Break the Chains

Chapter Sixteen

Ripka dragged herself into the rec yard after a restless night, her limbs so stiff from overwork she feared they’d have to roll her down the stairs like a barrel. She’d only been at the Remnant two days, but already she felt the heavy claws of prolonged routine sink into her. This time around, the guard ushered them into the rec yard in one big clump, not bothering to line them up for the trestle table that was used to feed the sparrows who hadn’t found other groups yet.

After one full day in the Remnant, the guards had decided the new intakes were on their own.

The table she’d occupied with Clink and her girls had a new member. A round-faced woman with lips that looked like she’d gotten them stuck in a bottle sat on yesterday’s empty seat. Must be Kisser, the ill woman whose manpower they’d pretended to be replacing when they took Ripka from the guard. For a moment Ripka feared she’d been replaced, that they really had only wanted her for her extra set of hands, but as she drew near, Forge’s head picked up and some quick words were exchanged amongst the group. Honey reached over and dragged a fresh chair across, giving her a little smile as she pat the seat.

Ripka smiled back, and regretted it. She couldn’t let herself get too close to these women. She’d be gone soon, if all went well. And worse, she was going to have to use them to get what she was after. Going to have to probe them to see if they could lead her toward the source of Radu’s clearsky dealer.

“You look like shit,” Clink announced as she shoved a bowl already topped off with morning gruel toward her.

“Aren’t you a ray of sunshine,” Ripka drawled as she shoveled the bland food into her mouth. Though she’d never been one for a home-cooked meal, she’d much rather have a bun off a streetcart and a ladle of thick milk tea than this flavorless mush. But, from the way her body ached, she knew she’d be a fool to scorn it for its taste.

“You hear the rumor?” The new woman, Kisser asked, her voice a low murmur as she leaned over the table, bread dangling from her fingertips. Bits of porridge dripped off its soggy edge.

“We get all our rumors from you,” Clink said. “Spill it.”

Ripka ate her gruel quietly, conscientiously, wondering how Kisser would have come by any rumors if she’d spent the day spewing in her cell as the others had claimed.

“Some sparrow tried to make a break for it last night. Faked something wrong with waterworks and as soon as they got outside ran for the damned sea.”

An unground grain caught in Ripka’s throat and she coughed. Honey passed her a clay cup of water without comment. All eyes were riveted to Kisser, which was well enough as far as Ripka was concerned.

“What a moron,” Clink pronounced. “What would they do if they made it to the beach? Swim for Petrastad? That water’s bone cold, and shark infested to top it off. They’d be chow or frozen solid before they were even tired out from the backstroke.”

Kisser spread her arms expansively, as if gathering in the whole of human folly. “Desperation, no doubt. What drove them here might very well be what’s driving them away. What about you, Captain? You considering taking a dip?”

Ripka blinked at Kisser’s use of her false criminal name. It made sense that the others would warn her of the new addition, but Kisser smiled at her as if they’d been friends for ages. After her encounter with Radu, any hint of familiarity made her twitchy.

“I’m from the Scorched. You think I can swim?” she said, getting a laugh.

“It’s true, though,” Kisser pressed, waving a spoon through the air. “The only way off this rock is up, in an airship. Sea’s too rough to try a raft, even if you did know how to build one.”

“Not to mention the sharks,” Honey said.

“She already mentioned the sharks,” Forge said, grinning as Honey blushed.

“I like the sharks,” Honey murmured.

“You considered building a raft?” Ripka asked, trying to keep the girls focused on the mechanics of the Remnant. The more she could glean about what went on here, the better.

Meanwhile, as long as they were talking to her, they were looking at her, and she took the opportunity to shift her body language. She may not be a practiced con like Tibal or Detan, but she’d seen a few addicts on their come-down in her day. Hunched shoulders, slouched posture, gripping an elbow with one hand while the other scratched lightly at the opposite bicep. Not to mention the teeth clenching. She already had that nasty habit, she just had to do it hard enough for them to notice.

“Me, build a raft?” Kisser snorted and shared a look Ripka couldn’t read with Clink. “Naw, but I’ve heard of people who’ve tried – stories, you know, nothing recent. More like fairy tales the inmates tell themselves. Evil, determined bastards slipping off in the night on rafts made of old, wax-fortified coats and sticks whittled together from our spoons. It’s all nonsense. Just wait your time, work hard, and don’t piss too many people off. You’ll get out eventually.”

“Anyone in particular I should avoid pissing off?”

Clink smirked. “You’ve already put your foot in it. Got the Glasseaters irritated with you, and the guards who had to break up that fight to match. I’m surprised no one’s pissed in your washbucket yet.”

“Wonderful.” Ripka groaned and stirred her porridge with a wooden spoon of legend, listless, pretending disinterest in food. Forge and Clink exchanged a look.

“Hey, Captain,” Clink said, her voice lower than usual. “You hurtin’?”

Ripka pressed her lips together hard to keep from smiling. Didn’t matter where you went in the world, those who dealt in illicit trades always made up their own language to obfuscate what they were really up to. She figured the language of Aransa’s dark trade would translate just as well here. Radu had insinuated that the drug he wanted rooted out was an upper, and those usually had an acerbic taste from which they took their slang.

“Yeah. Not much time to get used to going without. I got tossed straight on the transport. Anything bitter growing on this rock?”

“Hmmm,” Forge said, drumming her nails on the table. “Not much like that around here. Guards keep it pretty tight, but there’s…”

Clink cleared her throat and shot Forge a hard look. “I’ll ask around. See if I can scrounge up something to help.”

Ripka swallowed her disappointment. Either the girls knew something and were keeping the information close, or she’d attached herself to the wrong group. Pits below, she shouldn’t have to bother with this bullshit. She should focus on Nouli, on getting close to that yellowhouse. But the thought of being outed… She glanced sideways at Honey, at the hard planes of muscle hidden behind her jumpsuit. They weren’t likely to be so friendly with her if they knew where her “name” came from.

“I’d be grateful,” she said, forcing a tight smile but not trying too hard to hide her disappointment. They’d expect as much.

“We look out for each other, that’s the deal.” Clink didn’t need to explain what she meant, Ripka could hear between the words easily enough. She’d be called upon someday to repay the favor of their protection, their company, and their drug supplier if it came to that.

A little worm of guilt crawled under her skin as she realized she wouldn’t be around long enough to settle the debt Clink had offered her in good faith. But was it good faith, truly? Ripka hadn’t the slimmest idea what Clink, or the others, had done to get themselves tossed in the Remnant. Wasn’t anything petty, she could count on that. The empire didn’t go to the trouble of shipping you out to this sea-slapped rock if you hadn’t gone out of your way to earn the dubious honor. It had to be worse than petty theft, but not so nasty they’d lob your head off and be done with it.

Not much was a capital offense in the eyes of the empire, especially not on the Scorched. Planned murder would get you chopped, or being a deviant sel-sensitive – but with the sensitives, they just wanted them out of the breeding pool. In being sent to the Remnant, the empire thought they might be able to squeeze some use out of you someday. Rehabilitation was the lip service they gave it, but in truth this nest of vipers was a place of waiting.

Waiting for the next war, the next selium-rush. Whatever the empire’d need dirty hands for. Hands they didn’t mind chopping off.

“Your sweetums is making friends,” Honey said in her soft, whispery voice.

Ripka suppressed a scowl at the thought of Enard as anything more than a friend, and followed Honey’s gaze. Enard had set himself up at the trestle table again. The population there had thinned, many of the new intakes having broken off to join smaller, more insular groups. Some of them had even formed their own clumps of human protection. But not Enard.

He sat straight-backed, methodically spooning gruel into his mouth, a ratty napkin folded across his lap with angles so crisp Ripka wondered how he’d managed to beat the rumpled material flat, let alone straight. Give the man a change of clothes and you could plop him down in any high society dining hall and no one would be the wiser.

He’d attracted flies. At least, that’s what they looked like to Ripka. Three men made a crescent around Enard – one at either side, one at his back – leaning forward with expressions so intense Ripka couldn’t tell if they wanted to kill him or fuck him. Maybe both.

That songbird who’d started the fracas stood on the other side of the table, arms crossed, a smug look tugging up her still-swollen lips.

“Trouble,” Ripka said, automatically keeping her voice soft.

“Just another day on the Remnant,” Clink mused.

“Hope they don’t mess up those lovely cheekbones of his,” Forge added.

Ripka’s fist tightened around her spoon. They were criminals, these new friends of hers. Not her watchers, trained to fall into action by her words, by the subtle shift in her voice. She’d moved on the chair, unconsciously swung her legs around to the other side so that she faced Enard. Her hands curled in her lap, one still holding the wooden spoon. A paltry weapon, that. She’d give anything to have her baton, her crossbow, or her cutlass. Would give so much more to have her old sergeant, Banch, backing her up.

Pits below, she’d even welcome Detan’s idiotic face right about now.

“You gon’ fight, Captain?” Honey asked.

“Best not, unless you wanna spend a night in the well,” Kisser said.

One of the three men was talking, hunched over real close so Enard couldn’t miss a word he said, but Enard kept on eating, bringing that spoon up and down to his own internal rhythm. Maybe they just had harsh words to share. Maybe…

A small hand lighted on her shoulder and she snapped around to face the owner faster than she’d intended. Honey smiled at her, her little hand with its too-short fingers tugging on the cloth by her shoulder.

“Gimme your spoon, mine’s broken,” she said.

“Honey…” There was a warning note in Clink’s voice that Ripka couldn’t parse. Was Honey simpleminded? To be worried about cutlery at a time like this was so disjointed from reality that Ripka wasn’t sure whether to laugh or yell. She handed the spoon over without comment, acutely aware of the conversation going on at the table while her back was turned.

Honey snatched the spoon with glee and shoved one of her short, thick thumbnails into the end of its handle. Sticking her tongue out with concentration, she twisted her nail around until the wood began to splinter, then upended her plate and fitted the notched end of the handle against its narrow edge. With a few deft taps, she split the spoon in half against the plate and peeled a few splinters off one half. She tested the handle’s new point for sharpness, nodded to herself, and handed it back, beaming with triumph.

“For you.”

Ripka stared, dumbfounded. In a few heartbeats, Honey’d crafted a serviceable shiv.

“Thank you…” Ripka said, hesitantly, as she took the makeshift weapon and stashed it in her pocket.

“Be careful, there’s an awful lot of them.”

“I don’t think–”

Shouts echoed across the courtyard, cutting her off. The man who had been speaking to Enard grabbed his collar and jerked him from his seat, shoving him toward the ground. Enard twisted expertly, wrenching his shirt away from the man’s grasp, and got a hand down to brace himself.

There he perched, his thighs on the bench, a single hand holding him off the ground. Silence wove throughout the moment, the entire rec yard holding its breath to see which way things would swing next.

The man standing behind Enard, his jumpsuit dyed over the shoulders in a scale pattern, kicked Enard’s elbow. He crashed to the ground. The yard exploded in whoops and cheers.

Ripka couldn’t see Enard after he went down – the three men converged upon him – but she was on her feet before she could think. She sprinted, elbowing aside the crowd that swelled about the nucleus that was Enard.

Enard’s head popped up – taller than the rest, dark hair flattened with sweat. A trickle of blood snaked from his nose to his lip. The three tightened the noose, pressing him back against the bench so he’d be off balance. Ripka saw Enard’s eyes narrow, his shoulders set, his fists come up, and then she was in.

The crowd broke around her and she grabbed the first man she could reach by the scruff of his jumpsuit, yanked him back with one hand as she drove her other fist into his kidney. He barked in pain, tried to twist around to come at her but she held fast to his collar and kicked the back of his knee. Fabric twisted in her grip, rubbed her knuckles raw as he staggered sideways and wrenched away from her.

“The fuck–” he spat, but before he could get another word out she stepped into him, swung a jab into his liver as he threw his arms out to catch his balance and followed it up with a hook to that nice little sweet spot on his temple. He crumpled.

One down. Someone grabbed her hair and she swore as her head jerked back, chin pointing skywards and vision fuzzed around the edges for a heartbeat. She crouched, the movement just confusing enough for her attacker to think he’d knocked her down. The man let go of her hair and she spun, brought her leg up in a heavy kick aimed at stomach-height and connected with a woman she’d never seen before.

The woman toppled, taken by surprise. Ripka scanned the crowd closing in tight around the brawl. Pockets of fights broke out among the masses, twisted knots pushing and shoving against those who wanted to watch the show. Things were getting out of hand, a riot was about to start.

There – Enard had kicked the bench under the table and had his back against it, facing the two men who circled him. His stance was tight, squared off, his head ducked down while he protected his middle. Ripka grimaced. Decent form for a ring, but he wouldn’t last long like that against two determined bastards with his back against a figurative wall.

“Hey!” she yelled and grabbed a fallen clay plate, then hurled it at the back of the man standing closest to her. It shattered in a satisfying puff. “Hey, fuckface!”

He flinched as the plate slammed into his back and took a hit to his chest from Enard while distracted. With an enraged bellow he spun around, seeking his attacker. Ripka forced herself to stand still and smirk at him. He was much, much larger than she had originally thought. This was going to hurt.

If he could catch her.

She kicked up a cup into her hands and chucked it at the man. His lips curled in a snarl as he turned into it, taking the hit on the shoulder. She blew a kiss at him, winked, and spun to elbow her way back through the crowd.

No need to elbow, she realized. The big man chasing her scattered the other inmates like chaff. She sprinted along the edge of the table, threw a glance back over her shoulder to make sure he followed. Yep, still enraged and pointed right at her. She wasn’t sure whether to be happy about that or not. It was what she’d wanted, but… Still.

As she glanced back, she caught sight of Enard laying the other man out flat with a heavy blow to the jaw. At least he was safe.

She almost barreled into a cluster of smirking men before she noticed they weren’t moving, and she didn’t have time to shove them aside. She stumbled, arresting her course, saw one of them reach for her and realized they must be the big bastard’s friends, willing to hold her in place while he caught up.

Twisting away, she flung herself atop the trestle table and rolled to her feet, facing the man dashing toward her. The men crowded her side of the table, grins leering up at her. She swung her gaze along the other side of the table and found more of the same. Wonderful. If she could make it back to Enard, then at least she’d have an ally.

Taking a breath to steady her nerves, she sprinted, legs pumping hard enough to shake the table with every step, cutlery and cookware clattering as she stormed down the length of the table. Her heel hit spilled porridge, and she nearly lost her footing. Skidding, cursing, she righted herself and saw… blackness as the world swung above her head.

She hit the table with a grunt, air whooshing free of her lungs, shoulder burning as it took the brunt of her fall. Knowing only she needed to get moving again, she twisted, attempted to kick herself up. Someone had her ankle gripped tight. The songbird.

That cursed woman leaned over the bench on the other side of the table, spindly fingers digging in tight to Ripka’s ankle, a satisfied grin twisting up her sunken features. Ripka kicked out with her free foot, aiming for the woman’s head, and then the sun went away.

She blinked, understood the darkness as the eclipsing figure of the big man. He towered above her, brought back his arm as if to swing. Ripka threw her arms up, forearms pressed together, to shield her face. But he wasn’t interested in hitting her. His massive hand curled around her throat.

Squeezed.

Gasping for air she tried to shove her thumbs under his fingers. No use, the man was attached to her like a sandtick.

Her vision blurred out at the edges. Her need for air burned in her throat, her chest, her mind. Couldn’t think, couldn’t work out what to do. Her mind was one big scream of breathe!

A strange fuzziness filled her, making the world distant and slowed, the pain somehow less – it’d end soon, one way or another. A tickle of a memory called to her. She felt the hard lump in her pocket, Honey’s gift. As her fingers closed around the warm wooden handle she heard Warden Faud’s words, from all those years ago, before she’d even been a watch-captain. When he was teaching her to control a fight without killing.

Never go for a death blow, if it can be helped. Find the path to the quickest, safest end, and when you find it, do not hesitate.

On the edges of her awareness voices were raised, the big brass bells of the Remnant’s alarm beating along with the fading stutter of her heart. Guards were coming. Would be here soon. Not soon enough.

She shanked the big man in the hollow of his elbow. Drove the point up and in so hard splinters bit her palm and she felt the elastic give and snap of his tendon under the shiv’s point. Saw the severed tendon curl up under his skin like a gnarled root.

Maybe I am a farmer, she thought, delirium ebbing away as she sucked in great mouthfuls of sea-salted air. She coughed, retching stomach waters on herself, the table, anywhere at all. Hands closed around her shoulders and shoved her upright.

She heard the big man scream in pain, but she didn’t care. He’d made a mistake, looking to kill her.

“Where’d you get that?” Captain Lankal’s face loomed into hers, and she laughed, because it seemed such a stupid question. She opened her mouth to answer and tasted fire again, fell into another coughing fit.

“Fine.” He snapped as she was dragged off the table by too many hands to count. “You want to start fights, missy? Want to draw blood? I’ve had enough of your shit. You’re going in the well.”

As they bound her wrists and marched her out of the rec yard, she caught sight of Honey, watching her from behind the table where her new friends sat, hunger bright as a bonfire in her dark amber eyes. More than hunger. Reverence.