Gates of Stone by Angus Macallan

Author:Angus Macallan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2019-02-19T05:00:00+00:00

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Hour followed hour of brutal work. Bending, lifting, heaving the ore into the wagon. His soft hands were bashed and bruised by their constant blundering contact with the rough stone in the yellowish half darkness. His head still ached from the mace blow four days before, his neck was still badly chafed from the yoke, and untreated whip wounds burned all over his back and shoulders. The heat was like a physical thing: a smothering beast that hung from Jun’s body, that coated every inch of his skin in a foul slime of sweat and dust. After only a short while, an hour or two perhaps, his back muscles ached like they were on fire, as did his thighs, biceps, forearms—even his fingers. But no pause was allowed and any slowing in the labor was punished with the whip.

Kromo and his dwarf friend attacked the larger pieces of rock, some the size of buffalo or even bigger, slamming their hammers in a steady rhythm into the dark mass until it cracked and splintered into pieces that could be gathered up by the others. The tall man and woman attempted a similar task with the two picks until one of the Manchu became dissatisfied with the woman’s work, knocked her down with one smashing blow to the side of her head from the heavy butt end of his musket, and took the pick from her unresisting hands and gave it to a nearby slave, a tall man. Then he lashed the woman till she rose, swaying, and began shakily to collect the ore with her hands.

After what seemed like several days, one of the Manchu blew a whistle, and all the slaves dropped to the ground immediately. Skins full of blood-warm water were passed from hand to hand among the group and their contents gulped eagerly. Jun was almost delirious from tiredness but he found himself sitting on the ground next to a slim girl with a pert nose and pretty eyes. She reminded Jun a little of one of the jolly fisher girls he had chased so happily in Taman, though this one had a coarser, rounder, sweetly dimpled face, a more classically Yawanese-peasant look.

He smiled at her but she ignored him and stared stolidly at the ground between her legs. He touched her arm, smiled again and offered her the waterskin. She snatched the leather sack from his hand but refused to meet his eye.

Jun shrugged and looked at the vast pile of ore that had tumbled down from the face after the explosion. It did not seem to have diminished at all despite their efforts. When the whistle blew again, the pretty Yawanese-peasant girl leaped to her feet long before Jun could haul himself to his and was immediately heaving the slabs of ore as if born to the task. Her example spurred Jun: he was determined that he would not succumb to his own exhaustion.

Jun noticed that Ketut and Tenga worked together as

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