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“The scars,” I say before I can think. I pinch my lips closed.
Azmar regards me and nods. “I fell, and the others retreated. I was headed for the eternal black.”
I presume that’s their name for the afterlife, but I don’t ask. Later.
“But I didn’t die. I woke up in a house, on a pallet on the floor. Someone, a widow, I believe, had taken me in. I didn’t understand it. She took no risks. My arms and legs were securely tethered to the floor,not that I could have moved anyway. My injury was deep, but her husband had been a surgeon and taught her most of what he knew.”
Quietly I ask, “She told you this?”
“Yes. She knew I was young. Felt bad for me, being left behind. I couldn’t fight her. I could barely move, and half the time I was unconscious from whatever she gave me for the pain. I spent a week and a half there, slowly healing, and I learned that not all humans are savage ‘troll’ haters. We’re taught that your kind ravage the world like roaches and breed like feral rabbits.”
My skin warms. “Only partially accurate.”
His lip quirks, but somberness quickly overtakes it. “My band returned with reinforcements and completely brutalized that village. They killed her, the woman who took care of me. Aleah, her name was. They didn’t ask questions, just came in and killed her and took her supplies. Dragged me out, burned the house.”
My hand flies to my mouth. “Oh no.”
“In our culture, women and men both train as soldiers. It is not so with yours.” He looks to me as if to confirm. Mortified, I nod. “I protested. I tried to fight—she’d taken off my restraints by then. But I was still too weak. And, admittedly, I feared them seeing my weakness. I feared losing my caste.” He pauses, looking down into the canyon. “I was happy to take the demotion when I became an engineer. I’d lost my taste for battle.”
It takes several heartbeats for me to digest all of this. “You were Montra.”
“Both my parents were, so it passed down to me. But, Lark—” He shifts toward me, and in that moment he is more human to me than ever before. “I learned much of your kind during my stay in that house. I took many truths for myself, which I’ve kept close to my heart. Even Unach doesn’t know that story. She just thinks I am hard to kill.”
I search his face, feeling both comforted and anxious at the same time. “Then why trust it to me?”
That soft, barely there smile resurfaces. “Because you asked. Come.” He stands and holds out a hand. I take it, and it’s barely any effort on his part to lift me to my feet. “We’ve work to do, and Unach will find it funny if you return red.”
I touch my shoulders, which indeed have begun to pink with the heat of the sun. My time in Cagmar has stripped the protective tan that had built up day after day, year after year in the sun. Azmar lifts me back to the bridge, and I unbind my hair for some protection.
We get back to work, taking measurements, surveying rust, sketching damage, but all of it feels different now. Azmar moves, and in my mind’s eye I see the silvery scars beneath his shirt, a permanent reminder of a kind soul lost. I wonder if I somehow also serve as a reminder of the human who’d taken him in, and whether or not he wants to be reminded.
For now, it appears Azmar does not mind my company, and I certainly want to stay in his.
Chapter 13
My usefulness soon runs dry, but I’m loath to return to the city if I don’t have to. I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to be outside. It’s odd; when I ran between townships, all I wanted was a roof over my head. Now that I’m settling into Cagmar, all I want is the open sky.
In time, I’ll be trusted enough to come up here on my own. Perhaps after this whole thing with Grodd passes, though I’m not sure how long that will be. I certainly won’t be attending any caste tournaments in the meantime.
I consider introducing myself to Tartuk, the new trollis head of the human task force, and seeing if she’ll befriend me.
As the sun makes its slow way to the western horizon, Azmar compares charts with others. I watch them, trying to understand their conversation, but I soon find my attention drawn to the canyon, wondering if any strange beast or monster will climb out of it, trying to see beyond its shadows to the river deep below. I can’t, even shielding the sunlight from my face. I search the other direction and think I see a glint of something where the canyon widens before it turns, but it could be a climbing bud or embedded stone. But I imagine it’s the river, that the canyon is clear and monster-free, and that I am in some long canoe, rafting down it, beyond the other trollis city and far from this land, to where the drought doesn’t reach. Where a city greater than Eterellis awaits on the other side of the world, and perhaps there, humans and trollis get along splendidly.
I snap from the daydream and catch movement not far down the canyon, on the east side, a shifting of shadows. Thinking it rare game, I stand on the parapet and peer outward, the sun glowing at my back. The shadows scatter and head away from the bridge, and in their scramble I see defined human arms, legs, and heads.
Azmar must have noticed, for he says, “Lark?”
I bite the inside of my lip, wondering what I should say. These trollis are engineers, though military trained ... Would they harm these folk?
Did these shadows mean to harm the trollis, before I spotted them? What other reason would they have to hide?
“Humans,” I murmur, pointing. “There’s a band of them, there. They ran when I stood.”
Alarm crosses the faces of the engineers, and nearby, Homper springs to attention, pulling a club the length of my leg from his back. Several of the engineers drop their tools and notes. Even Azmar looks worried.
One engineer, named Dart, says, “Southwind formation, split three.” Then, to Homper, “Alert a rear guard.”
Dart is not one of Homper’s colleagues, but his caste is higher, so Homper immediately turns for the city and starts yelling to the guard barracks.
