Page 51 of The Iron Dagger
“We must continue with the tour,” said Tamsin, opening the door. “Good to see you both.”
They left the canteen and returned to the Recruiter area, where they entered a creaking wooden lift. With a jolt, it began to descend.
“Down here is where we keep the wretches,” Tamsin said with a sly smile.
The lift opened to a long, featureless hallway. The walls were rough stone, and water was actually dripping from a dark corner. At the very end of the hall, Tamsin took up a lamp that stood ready in a brazier and descended some winding stone stairs. Hara could see nothing but darkness after the first five or six steps.
“Brace yourself, it’s not pleasant down here,” said Tamsin.
The air grew chill and the darkness became suffocating as they made their way down. The only light came from the lantern Tamsin held. Presently Hara became aware of a strangeburning sensation that prickled over her face and throat, and every instinct was telling her she did not want to go further.
The ground leveled out, and Hara could hear distinct weeping. Her feeling of foreboding grew as she realized they were passing iron bars, and the odd burning sensation was made clear. Though she was not as sensitive to metals as other witches, she could still feel the prickling heat of them as they passed. She imagined that Tamsin was even more uncomfortable.
“These are the holding cells where we keep rogue witches who refuse to come into the service of the Emperitor,” said Tamsin, her voice too loud for the small dark space. In the faint lantern light, Hara could make out the figure of a woman slumped against the wall of one of the cells, weeping piteously into her hands. Her stomach clenched as she realized the woman was naked, and there was not a scrap of fabric or furniture to give comfort in the small space. The woman’s hair was loose and tangled, and she did not uncover her face when the light shone into her cell.
Hara noticed there were no locks on the iron gates. No need, when a touch on bare skin caused burns and blisters as though the bars were red hot.
There were no other witches in the cells, and Tamsin turned them around and led Hara hastily back the way they came.
As they entered the lift, Tamsin turned to her with a smug smile. “Are you shocked?”
“What was that woman’s crime?” Hara asked, keeping her voice low so that it would not tremble.
“She was selling ever-growing seeds for crops. You harvest the field, and by next season, it would be ready to harvest again, no matter the weather. There are a select few farmers with contracts to supply grain to the citizens, and her invention caused them to miss out on revenue.”
“And that is a punishable offense?” asked Hara, barely keeping the outrage from her voice. She remembered Gideon mentioning that Montag had a problem with their crop yields. It seemed that problem was in no small part caused by the hold these few farmers had on the rest of the country.
“It was enough for the farmers to lodge a complaint. We aren’t punishing her for her invention—in fact, we offered her a place here at court as an assistant to the farmers who complained. They would love to get their hands on her magic seeds. But she refused to work with them, and all witches who refuse to cooperate are considered a threat to the Emperitor. That is why she is being held.”
“What will happen to her?” asked Hara. “Will she remain down there?”
“We will persuade her,” said Tamsin. “I’ve never seen anyone refuse for long.”
Torture. Hara stole a glance at the slender young woman who strode beside her. She thought of the friendly way Tamsin had chatted to Hara, as though she was pleased to have a new friend. Hara had almost been lulled into thinking the woman was sweet.
When they reached the main workroom, Tamsin took a record of Hara’s fingerprints, collected her breath in a vial, and gave her a curious black bead to wear behind her ear.
“Your fingerprints and your breath are to bypass the wards so you can access any protected rooms and materials in the palace. The bead is so you can hear us.” Tamsin pressed behind her ear and said, “See? We’re able to hear every Recruiter no matter where they are in the realm.”
Her voice rang in Hara’s ear as though she had spoken directly into it.
“It will also sting if an intruder triggers the wards.”
Hara massaged around the bead. It was rather unpleasant already, and she wondered how long it would take before she got used to it.
Used to it.
Hara suddenly felt confined and uncomfortable, as though she needed to climb out of her own skin. Giving up the intimate signatures of her body felt as though they were capturing her very essence. She couldn’t dispel the image of the Planter witch, naked and weeping, down there in the dark. It was all an act, but joining this group and seeing first hand what she was expected to take part in felt all too real.
“I’ll report back tomorrow to begin my research,” she said, and without a backward glance, she left the Recruiters’ quarters.
She walked quickly down the corridor, and when she reached the main stairs she leaned back against the wall, concentrating on the cool, unyielding pressure against her back.
As she worked on tamping down the nauseous feeling in the back of her throat, a new realization slammed into her, stopping her breath. All the records in the palace could not match the detail of a memory. Turnswallow himself might hold the key to her mother’s whereabouts. If she looked into Turnswallow’s memories after her mother’s capture, perhaps she could learn the truth.
Gideon
By mid-afternoon, Gideon was seething. He’d been rudely awoken by his manservant Tobin telling him that some lawmen were asking to see him. Groggily, he had risen from bed and gone all the way to the city gates to meet them, the night mist not yet cleared from the valley. He wondered if there had been an accident at one of the factories and was genuinelypanicked, only to be met with Norwen lawmen who had tracked him down for stealing from the old miser in the secondhand shop.
