritual as you.”
Kid could only look around the room in wonder. Marc must have been fabulously wealthy. “Where did the money for all this come from?”
“The Goddess provides.”
Kid didn’t press him.
“I have a task for you since you’re so conveniently awake.”
Kid swallowed. “What is it?
Marc grinned at him, then handed him his missing coin pouch. “Relax. Enjoy the money you earned and come back at sundown.”
Kid let out a breath of relief as he took the money. He’d been afraid he wouldn’t get it back. “Thank you,” he whispered.
Marc nodded and turned back to look at the room full of arms. Kid turned to leave but stopped in the doorway when Marc spoke again. “And Kid, I won’t ask where you got the extra Hart. So long as I don’t catch you with another.”
Chills ran down Kid’s spine and he rushed from the room.