Grace and Fury (Grace and Fury #1)(22)
Cliff and the new prisoners followed Oracle’s crew up a twisting, rocky trail that led through the scorched remains of a forest. The occasional gnarled cypress pushed its way out of the ruined earth, and tenacious ivy snaked across chunks of stone from what might have once been a road. The only other plant to find purchase was a hardy grass that sprouted in little clumps across the black volcanic rock, rustling mournfully in the wind.
“Where are we going?” Gia asked. She kept twisting her hair in her hands, as if desperate for something to hold on to.
Serina tried to catch her breath, her legs flaming.
Cliff didn’t slow her pace. “We live in a cave. Well, a lava tube. The outer layers cooled while the lava still flowed, leaving an empty space behind.”
“That doesn’t sound safe.” Gia grimaced. Her deeply tanned skin and sun-bleached hair suggested she came from a southern city, or maybe one of the nomadic fishing families that lived on boats along the western coast.
“It isn’t,” Cliff snapped.
“Then why do you live there?” Serina asked.
“Oracle doesn’t want us to be safe.” Cliff shot a glare over her shoulder. “She wants us to be tough. The tube is a terrible place to live, which is exactly the point. No more questions. Get moving.”
The dark pressed in around them. Cliff’s flickering torch only illuminated so much, and Serina frequently stumbled. Jacana, for all her timidity, tore up the path quickly.
Eventually, they reached a gaping mouth of stone. The crew disappeared into the cave. The new prisoners hesitated at the entrance, sagging with exhaustion. The air smelled like a burnt match. A red glow seeped into the sky from the hills in the center of the island.
Theodora stared at the tunnel and shook her head, eyes wide with horror. “I don’t think I can do this.”
Gia yanked on her arm. “You want to stay out here alone all night?”
“It’s harder without a torch,” Cliff said over her shoulder. She didn’t wait.
As Serina entered the cave, bitter dust coated her tongue. The torchlight flashed madly against the walls. Even so, it was too dark to see more than the pale form of Jacana in front of her.
At last, a brighter flicker of firelight appeared to guide their way. The tunnel ballooned up and outward, creating a natural room. Women sat on rusted chairs in the center or sprawled on pallets lining the curved walls. At the far end, a fire had been lit beneath a large, ragged hole.
There were no guards. No men at all. Serina had never seen so many women in one place in her entire life.
Oracle walked over to the new girls. When she stood before them, she crossed her hands over her chest. The noise in the cave echoed to nothing. “Everyone has a moment here,” the leader said, her voice carrying, “when they stand at the edge of a cliff and wonder if it will be easier to jump.” She stared at each of the new prisoners, one after another. “Let me save you the internal debate. It is easier.”
For a long moment, the words hung in the air, depressing and inescapable. Serina swallowed down the lump forming in her throat.
“Here on Mount Ruin, we have to earn our rations,” Oracle continued. “And everyone is hungry. So jump if you have to, but don’t expect to be fed unless you work. Unless you fight. The guards control the island, but you control your own survival. Listen, learn, and remember this one thing: Every rule you were ever taught in Viridia—about being quiet, modest, humble, weak—won’t help you here. Here, strength is the only currency.”
Serina had been trained to be soft. Pliant. Her grace had been her greatest strength. Now it was useless. She was useless. No one needed her harp playing, or dancing, or embroidery here.
Oracle’s gaze found her, that strange milky eye seemingly reading every terrified thought. Almost as if she spoke straight to Serina, Oracle added, “You must be as strong as this prison, as strong as the stone and ocean that hems you in. You are brick and barbed wire. You are iron.”
On another day, Serina might have wept. But she had no tears left, no energy for sorrow. This was her life now. Somehow, she would have to learn how to survive.
Serina woke, stiff with panic. A phantom weight pressed down on her, heavy as the rocks above her head. She sat up and tore at her shirt, trying to free her lungs from their cage.
A hand clamped onto her shoulder. “It’s a dream. Relax. You’re fine.”
The strange voice shattered the haze of sleep that still clung to her. Suddenly, with a great gasp, she could breathe again.
Torches had been left burning at intervals throughout the main cavern, breaking up the darkness into waxy orange blocks of light and shadow. Serina tried to get her bearings in the low light.
“The tunnel makes some people claustrophobic. Me, I like it.” The raspy voice belonged to the woman on the pallet beside Serina’s. “I spent ten years living in the windowless basement of a powerful man’s house, dreading the sound of his key turning in the lock. I’ve become accustomed to the dark.”
“How did you end up here?” Serina asked shakily as she tried to ground herself in the here and now.
“The man took my child.” The woman’s gnomish face turned grim, her eyes dark holes the dim light didn’t touch. She held her hands up, fingers curved into claws. “So I took his eyes.”
Serina gripped the edges of her mat, trying to keep her expression neutral. “Oh.”