A stale breath passes my lips. “Thank you, Azmar.”
He nods, though I sense his own discontent with my answer. But that answer is all I can give. If I’m to stay in Cagmar, I must forget my fear, slough it off like snakeskin and become a new Lark. The thought is both liberating and terrifying.
I suddenly want Perg’s knife, but I should get rid of it. I must do nothing to tarnish my name further. I must become a perfect human.
Azmar lets me walk down the stairs first. The council chamber sits higher than the market, so we have a good view of it as we start down the hill. A small group of trollis loiters near the food handlers, jeering and calling names, occasionally kicking or slapping someone amidst them. It reminds me too much of Perg, but Perg is in the infirmary. Thinking of Ritha and the others, I quicken my step.
One of the trollis shifts, and I see it’s not a human they torment, but Grodd. He wears the common clothes of a Pleb, and his disheveled hair speaks of ill treatment. He scowls at one of his assailants and raises a hand as though to strike back.
A trollis behind him batters a fist into Grodd’s skull. “Raise your hand to your betters, Pleb? I’ll have you thrown in the dungeon for that.”
The others laugh. Unach watches, too, her face grim. “How easily the iron bar bends,” she murmurs. I wonder if that’s a trollis idiom.
Before I can wrench my gaze free to follow Azmar, Grodd looks up and meets it. In his vivid green eyes, I see hatred deeper than any I’ve ever encountered. Hatred sharp enough to steal my breath away.
He knows, more than anyone, that I’m hiding something.
And in that embittered glare, I see the promise of revenge.
Chapter 11
I don’t know if the excitement of my brief encounter with Grodd has died down or if the council sent out some missive I don’t know about or even if Unach’s rage can quell the entire city, but a few days after the caste tournament, the glares and whispers reduce to a simmer, and I’m able to visit Perg. Trollis still examine me when they pass by, but I don’t fear being mobbed by them, and very few speak to me outside of small comments, like an awed “a human, of all things” or “would-be Montra.” Some even salute to me. I seem to have earned some respect among the more open-minded. While it pleases and astounds me, I wish even the compliments would end. The sooner Cagmar forgets about me, the easier my transition to a defenseless, boring human. The sooner I will be safe.
Perg looks better. Bruised, but better. Blue cuts and abrasions speckle his skin. Heavy bandages encompass his forearm and torso. A thick blanket hides the rest of him.
“But it’s worth it,” he says as we discuss what happened on the bridge. He doesn’t remember my being there, except hovering over him as he lost consciousness. “To see that teat-sucking mole in squalor. Or it will be, when I do see him.”
I don’t answer. Looking around the infirmary, I see that everything here is trollis-made, all beams and steel, some wood and mortared stones. Lamps hang from the ceiling over each bed, making it the brightest room in Cagmar. There are six beds in total, two of them pushed together against a far wall to make more space. The nurse, a slender trollis with tusks too big for his mouth, stepped out just a minute ago.
I do think Grodd deserves punishment for his cruelty, but I don’t believe in fighting malice with malice. It seems everyone in Cagmar hates him now. Just as they hated Perg. And yet Perg has no empathy for him. I don’t blame him, but it makes me wonder.
“How long will you be here in the infirmary?” I ask.
Perg tries to shrug, then winces. I wonder how trollis medicine compares to humans’. “At least a few more days. Make sure infection doesn’t set in. But then I’ll be confined to quarters after that. Don’t know which I’d prefer. But as soon as my body catches up with me, I’m training again.”
I blanche. “Will you be ready for the next tournament?” It is only three months away.
Perg grimaces. “No. And not the one after that, either.” He focuses on a spot on the wall. “He beat me, Lark. Tore and broke so much . . . even when I’m healed, I’ll be soft. I don’t hold my musculature as well as a full-blooded trollis. I have to work twice as hard for everything . . .”
His voice cuts to a whisper. I place my hand on his bicep, above his bandages. “But you’ll do it, Perg. You’re already a Deccor at heart. You did it once, and you’ll do it again. I have faith in you.”
He offers me a half smile at that, but a heaviness pulls at his features.
“I’ll visit you every day,” I promise. “What’s your favorite meal? I’ll steal from Unach’s stores to make it for you.”
He laughs, then winces as it shakes his broken ribs. “You’ll think it’s ridiculous.”
“Why would I think it’s ridiculous?”
“Because”—he glances around, checking for nurses, but we’re alone—“it’s carrot soup.”
I blink. “Is that funny?”
He shrugs. “Well, it’s not meat.”
The trollis do have a meat-heavy diet, I’ve noticed, and meat seems the more masculine food group. Azmar’s favorite food is boar belly.
I pause, wondering when I learned this. I’ve never even cooked it for him. I try to think what Unach’s favorite meal is, but my mind comes up blank.
“I’ll make the best carrot soup you’ve ever had. And I’ll even spoon-feed it to you.”
Perg rolls his eyes. “Please no. Any respect I earned from my first battle will be gone the moment someone sees a human babying me.” He says human like it’s a totally foreign concept, not like it’s half of who he is. “It’s bad enough that—” He stops abruptly.
I pull back. “Bad enough that what?”
He waves a hand. “Don’t worry about it.”
But in my gut, I know what he was going to say. It’s bad enough that I’m friends with one.
A sharp shiver runs through my heart. I swallow in an attempt to relieve it.
After Perg heals, he’ll train again. He’ll find someone to battle. He’ll become a Deccor, maybe even reach Intra. Will there be a point where befriending me is no longer in good taste? Is our friendship based not on our shared humanity, but on our shared lowliness in the trollis caste system?
But Azmar is Centra, and Unach Montra. And they’re my friends. At least, I consider them friends.
Rubbing my hands together to warm them, I say, “I should be going. Errands to run and all.” I have to return to my shifts at the south dock tomorrow.
Perg nods. “Good luck.”
I offer him a weak smile and find my way out, grateful not to encounter any other trollis in need of deference.