“You OK, kid?” Jensen asks, his voice dropping its usual sharp edge.
“Fine,” Imran mumbles.
We all know he is not.
Clay looks at me, and I can see the raw worry in his eyes, but I have to look away. There is nothing I can do. The people upstairs don’t care if we rot away to nothing down here.
Fuck.
“What’s the word in the yard?” I ask, getting to the task in hand.
Prison rules say my challenge was fair, but I’m not an idiot. Dimitry isn’t the type to take a loss; especially not when it involves a Guilder being humiliated. And Gleb is probably going to be singing soprano for the rest of his miserable life.
“They’re screaming for blood, Tally,” Clay says. He’s the only one who looks even remotely relaxed. “Gleb… well, the infirmary doesn’t have enough magic or thread to fully fix what that girl did to him.”
A few guys chuckle, but Layla isn’t laughing.
Neither is Jensen. “It’s not a joke," he grunts, cracking his neck. Jensen runs the incinerator crews. “What do the Guild want? How is it going to affect us?”
Clay looks at me, and I can see reluctance in his expression.
“Just spit it out,” I tell him. Whatever he’s heard, I’ll deal.
“Well,” my friend mutters, “Dimitry’s demanding compensation for the ‘temporary loss of a high-ranking officer.”
“And? Don’t drag it out, Clay.”
“He wants the thermostats on the upper floors bumped up two degrees.”
Shit.I look at Jensen. “What’s the math? What are they sitting on now?”
“Sixty-six. And yeah, sixty-eight would be great for them, but it would put our floor on eighty-nine. Too fucking hot, boss.”
Ah, but that’s the game.
We control the temp, but comfortable for them is a furnace for us. Dimitry is well aware of that. He wants us to sweat for her.
“Fine. We can do that until Gleb is back on his feet. A couple of weeks. Is that it?”
“Not even.” Clay won’t meet my eyes. The next demand is going to be unreasonable.
“Hurry up, I’ve got things to do,” Layla snarls. Her resentment has been simmering since I hauled the Princess over my shoulder.
“Fine,” Clay sighs. “They want to humiliate her, OK? Dimitry knows she’s a Digger now, physically untouchable, but he wants you to ‘lend her out’ to serve him during rec.”
A growl sounds low in my throat. “Serve? What the fuck does that mean? He can’t twist the outcome, we played by the rules.”
“True,” Clay says. “But having her run around, fetching drinks and scrubbing the bleachers? That kind of shit isn’t a big deal. Dimitry made it clear no one would touch her. He just wants her humbled. It restores his ego, and honestly, I think you should agree.”
“I second that,” Danny laughs. “No skin off our nose.”
“Thirded,” Layla says, pushing her chair back.
I slam my fist onto the table. “Did anyone call a fucking vote? This is only a partial democracy. I have the final say.”
Clay nods, hands up in a placating gesture. “You do, Boss. So, what’s the call?”
Fuck.
