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No. My cheek was throbbing, and when I touched my lip, my fingers came away coated in blood. I was too terrified to care, scared that whatever happened next to me and Hen would be much, much worse.
“I—I’m fine,” I lied, my voice a frayed whisper. Skies, why was I talking to him? I needed to get out of here.
“You should get back to the others before anyone finds you,” the guard said. He flicked his eyes to Meat’s unconscious form. “I’ll take care of this.”
“If you kill him?—”
“I’m not going to kill him. Though he deserves it,” he mumbled, shaking his head like he was frustrated by the injustice of it.
“Who—who are you?” I asked, studying him. He was younger than most of the other guards, but no less intimidating. His messy, dark-brown hair was damp with sweat, and the bloodstains on his face made the angles of his cheeks and jaws appear harsh and jagged. Unlike many of the other Rathalans I’d seen, his irises weren’t colorless. They were a rich brown hue with a ring of gold that shimmered like coins in the torchlight. Even at a distance, he radiated the power and raw strength of a predator who’d just made a kill.
Our eyes met in the dim light. “I’m no one in this place.” His lips parted like he was going to say more. Instead, he lookedaway, rubbing his forehead like he was warding off a headache. I noticed the blood coating his hands and oozing from deep gashes on his face and knuckles. My stomach instantly knotted like it always did when I saw someone injured down here.
“You’re hurt,” I said, still talking and not running like I should have been. Skies, had I gone mad? Why did I care if he was hurt? He was amineguard. Among all the Rathalan guards, mineguards were famous for their flagrant brutality and cruelty. They didn’t spend their time rescuing worthless worker girls. What game was he playing?
“I heal fast,” he said solemnly, picking up Meat’s knife, wiping it on his sleeve, and shoving it into his belt. “You need to go.”
“One thing first.” The young guard watched me warily as I hurried over to Meat’s limp body and kicked him square in the crotch. “Now I’ll go.”
I foundHen hiding in the dark alcove near the mine entrance. She threw her arms around me, tears streaming down her face as she hugged me close. We stood like that for a time, both of us shaking and crying.
Maybe we were friends after all.
“Thank the sky goddess,” she choked, whispering a quiet prayer to Inaya. “I thought you were right behind me, but then—” Hen pulled back to look at me. “Oh no, you’re bleeding.”
“I’m fine,” I lied for the second time. I was far from fine, but at least the cuts on my face and neck didn’t feel very deep.
“Is he dead?” The panic in her glossy eyes said she knew our lives were about to be cut short either way. If Meat was dead,at least one of us would be executed. But if Meat was alive, we might face an even worse fate when he found us.
“I—I don’t think so,” I said, wishing there was something else I could say that would erase this horrible memory so she could go back to being her regular tough, no-nonsense self. Seeing her so scared and frail was too much to bear.
Before I could tell her about the young guard who’d helped me, the sound of approaching footsteps silenced us. Neither of us moved or spoke after that. Eventually, Hen’s head dropped onto my shoulder and her breathing slowed. I leaned my head on hers, but with the vision of Meat’s beaten face burned in the back of my eyelids, sleep never came.
Henand I sneaked out of our hiding place when the guards roused everyone for first shift. We hadn’t spoken since the incident, but we kept in sight of each other as we worked, lingering in the shadows and keeping our heads down. By late afternoon, I had a permanent crick in my neck from looking over my shoulder, and I could tell Hen was exhausted by the way her back slumped.
When the guards moved several of us to another chamber in the mine to shovel gravel, I finally got a chance to talk to her.
“Hen, something strange happened last night,” I began, scanning the area to look for the young, golden-eyed Rathalan guard. There was no sign of him.
“What?” Hen whispered, after double checking all the guards were out of earshot.
“Another mineguard—” I cut myself off as one of the newbies rolled over an empty cart. It was too depressing to look at the young boy’s miserable expression and too ridiculous to offer himan encouraging smile, so I kept my gaze on the ground as I shoveled.
“The lot of you need to work faster!” the approaching guard barked as the tip of his whip stung the young boy’s back. The boy yelped in pain. “Put your backs into it!”
Hen shot me a nervous glance after the guard moved on.
“One of the other mineguards helped me get away from Meat last night.” I’d gone over the events of the previous night in my head a hundred times, and it still sounded unreal when I said it out loud.
Hen closed her eyes like she was silently praying to Inaya to wake up from this continuing nightmare. “Skies, Raven. If a guard helped you, he’ll soon come to collect payment for the favor,” she said, the deafening clamor of the pickaxes echoing behind her words. “We have to stay hidden from both guards now.”
I couldn’t disagree with her. At the same time, the young guard had seemed so, well,differentfrom the other mineguards. When our eyes had met, there was no trace of the malice or scorn that radiated from the other Rathalans. That was the most confusing part. “Maybe not all the Rathalans are like Meat,” I whispered as I bent to plunge my shovel into the pile of rubble.
Hen scoffed. At least some of her tough armor was back on.
No, she was right. They were all like Meat. So, what did the guard from last night want? Was it some sort of trap? Did he think it would be fun to rat me out himself? The unanswered questions wrapped their long fingers so tightly around me that I could barely breathe.
When I straightened back up to dump the rubble in the cart, there was a girl standing beside me. Where had she come from? Her unstained hands told me she was another one of the new workers who’d arrived yesterday.
