The Thin Executioner

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Jebel would have taken the first turn they came to, but Tel Hesani had passed all of the side streets earlier, and he told the boy to run straight on. He ignored the next two turnings too. Only when they came to the fourth did he shout, “Left!”

Jebel raced along a dark alley. Halfway down they took a right turn into a larger but deserted street. It was all new territory from this point for Tel Hesani, so he paused to consider his next move. As he wavered, he heard a single pair of footsteps behind them, approaching fast.

Tel Hesani stood, sword at the ready. He didn’t think it was Bush or Blair — he assumed they always worked as a pair. Maybe a soldier. A man came flying around the bend, and Tel Hesani began to swing. The man threw himself to the ground. “No!” he yelled. “I’m a friend!”

Tel Hesani did a quick double-take. The man was one of the slaves from his work gang. Khubtha, an Um Rashrasha, one of the younger members of the crew, sent back from the mines because he had bad lungs.

“Take me with you,” Khubtha gasped. “I don’t want to die a slave. I know these streets. I can help you hide and escape.”

There was no time to think it through. Tel Hesani didn’t know what manner of a man Khubtha was, but he decided to trust the young slave. He tugged Khubtha to his feet. “If you can’t keep up, we’ll leave you behind,” he warned.

Khubtha nodded desperately. “Do you know where you’re going?”

“No.”

Khubtha looked around. “I know this place. There are abandoned houses nearby. Follow me.”

He started forward, but Tel Hesani called him back. “They can track our footprints in the snow.”

Khubtha looked down and cursed. “There’s a street close to here that holds a market in the morning. Nobody will be there now. We don’t sweep it until later, so it will be full of prints.”

“Lead the way,” Tel Hesani said, then fell in behind Jebel. The pair ran along after the panting Um Rashrasha, Tel Hesani listening for sounds of pursuit.

Khubtha took a right turn, then a left. They panted down a long, wide street, then came to an even broader one, where the market had been that morning. The snow was churned up, as Khubtha had said it would be. At Tel Hesani’s command they slowed to a walk, so their strides matched the rest of the marks. They spread out, Khubtha left, Jebel right, Tel Hesani in the middle. At the end of the street was a road. The snow wasn’t as disturbed there, but there were enough prints to mask their own. Halfway down, Khubtha made another turn, then stopped at an old house whose roof had fallen in.

“How about this?” Khubtha asked.

Tel Hesani frowned. “It’s close to where we’ve come from.”

“They’ll expect us to run far before we stop,” said Khubtha. “I’ve seen dozens of men try to escape, but only a few ever made it out of Disi. The trick is to get off the streets as soon as you can. Hide, wait for night, give yourself time to form a plan. We’re exposed at the moment. Somebody will see us. Alarms will be raised.”

That made sense, so Tel Hesani told Jebel to slip into the house, past the broken front door. Jebel didn’t want to box himself in, but he deferred to Tel Hesani. Khubtha went next, Tel Hesani last, after checking the street one final time to make sure nobody had seen them.

It was dark inside, and cold. Moss grew on the walls. There were frozen puddles of water. The fugitives moved to one of the rear rooms, where the windows were boarded over, and lay down. All three were puffing and shivering. Jebel was dressed warmly, but Tel Hesani and Khubtha were clad in rags.

Once they got their breath back — although Khubtha still wheezed, as he always did — Tel Hesani smiled weakly at Jebel. “I never thought I’d see you again.”

“I didn’t think I’d see you either,” Jebel laughed, feeling a strange surge of friendship for the slave. “I was sure they’d stick you down a mine.”

“They were going to,” Tel Hesani said. “But the slavers who Bush and Blair sold me to gambled when they came here, and lost heavily. They had to sell me to pay off their debts. The man who bought me is a trader. He meant to auction me in a big market they hold in Disi at the start of the year, when the wealthiest miners gather and pay the highest prices. He rented me out in the meantime. That’s how I ended up working on the streets.”

Tel Hesani asked about Jebel’s adventures, and Jebel spent a few minutes filling him in on his recent, grisly past. Tel Hesani listened quietly, watching the boy’s face as he described his graverobbing duties, noting the different tone in his voice. Jebel sounded less arrogant than when Tel Hesani had last seen him. Back then the boy had thought himself the hero of Makhras, but he had learned some humility since their paths diverged. That surprised Tel Hesani, who had deemed Jebel incapable of change.

When Jebel finished, it was Khubtha’s turn. He didn’t have much to say. “You know most of my story,” he told Tel Hesani. “I’m a slave with weak lungs. When I found myself free on the street, my first instinct was to stay there and let myself be chained again — that would have been the safest option. Then I thought, if Tel Hesani has the courage to escape, why not me too? So I ran.”

“It’s dangerous,” Tel Hesani noted. “If you’d stayed, you wouldn’t have been punished. You might even have been rewarded for not running. But from what I’ve gathered of the laws here, any slave who tries to escape is executed if recaptured.”

“Yes. The only way—” Khubtha stopped himself and coughed. “Yes,” he said again when he got his breath back. “If the Um Saga catch us, they’ll kill us.”

“But you ran anyway,” Tel Hesani said.

Khubtha nodded. “With my lungs, I wouldn’t have survived much longer on the streets. It’s not too bad in summer, but the snows would have been the death of me. I figured, if I’m going to die whether I stay or run, why not die running?”

Tel Hesani squeezed Khubtha’s bony arm. “They took a lot from you when they enslaved you, but not your courage.”

Khubtha blushed. “Let’s get some rest,” he muttered.

Leaning against one of the drier walls, Khubtha closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around himself. Tel Hesani did the same. Jebel was about to lean back when he looked at his clothes and paused. He didn’t need so many layers. If he gave his cloak to Tel Hesani and Khubtha to share, all three of them would be moderately warm.

Jebel opened his mouth to make the offer… then closed it. The older men were slaves. He would need their help if he was to make it out of this hellish country, but they weren’t his equals. The gods cursed those who tried to help the weak, and the last thing Jebel wanted was to get on the wrong side of the gods. It didn’t feel right keeping the cloak to himself, but he knew that any Um Aineh who showed pity to a slave would be scorned by his people back home.

Khubtha caught Jebel’s eye as the boy settled back and pulled the cloak tighter around himself. The Um Rashrasha stared longingly at the cloak, and there was an unvoiced plea in his expression. Jebel flushed, feeling an unavoidable pang of guilt, but he said nothing, only turned his head away so that he would not have to look at the slave. He would rather offend Khubtha than the gods.

When darkness fell, Tel Hesani rose and went to study the street. “I don’t see anyone,” he reported back. “I think it’s safe to leave.”

“Let’s not be hasty,” Khubtha wheezed. “We should stay here for a few nights. They’ll expect us to run. If we wait, we might outfox them.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” Tel Hesani said.

“They’d have searched this house by now if they were going to,” Khubtha argued. “Nobody will look for us here. We’re safe.”

“What can we eat?” asked Jebel.

“We don’t have to eat,” Khubtha said. “This wouldn’t be the first time I’ve gone a few days without food. We can wait for a storm, then slip away.”

“That’s a good point,” Tel Hesani reflected. “The sky’s clear. If we leave now, we’ll be exposed. Good thinking, Khubtha.”

The Um Rashrasha chuckled. “You have lots of time to think when you’re shoveling snow. Get some sleep. I’ll take the first watch in case anyone comes sniffing around.”

Jebel didn’t think he could sleep, what with the cold and threat of recapture. But he saw Tel Hesani drop off after a few minutes, and as he watched the slow, steady rise and fall of the slave’s chest, he felt his own eyelids drooping, and he joined the Um Kheshabah in the land of dreams soon after.

Jebel was roughly kicked awake. A foot connected with his jaw and sent his head snapping back. As he jolted out of sleep, somebody pinned him to the floor. He cried for help, but then he saw the Um Kheshabah, arms bound, surrounded by three men. His heart sank, and he looked for Khubtha, wondering why he hadn’t warned them. That question was soon answered when he spotted Khubtha standing nearby, wrapped in a rug, smiling.

“Traitor!” Jebel screamed.

Tel Hesani stopped struggling and stared at Khubtha. “You betrayed us?”

“I had to,” said Khubtha. He didn’t sound ashamed.

“Why?” Tel Hesani asked as soldiers jerked him to his feet. “They won’t free you. Um Saga never free slaves. And they execute all who try to escape.”

“No,” Khubtha said. “The Um Saga waive the death penalty if an escaped slave turns in another. They’ll take me off the streets and put me to work in a factory. I’ll live longer. Maybe I’ll find a woman, have children….” He shrugged.

“But they’ll kill us!” Jebel roared.

“So what?” sneered Khubtha. “You’d have done the same thing if you’d been a bit smarter. I feel bad about Tel Hesani — he’s an honorable man — but you deserve all this and more. You Um Aineh only think of yourselves. Did you offer to share your warm clothes with us?” He ripped Jebel’s cloak away and draped it around Tel Hesani’s shoulders. The Um Kheshabah didn’t react. He was staring at the ground, making his peace with God.

“All right,” one of the soldiers said, binding Jebel’s hands. “Take them away.”

“Where?” Jebel asked sickly.

“The Uneishu,” Khubtha answered with grim satisfaction. “That’s the Disi court. It’s always open for business. Justice works quickly and surely here in Abu Saga. You’ll be tried, found guilty, and executed within the next hour.”