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I ruffled his hair. “And so, for now, I shall call you Boy.”
The further we went into the back of the Well, the less people there were. Light was also fleeting. When it became so dark it was hard to see and the voices were hard to hear, we decided to turn back—there was no one in this part of the dungeon.
No one alive, that was . . .
I stepped cautiously around the body of a woman who looked like she had died many years ago and her body had been left to rot. A few plump rats nibbled on her dehydrated carcass, her lidless eyes wide open.
Our search turned up empty.
I didn’t know if I was relieved about that or not. I was happy the healer wasn’t down here, but that also made me worry aboutwhere they might have taken her. I sent a quick prayer up to the Creator asking for the healer’s safety. It helped. A little bit.
Boy had gone off somewhere, leaving me alone with my thoughts and my poor, aching body.
I sat slumped against the wall, close to the spot where I had awakened. I peeled my dirty-bottomed underskirts upwards so that I could inspect the backs of my legs. I could almost make out the perfect shape of the bottom of the guard’s shoe, where he had kicked me. The flesh was stained an angry dark blue, the area slightly swollen. I didn’t know what was more painful, that or the small arrow wound.
I shucked the bottom of my skirts back down, watching Boy as he approached—a stick in his hand, and a big smile on his face.
“Look what I have!” he exclaimed victoriously.
“A stick?” I asked, a bit perplexed at his excitement.
“Yup,” he said, popping thep. “I didn’t steal it either. I traded for it. Fair and square.”
“Oh?” I said out loud, not entirely sure what to make of allofthat. “What are you going to do with it?” I asked, a quizzical brow lifting.
He squatted beside me, shifting a small, broken piece of stone around with the stick. “Well, food is scarce, but the rats are in abundance down here. I’m going to see if I can use the stick to build a trap to catch one.”
My stomach lurched and my lips curled back in disgust.
Boy chuckled. “Just you wait. Once you’ve been down here for a month with only a few breadcrumbs to eat, you’ll be eyeing up the rats too.”
“I hope not,” I said, trying not to gag.
All he did was shrug, as if to saywe’ll see about that. “I’ve been meaning to ask,” he started, his eyes dipping to the injury in my side. “What’s that from?”
I’d gotten pretty good at ignoring the pain, but now that he brought it up, it was hard not to think about. “I got it from an arrow,” I sighed.
He nodded. “One with a small head?”
“Yeah, how’d you know?” I asked.
“It’s a newer weapon they’ve started using to subdue the Cursed. Some of the newcomers down here have the same wound as well. The soldiers always take the arrows out before they bring the people down here.” He shrugged one shoulder. “I imagine they take them out because they probably don’t want to give us prisoners anything sharp, in case we try to use it against them.”
That made sense. And it explained why they had taken the arrow out of my side before bringing me here.
Boy withdrew a string from his pocket, something I imagined he’d traded for as well, and he started to tie it around the end of the stick.
While he focused on building his rat trap, I looked around, my gaze settling on the door. “Is that the only way to get in and out?” I asked him.
He paused what he was doing. “Yes. Why?”
Determination knitted my brow. “I’m going to get us out of here.”
“How?” he asked.
“I’m not sure yet,” I answered truthfully. “How often do the guards come down here?”
He scratched the back of his head, thinking about it. “Two to four times a day. Usually, it is to bring new people in, or take people out. Occasionally, they bring food, or they fill the water buckets.” He nodded to one—it looked no different than the one I had seen the man relieving his bowels in. I shoved off the thought.
