“That side door over there,” Axio whispered, “only has one guard. They use it to bring in firewood. Might make a good exit.”
Thessa glanced in that direction but could immediately see that the double doors were in plain view of everything else in the courtyard. All the guards would have to be blind or distracted – and if that was the case, they might as well use the front gate. “Good eye,” she told him. “Keep watching it – but don’t be obvious.” She gave him a quick, reassuring smile. He nodded back, holding his chin up. Since his breakdown upon their arrival he’d been putting on a good face. Whether it was for her benefit or his own she did not know.
Thessa watched one of the laborers – a young woman, tall and sinewy, probably no more than a few years older than herself, with short-cropped brown hair and light Purnian skin – pushing one of the massive carts of firewood across the uneven cobbles. No one seemed to pay her any mind as she struggled with the load. The left wheel hit a rut between two of the cobbles, and the laborer gave a resigned grunt. She pulled, frowned, then pushed. The cart would not budge.
Minutes passed. The laborer looked at the cart from all angles, tried to rock it out of the rut once more, then walked away. She returned moments later, red-faced, muttering under her breath. By now her predicament had been noticed, and the prisoners watched her struggles surreptitiously. Three of the guards on the walls above gazed down, chuckling to themselves. No one came to help.
The laborer tried to get underneath the stuck wheel, shoving and grunting. Thessa watched with everyone else, bemused at the efforts until the wheel suddenly slipped forward. Thessa had a clear view, wincing in sympathetic pain as the wheel rolled across the next cobble and dropped squarely into another rut, trapping the laborer’s hand underneath it. The laborer inhaled sharply, eyes going wide, her face twisting. She didn’t make a sound but threw her shoulder desperately against the cart, trying to lift it.
Thessa looked around. Everyone had seen what happened. Dozens of prisoners, five or six guards. Many of them laughed openly. Thessa scoffed and got to her feet. “It’s not funny when people get hurt in a glassworks,” she snapped at a nearby chuckling old man, then hurried over to the wood cart. “Axio, help me!” Together, they got beneath the cart and managed to get the wheel out from between the cobbles.
The laborer gasped in pain, clutching her hand to her stomach. She made a low keening noise and turned away when Thessa approached.
“Someone needs to look at that hand now,” Thessa said firmly. “Show it to me.” She ignored the shake of the woman’s head and pulled her arm out so that the injured hand was flat in front of her. It didn’t look bad – some redness around her pointer finger and several deep scuffs. The woman tried to pull away, but Thessa could see the shock still in her eyes. Thessa gently touched the pad at the base of each finger, watching carefully for reactions.
“I’m going to lose my hand,” the laborer whispered.
“What’s your name?” Thessa asked.
“Pari.”
“Pari, you’re not going to lose your hand. It only landed on one finger. It’s broken, but a day with cureglass and it’ll be good as new.”
“I can’t afford a day at a healinghouse.” The laborer trembled in pain, but was clearly trying not to show it. Thessa had met plenty of laborers and assistants like her – people from the types of backgrounds where showing weakness would cost them.
“This is a glassworks. They have cureglass on hand. They’d be fools not to.”
“Not for us laborers, they don’t.”
Thessa searched Pari’s eyes, realizing with surprise that she was telling the truth. There was pain there, but there was also fear and shame. Thessa swore softly. She broke a piece of kindling from the wood cart, then tore the hem of Pari’s tunic into a long strip. “This is a splint,” she said. “It’s rudimentary, and you’ll want to see a doctor for something better, but it’ll get you through the rest of the day. If you keep the finger splinted properly, it should heal in around eight weeks.”
The laborer did not object as Thessa bound the finger. Up on the walls the guards had gotten bored, wandering back to their posts, while the prisoners actively ignored the situation. Thessa sent Axio running to the mess hall for watered wine – one of the few luxuries the prisoners were allowed – and finished the splint.
“Why didn’t you ask for help?” Thessa asked.
“I did,” Pari responded petulantly. “Everyone here is an asshole.”
“I meant once the cart fell on your finger.”
Pari snorted. “You’re new. Haven’t seen your face around.”
“I was brought in yesterday.”
“Grent?”
Thessa nodded, glad to finally get the woman to engage with her.
Pari just snorted again. “Then you should know about the Magna.”
“I’ve heard they’re assholes.”
“You don’t show weakness in front of a Magna,” Pari replied.
Just as Thessa had suspected. “You’re not a client?”
The laborer lifted her other hand to show the nail of her pinkie finger. It was unpainted. “I’m not going to sell my soul to the Magna, but I will work for them when money’s tight.” The moment Thessa let go of her hand, she pulled it back as if she’d been burned.
“You’re welcome,” Thessa said.
Pari said nothing. She got behind her wood cart, studying the cobbles carefully before awkwardly leveraging it up on her shoulder and pushing it recklessly across the courtyard. The gamble succeeded, and the last Thessa saw was her disappearing around the corner.
Thessa sighed and looked around. Axio had yet to return – probably arguing with a cook over taking wine out of the mess hall – and the rest of the prisoners seemed to want even less to do with her now. She walked back into the furnace room and around to workstation nine, looking across the subpar tools and the low-quality molten cindersand crucible. She swore again. She didn’t deserve this. She’d put in her licks – lost her family, spent years as an apprentice, worked herself to the bone. She was not a damned criminal.
“Hey, blue eyes,” a voice said.
Thessa turned to find that one of the other prisoners had followed her in. He was about her height, probably in his early thirties, with broad shoulders and plenty of scars from working the furnaces. She’d already dubbed him Six based on his station number. “What do you want, brown eyes?” she asked.
“You’re a soft one, aren’t you?” he asked, sidling over beside her. “Helping one of the hired pricks. Sneaking godglass in to fill out your friend’s quota.”
Thessa felt her eyes narrow. She wasn’t even surprised or afraid. She didn’t have those qualities left anymore, and all that fury and indignation that drove her had reached a peak. “Walk away and forget what you’re about to say,” she told him.
“No, no. You’re going to fill in for me, too. I’ve earned a break and you’re going to give it to me, or I’ll tell Craftsman Magna that your friend can’t make godglass. He’ll get sent straight to the lumber camps, and I bet he’ll get chewed up like a two-penny–”
Master Kastora always said that a siliceer could show their authority by earning respect, or earning fear. The latter had no place in his glassworks, but Thessa had spent the last twenty-four hours seeing firsthand how effective it could be. She didn’t let Six finish his sentence. The fool had pushed her past her limits. She grabbed the heavy shears off her workbench and slammed them across his cheek, then readjusted her grip to press the sharp end against his collarbone.