Chapter 5
Wide as God’s Ocean
Many families waited in front of the Keep that day, preparing themselves for grief. They couldn’t know that they were about to become players on the stage of history, and some to hold parts greater than they could ever have imagined.
—The Early History of the Tearling,
AS TOLD BY MERWINIAN
They entered New London several hours after midday. Kelsea was groggy with the heat, the punishing weight of her armor, and lack of sleep, but as they crossed the New London Bridge, the sheer size of the city slapped her awake.
The bridge had a toll gate, two men on either side making the collection. Mace produced ten pence from his cloak and managed the admirable trick of paying the gatekeeper while keeping his face covered. Kelsea studied the bridge. It was a marvel of engineering: at least fifty yards long, carved from grey blocks of granite and supported by six enormous pillars that jutted upward from the Caddell River. The Caddell would continue around the outer edge of the city, meandering some fifty miles southwest before it descended in falls over the cliffs and emptied into the Tearling Gulf. The water beneath the bridge was a deep azure.
“Don’t look too long at the water,” Mace murmured, and Kelsea jerked around to face forward.
New London had originally started as a small town, built by early settlers on one of the lower foothills of the Rice Mountains. But as the town grew into a city, it had spread from hill to hill, eventually becoming the Tear capital. Now New London covered the entire stretch of foothills, its buildings and streets rolling gently up and down to accommodate the topography. The Keep rose from the center of the city, an enormous obelisk of grey stone that dwarfed the buildings surrounding. In her mind, Kelsea had always pictured the Keep as an orderly structure, but the castle ascended ziggurat fashion, without symmetry: battlements and balconies on various levels, multiple nooks and crannies capable of concealment. The Keep had been constructed during the reign of Jonathan the Good, the second king of the Tearling; no one knew the name of the architect, but he must have been a marvel.
The rest of the city was less marvelous. Most of the buildings were poorly constructed of cheap wood, and they leaned haphazardly every which way. One good fire, Kelsea thought, and half the city would burn down.
Near the Keep, perhaps a mile distant, was another tower, pure white and perhaps half as tall, topped with a golden cross. That must be the Arvath, the seat of God’s Church. Close to the Keep, of course, although Mace had told her that the Regent had given in and allowed the Holy Father to build a private chapel within the Keep walls as well. Kelsea couldn’t tell if the cross atop the Arvath was gilded or made of real gold, but it shone brilliantly in the sun, and Kelsea narrowed her eyes at the sight. William Tear had forbidden the practice of organized religion in his utopia; according to Carlin, he had even thrown one man right over the side of his flagship when he found out the man had been proselytizing in secret. But now Christianity had rebounded as strongly as ever. Kelsea couldn’t say what her attitude toward God’s Church would have been if she’d grown up in a different house, if her values had not been so shaped by Carlin’s atheism. But it was too late; Kelsea’s distrust of the golden cross was instinctive and visceral, even though she knew that she would have to come to some sort of compromise with what it represented. She had never been good at compromise, even during the easy conflicts that arose in the cottage.
Mace rode silently beside her, occasionally pointing for a change of direction, as the bridge ended and the crowded thoroughfare entered the city proper. They both remained heavily cloaked and hooded. Mace believed that all routes to the Keep would be guarded, and Kelsea sensed the watchfulness in him, the way he occasionally shifted his position to place himself between her and something that had put his wind up.
Kelsea couldn’t detect anything out of the ordinary, but how could she know what was ordinary? The streets were lined with stalls, merchants hawking everything from simple fruits and vegetables to exotic birds. An open-air market, Kelsea realized, one that grew ever more densely packed as she and Mace attempted to maneuver their horses farther into the city. There were shops as well, each with a gaily-colored placard out front, and Kelsea saw a tailor, a baker, a healer, a hairdresser, even a haberdasher! What sort of vanity supported a hat shop?
The crowd astounded her. After years with only Barty and Carlin, it was hard to accept so much humanity in one place. People were everywhere, and they came in so many varieties, tall and short, old and young, dark and fair, thin and round. Kelsea had met plenty of new people in the past few days, but she had never really considered before how many possibilities were presented by a single human face. She saw a man with a long, hooked nose, almost like the beak of a bird; a woman with long, wavy blonde hair that seemed to reflect the sun in thousands of sparkles. Everything seemed overly bright, enough to make Kelsea’s eyes water. And the sounds! All around Kelsea was the roar of innumerable voices raised at once, a clamor that she had never heard before. Individual voices pressed in on her from time to time, merchants shouting their wares or acquaintances greeting each other across the confusion of the road, but their voices were nothing compared to the overall roar of the crowd. It attacked Kelsea’s ears with a physical force that threatened to crush her eardrums, yet she found the chaos oddly comforting.
As they rounded one corner, a street performer caught Kelsea’s eye. He placed a rose in a vase, made an identical vase appear from nowhere, then made the rose vanish and reappear instantaneously in the second vase. Kelsea slowed her horse to watch. The magician vanished the rose and both vases entirely, and then reached into his own mouth and produced a snow-white kitten. The animal was clearly alive; it squirmed in his hands while the crowd applauded. The magician then presented the kitten to a small girl in the audience, who squealed with excitement.
Kelsea smiled, charmed. Most likely he was gifted only with extraordinary dexterity, not true magic, but she could see no slip in the flawless transition of objects.
“We court danger here, Lady,” murmured Mace.
“What danger?”
“Only a feeling. But my feelings on such matters are usually right.”
Kelsea shook the reins and her horse began to trot forward again. “The magician, Lazarus. Mark him for me.”
“Lady.”
As the day drew on, Kelsea began to share Mace’s anxiety. The novelty of the crowd was diminishing, and everywhere Kelsea looked, she sensed people staring at her. She felt more and more hunted, and wished simply for the journey to be over. She had no doubt Mace had chosen the best route, but still she began to long for an open, clear space where threats could arrive cleanly, an honest fight.
But she didn’t know how to fight.
Although New London had the feel of a labyrinth, some neighborhoods were clearly better off than others. The higher-end areas had well-tended roads and well-dressed citizens on the streets, even a few brick buildings with glass windows. But other areas had tightly packed pinewood buildings with no windows and denizens who slouched along the walls in a creeping, furtive manner. Sometimes Kelsea and Mace were forced to ride through a cloud of stench that suggested that the houses were plumbed poorly, or not at all.
This is what it smells like in February, Kelsea thought, sickened. What must it be like in high summer?
Halfway through a particularly run-down section, Kelsea realized she was in a blue district. The street was so narrow that it was really an alley. The buildings were all made of some cheap wood that Kelsea couldn’t even identify, and many buildings listed so far sideways that it seemed a miracle they were still standing. Occasionally Kelsea heard screams and the sound of things breaking as they passed. The air rang with laughter, a cold laughter that made her skin break out in gooseflesh.
Poorly dressed women appeared from the crooked doorways and leaned against walls, while Kelsea stared at them in helpless fascination from beneath the shelter of her hood. There was an indefinable air of squalor about the prostitutes, something that couldn’t be pinpointed. It wasn’t their clothing; certainly their dresses were neither more nor less fancy than many Kelsea had seen, and despite the considerable amount of flesh they displayed, it wasn’t the cut of the garments either. It was something in the eyes, in the way the eyes seemed to eat up the faces of even the heaviest women. They looked worn, the young as well as the old. Many of them appeared to have scars. Kelsea didn’t want to imagine the lives they must lead, but she couldn’t help it.
I’ll close this entire section down, she thought. Close it down and give them all real employment.
Carlin’s voice spoke up in her head. Will you regulate the length of their dresses as well? Perhaps forbid novels deemed too pornographic?
There’s a difference.
No difference. Blue laws are blue laws. If you wish to dictate private morality, march yourself over to the Arvath.
Mace directed her to the left, between two buildings, and Kelsea was relieved when they emerged onto a wide boulevard lined with neatly kept shops. The grey facade of the Keep was closer now, blotting out the surrounding mountains and most of the sky. Despite the width of the boulevard, it was so crowded that Kelsea and Mace were boxed in again, and could only muddle along at the crowd’s pace. There was more sunlight here, and Kelsea felt uneasy, exposed despite her cloak and hood. No one knew what she looked like, but Mace must cut a recognizable figure anywhere. He seemed to share the feeling, for he spurred his stallion forward until he was literally nudging the crowd of riders and pedestrians out of the way. A path opened before them, with some grumbling on either side.
“Straight ahead,” Mace muttered, “as quickly as we can.”
Still their progress was slow. Rake, who had behaved well throughout the journey, seemed to sense Kelsea’s anxiety and now began to resist her direction. Her efforts to control the horse quickly became exhausting in combination with the weight of Pen’s armor. She was sweating in thick drips that trickled down her neck and back, and Mace’s darting glances behind them became more frequent as they went. The crowds continued to pack them in more and more tightly as they approached the Keep.
“Can’t we take another way?”
“There’s no other way,” Mace replied. He was controlling his horse with only one hand now; the other was on his sword. “We’re out of time, Lady. Push on; not much farther now.”
For the next few minutes, Kelsea struggled to stay conscious. The late-afternoon sun bore down on her dark cloak, and the close quarters created by the crowd did nothing to relieve the feeling of suffocation. Twice she swayed in her saddle, and was only restored by Mace’s tight grip on her shoulder.
Finally the boulevard ended, branching off onto a wide field of grass that circled the Keep and its moat. At the sight of the Keep Lawn, Kelsea felt a moment of atavistic excitement. Here the Mort soldiers had gathered with their siege equipment, had nearly breached the walls, and then had been turned away at the last minute. The lawn sloped gently downhill toward the Keep, and almost directly below Kelsea, a wide stone bridge crossed the water, leading to the Keep Gate. Two lines of guards were stationed at even intervals along the edges of the bridge. The grey monolith of the Keep itself towered almost directly over Kelsea’s head, and staring at the top made her dizzy, forced her to look away.
The Keep Lawn was covered with people, and Kelsea’s first reaction was surprise: wasn’t her arrival supposed to be a secret? Adults, children, even the elderly streamed like water across the grass and down toward the moat. But this wasn’t at all how Kelsea had pictured this day in her daydreams. Where were the cheering masses, the flowers thrown? Some of these people were weeping, but not the happy tears that Kelsea had imagined. Like the farmers in the Almont, all of these people looked as though they could use several hundred good meals. They wore the same sort of clothing Kelsea had seen in the Almont as well: dark and shapeless wool. Deep misery was etched into each face. Kelsea felt a sudden wave of powerful anxiety. Something wasn’t right.
Another scan of the lawn revealed that while many of the people on the lawn were milling around, apparently loitering, some of them had organized into long, straight lines that stretched down to the edge of the moat. When the crowd parted, Kelsea saw that there were several tables down there, tables with men standing behind them, probably officials, given the deep, identical blue of their clothing. Kelsea felt relief, tinged with slight disappointment. These people hadn’t come to see her at all. They were here for something else. The lines were very long, and they weren’t moving. The entire crowd appeared to be waiting.
But for what?
She turned to Mace, who was keeping a sharp eye on the lawn, one hand clenched on the hilt of his sword. “Lazarus, what are all these people doing here?”
He didn’t answer, wouldn’t meet her eye. A cold noose seemed to tighten around her heart. The crowd shifted again, and Kelsea spotted something new, some sort of metal contraption beside the moat. She stood up in her stirrups to get a better look and saw a series of structures: low rectangular boxes, about ten feet tall. The tops and bottoms were wood, and the sides were metal. There were nine of them in a line, stretching all the way down the lawn toward the far corner of the Keep. Kelsea squinted (her eyesight had never been very good) and saw that the walls of the boxes were actually a series of metal bars. Time suddenly slipped backward, and she saw Barty, heard his voice as clearly as if he was beside her, his fingers cleverly weaving wire through a series of holes punched in a piece of sanded wood. “Now, Kel, we make the wire tight enough that the rabbit can’t get away, but not so tight that the poor little bastard suffocates before we find him. People have to trap to survive, but a good trapper makes sure the animal suffers as little as possible.”
Kelsea’s eyes ran over the line of metal boxes again, assessing, and she felt everything inside her go cold, all at once.
Not boxes. Cages.
She gripped Mace’s arm, heedless of the wounds that she knew lay beneath his cloak. When she spoke, her voice didn’t entirely sound like her own. “Lazarus. You tell me what’s going on here. Now.”
This time he finally met her eye, and his bleak expression was all the confirmation that Kelsea needed. “It’s the shipment, Lady. Two hundred and fifty people, once a month, like clockwork.”
“Shipment to where?”
“To Mortmesne.”
Kelsea turned back to the lawn. Her mind seemed to have gone blank. The lines had begun moving now, slowly but surely, toward the tables down beside the moat. While Kelsea watched, one of the officials marched a woman away from the table, toward the cages. He stopped at the third cage and gestured to a man in a black uniform (the Tear army uniform, Kelsea realized faintly), who then pulled open a cleverly concealed door at the cage end. The woman marched meekly inside, and the soldier in black closed and locked the door.
“The Mort Treaty,” Kelsea murmured numbly. “This is how my mother made peace.”
“The Red Queen wanted tribute, Lady. The Tearling had nothing else to offer.”
A sharp pain arrowed through Kelsea’s chest, and she pressed a clenched fist between her breasts. Peeking beneath her shirt, she saw that her sapphire was glowing, a bright and angry blue. She gathered the jewel in a handful of the cloth and found that the thing was scalding, deep heat that burned her palm through the cloth. The sapphire continued to burn her hand, but the pain was nothing compared to the burn inside her chest, which continued, deepening with each passing second until it began to change, moving toward something different. Not pain . . . something else. She didn’t question the feeling, for she seemed to be beyond any capacity for wonder now, and could only stare mutely at the scene in front of her.
More officials were escorting people toward the cages. The crowd had backed up to allow them space, and Kelsea saw now that each cage had enormous wheels of wood. Tear soldiers had already begun to tether a team of mules to the cage at the far end of the Keep. Even from a distance, Kelsea could tell that the cages had seen hard use; several of the bars were visibly scarred, as if they’d been attacked.
Rescue attempts, her mind murmured. There must have been at least a few. She suddenly remembered standing in front of the big picture window at the cottage as a child, crying about something—a skinned knee, perhaps, or a chore she hadn’t wanted to do—staring at the forest, certain that this was the day when her mother would finally come. Kelsea couldn’t have been more than three or four, but she remembered her certainty very well: her mother would come, she would hold Kelsea in her arms, and she would be nothing but good.
I was a fool.
“Why these people?” she asked Mace. “How do they choose them?”
“By lottery, Lady.”
“Lottery,” she repeated faintly. “I see.”
Family members had begun to gather around the cages now, speaking to people inside, holding hands, or merely loitering. Several of the black-clad soldiers had been stationed next to each cage, and they watched the crowd stonily, clearly anticipating the moment when a family member presented a threat. But the onlookers were passive, and to Kelsea that seemed the worst thing of all. They were beaten, her people. It was clear in the long, straight lines that stretched from the official table, the way families merely stood beside the cages, waiting for their loved ones to depart.
Kelsea’s attention caught and held on the two cages nearest the table. These cages were shorter than the others, their steel bars set more tightly in their frames. Already, each cage held several small forms. Kelsea blinked and found that her eyes had filled with tears. They coursed slowly down her face until she tasted salt.
“Even children?” she asked Mace. “Why don’t the parents just flee?”
“When one of the allotted runs, his entire family is forfeit in the next lottery. Look around you, Lady. These are large families. Often they must sacrifice the welfare of one child, thinking of the other eight.”
“This is my mother’s system?”
“No. The architect of the lottery is down there.” Mace pointed toward the officials’ table. “Arlen Thorne.”
“But my mother approved it?”
“She did.”
“She did,” Kelsea repeated faintly. The world tipped crazily in front of her and she dug her fingernails into her arm, drawing blood, until the haze disappeared. In its wake came fury, a terrible, cheated anger that threatened to overwhelm her. Elyssa the Benevolent, Elyssa the Peacemaker. Kelsea’s mother, who had sold her people off wholesale.