Page 71 of The Iron Dagger
As the lift began to descend with a groan, Hara saw the guard running his hand through his hair and shaking his head. When they were swallowed by the darkness of the mine shaft, Hara noticed that Sarai’s flirtatious manner had disappeared and she was staring stonily at the wall.
“Thanks for playing along,” Sarai said. “I tried finding a few weak spots to gain access, but I found the easiest way was to charm my way in.”
“And you don’t want your location tracked when you come here?”
Sarai shook her head. “The less they know, the better. That’s why I brought my family’s autocar; no keys required.”
Hara did not ask who ‘they’ were. Whoever stood to profit off of the mines, she supposed.
“Don’t remove your mask. This mine is used for gold and copper, but there are other more insidious things in here.Arsenic and lead, for instance,” said Sarai. “Not to mention the gasses that build up due to poor ventilation. They have explosions and asphyxiation deaths every month.”
The lift creaked to a halt, and Hara hesitated as the door opened to a solid rock wall. Then she looked down and realized that there was a short opening that was only as tall as her waist. Hara felt a wave of unease.
Lights glowed from the opening, and Sarai bent over double to climb into it on her hands and knees. Hara followed suit. There were lamps strung upon the low ceiling, and Hara realized that the space was vast, stretching off into darkness. Sarai pointed her to a couple of flat boards with wheels fastened to the bottoms, and they both took one.
She showed Hara how to scoot along in a reclined position, and they began to make their way through the close space. Hara felt as though the weight of a mountain was above them, ready to crash down on this tiny sliver of air. Hara tried to calm herself as memories of her time beneath the floorboards reared up her throat, but after several minutes of inching along on her back, her breaths puffed frantically against the fabric covering her mouth.
Finally, the close space opened and they were able to stand. Sarai led her down a corridor of rock to an office occupied by two men. One was barking orders while the other sat silently. When the shouting man saw Sarai, he halted his tirade and waved the silent man away. He passed them on the way out, and Hara noticed a name stitched on his filthy miner’s suit:KENTON-Nor.
“My lady,” growled the disgruntled man behind the desk, who Hara assumed was a foreman of some kind. “Back to collect more pebbles?”
Sarai let out a sweet little laugh and said, “I just came back to see you, Gormun. Oh, and this is my colleague, Lady Hara. If you have any trinkets for me, I’ll gladly take them.”
“I’ve set some things aside for you. Come take a look,” said the man, pulling out a tattered box and tossing it on his desk. Sarai stepped forward and made littleoohsandahhsover the contents of the box. While her head was downturned, Gormun fixed hungry eyes to her, raking them up and down her form.
As she selected some pieces, she turned to Hara and said, “Here, take a look at these. What do you think?”
Hara peered into the box. Several shards of mineral and rock were clustered within, but one seemed to glow with that odd, hollow mist. She pointed it out.
“This one is sorbite.” She said.
Sarai nodded, picking it up and slipping it into a pouch at her waist. Then she turned to Gormun.
“Lady Hara is a Seer, and she’s helping with my research. She was curious about the brave work you do down here, and so I told her you would be happy to give her a tour.”
“Well . . .” said the man, glancing at the smudged sheafs of paper on his desk. Clearly, they were less appealing than spending time with two court ladies because he said, “Of course, my lady. Follow me.”
As they stepped out of the office, Hara began to hear clanking and shouting from the passages around them. There were some lights, but most of the corridors were pitch black.
“Found a gold seam up ahead—should give us a nice payload over the next six months,” Gormun said over his shoulder.
They began to pass groups of miners. Most did not glance up as they passed, but a few gave them dull looks. Men and women were covered in soil from their heads to their boots,and almost none wore masks. Many were not even wearing shirts. They used pickaxes to swing at the walls, piling the debris into wheeled carts. A few workers used motorized tools that sent tremors vibrating through the rock, causing Hara’s teeth to chatter. More than once she almost stumbled over reddish mounds of rock piled along the narrow corridors.
Gormun’s explanation on rock weathering was interrupted by a deafening rumble, followed by shouts. Gormun cursed and took off in the direction of the noise. Left with little choice, Hara and Sarai followed him.
In a larger chamber, part of a wall had collapsed and a group of miners were frantically digging with their hands through the rubble.
“Widderstone and Colston are trapped!” one of the workers called to Gormun. A woman’s sobs could be heard over the ominous rumbles, and Hara’s attention was snagged by the name Widderstone.
Three men dug furiously, shifting cabbage sized rocks until an arm broke free. Immediately, they seized it and pulled the man out. Smaller pebbles rained down and surrounded him as he was lifted out, filling the hole he had emerged from. A few workers tended to him while the diggers continued to pull the newly fallen rocks out of the way. The woman was sobbing harder now, an edge of panic in her cries. Hara could not help it. She went to her side and put her arms about the woman’s shoulders.
“They’ll be all right, see? They got one man out, and they will get the other. Just wait and see, they won’t give up. They are moving quickly.”
“He’s all I have—all I have left,” the woman choked, clutching onto the front of Hara’s clothing. “The children, and now Henry . . . ”
The realization slammed into Hara. “Your family name is Widderstone?”
The woman paused briefly in her sobbing, her shoulders still shaking. “Yes, I am Selda Widderstone.”
