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Oh, how I hated his face. We all did. His elongated, smug visage, with that finely combed little moustache on it. Always shadowed by his tricorne, which he decorated every day with the feathers of some other exotic fowl he padded his bloated stomach with. He passed our place on his daily walk, watched us toil and sweat under the ever-burning sun, and presumably got so exhausted from his slave holding his parasol that he had to return to his nice mansion for the rest of the day.
We would have loved to twist his neck, but whoever had designed that quarry would have deserved it more: the entrance was situated right on the face of a cliff; below, the waves trashed against the naked rock, which jutted out of the water as thin around the waist as us yet as pointy as our pickaxes. The guards were roped down in a lift every day to retrieve any ores we found, and to leave some resemblance of food behind. Inflation must have been pretty high, we gave them bags of gold and only got a few loaves of bread and some cheese out of it! We could have tried to overwhelm them—they weren't heavily armed—but then their mates above could just have cut the ropes leaving us stranded.
The only news we ever got from the outside world was when new convicts arrived. Some mineurs spectacularly sabotaging a coronation in another country; an indigenous island empire further west expanding and the neighbouring Wortlanders getting queasy… One fellow was particularly knowledgeable about the state's affairs, which might have been the reason why he was here with us. Thin, weak—I didn't expect him to last long (he did, though). Pieter was his name; he had been ambassador, and apparently an eager schemer, until he schemed himself onto this lovely prison island. He was from Nieuw Walschor, as quite a few of the newer arrivals seemed to be; some were not even criminals, but had moved here seeking opportunity. I admit, when I first arrived and stepped onto the deck of the ship in whose mouldy hull I had spent the weeks prior, my impression had not been all that bad. Bright sand all around, palmtrees swaying in the salty breeze, and a range of uniquely steep mountains competing with the mighty green of the jungle for the most imposing part of a picturesque backdrop. If only I had then not been forced to scrape them out one by one.
One day, Daniël ran up to us while we were lazing around in the shadow. Ah, Daniël: built like a bear but docile as a lamb; he had gotten caught up in something back home and couldn't bear to lie his way out of the mess, the fool, and thus ended up taking all the blame for the incident himself. A slow thinker, but a unconditionally kind-hearted spirit. New convicts tended to try and exploit his friendliness, but we always made it quite clear to them that this was not in accordance with our idea of comeradie.
That day, he was drenched head to toe, and quite excited about it. “I found water!”, he shouted, waving his arms. “There's a waterfall underground!” Everyone would have welcomed a little refreshment, and so we followed him into one of the mineshafts. Sure enough, behind a turn the rushing of water beckoned us with the promise of a cool respite. Just as Daniël had said, it was a waterfall, tumbling into the darkness below. It was illuminated only by the shine of our lanterns, for above all was pitch black; presumably it did not drop straight down from the surface but took a few detours through underground tunnels.
The cold shower was welcome, even if we had to be careful not to be torn down to our untimely doom.
We were about to go back to work when I noticed bald Nestory to be rather captivated by the scene. He tossed a rock down the chasm and listened attentively; then he asked Daniël to hold him tight as he leaned out through the waterfall, trying to squeeze a lantern past it dry. “What's the matter?”, I asked when he stood safe on his feet again. “Obviously, the water has to come from and go somewhere.”—“That much I figured. So you're saying there might be an escape route?” He flashed a smile, but avoided fuelling false hopes. “Perhaps. The water might flow out into the sea, but in what manner I cannot even guess. Upwards is hardly an option, alas.” I nodded. “Still worth a closer look.”
We did not want to draw unwanted attention to the discovery, so we returned to our work and laid a bit of our finds aside to have something to show for the following days when our focus would lie elsewhere. Ropes were organised, knotted together, and when the time seemed right, I volunteered to be let down on them. The waterfall continued to drop for a few dozen metres, and the shaft it had bored into the mountain was quite narrow. As it began to widen, I felt the stone under my hand to become smoother. I loosened the lantern tied to my belt and its light revealed crude carvings of various fish, crabs, and other such appetising things. I copped a feel of a creature haf-woman, half-fish, too! Though the shine from the lantern was too faint to illuminate the bigger picture, the carvings stretched as far as it reached. Apparently the rope had run out, or the men above had gotten worried, because hereafter I was pulled back up and reported wht I had seen.
The next day, I descended again, and soon reached the carvings. Below me I could make out a structure—or what was once a structure; the waterfall must have eroded it, for much of it had collapsed—which might once have been a pavillion; and, at least, the glow of the lantern was reflected in ripples rolling over the surface of a body of water. It was fairly shallow, I could stand in it up to my chest; there were no waves, and it barely tasted of salt. The darkness of the cave swallowed the flame's fickle flicker, and so I waded through the water blindly until I stumbled over something. It was a step, followed by another, and another, until I was on dry land. I tied the rope still clinging to my waist to a nearby column and ascended further. The noise of the waterfall faded into the distance, but the silence could not settle down as from the distance it faintly screamed and roared, shrill voices sang. The darkness ahead was impenetrable, the clamour otherworldly, but the allure of freedom hastened my steps—only for them to halt before a wall of massive roots, dirtied with soil. At least the sounds from beyond were not coming from the beasts of hell, unless the devil was truly so cruel as to have a man claw his way to his realm, full of expectation meant to be shattered. Freedom was just out of reach, and with these good news I returned to the other inmates, or some of them. A select few of us (to minimise the risk of someone slipping and telling the guards) would descend into the cave every day and scrape and cut away at the roots and vines.
LCN WRITING WEEK, i had not a better name, sorry world.
Mar 25 2013, 03:00 AM
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Shiokazu LCN WRITING WEEK Mar 25 2013, 03:00 AM
