The Hanging City (25)

I force back another smile. Soft spot.

Then I think of the gleam in Colson’s eyes and clench my teeth to banish the image away.

Passing me, Unach picks up the heavy fur blanket I rolled up on my pallet last night. The almanac drops out. She examines it, loses interest quickly, and shoves it into the blanket roll before tossing the lot to me. I barely move fast enough to catch it.

“Azmar insists he doesn’t need it anymore, so you might as well take it.” She shrugs.

That causes me to pause. I hold the soft fur tightly against me. Azmar? So he’d laid the blanket upon me when I was shivering in the dark?

Unach doesn’t give me time to ponder. She strides for the door, and I hobble after her, using the broom as a crutch. She waits a moment, then rolls her eyes. “Regret’s breath,” she mutters, then steps toward me and swoops me into her arms.

Gasping at the pain of her forearm against my thigh, I say, “I can walk.”

“I don’t have all day.” Unach steps into the corridor and takes the lift down a single floor.

Wishing to get my mind off my bruises, I ask, “Wh-Why does everyone say that? ‘Regret’?”

She looks at me incredulously. “Not much for religion, I take it.”

My lips part. “I . . .” I have always considered myself a believer, especially after meeting the Cosmodian. I piece together everything I know of the trolls and Cagmar. “We . . . Our gods do not have names.”

Unach snorts. “The only god who listens to the trollis is Regret. He is the only one who cares for the world’s castaways.” She steps off the lift as another troll heads our way. “Now hush.” Her words are sharp, but not unkind. So I stay quiet, avoiding the curious eyes of the passing troll, knowing that my being carried construes weakness. I mull over the idea of Regret as a deity. In the past . . . it’s easy to label the trolls as castaways. To deny it would be to deny Cagmar’s existence: a great city built beneath the earth, away from the reach of human hands. But now, with the drought, the playing field has leveled. Or even, finally, granted the trolls the gods’ favor.

I wonder what the names of the other gods are, or if they’d even want us to know.

Near the end of the stone corridor stand several wooden doors, thinner and narrower than Unach’s, and closer together. She stops at the second one and sets me down none too gently.

Inside is a cramped space with a troll-sized cot and an empty crate. No water pump, wash basin, fireplace, or cold storage. But to my delight, another one of those skinny, horizontal windows splits the rock. Tendrils of distant sunlight slice through it.

“Lie down,” Unach snaps. “I’m not covering all your shifts, hear?”

“Unach?”

She frowns. “What?”

“What does the sun, earth, and shadow have to do with Regret?”

Her frown fades as a sudden soberness overtakes her. “You mean the oath.”

I nod. By sun, earth, and shadow, and as Regret forms on my lips, I am of trollis and am bound by its words.

“It’s old folklore, really.” Her voice lowers. “It isn’t anything we believe or practice, but tradition . . .” She swipes a hand through the air between us. “The gods made the sun, and then they made the earth. But the earth blocked out the light and created shadow. And from the shadow came the trollis.” With a half-hearted shrug, she adds, “I suppose it’s not too inaccurate, given where we live.”

“You’ve always lived in Cagmar?”

She nods.

Her honesty warms me. “Thank you. For that, and for helping me with my shifts.”

She leans away from me, uncomfortable with my gratitude. Without another word, she turns back for the corridor and shuts the door behind her.



I rest as long as I can before my mind grows antsy. I reread the almanac, studying the star charts, wishing I could compare them to tonight’s sky. I’ve nothing else to read, and no one to converse with. I am grateful for the rest, but this blessed space begins to close in on me. I miss sunlight, starlight. Carefully peeling my aching body from the bed, I stumble toward the door. I am stiff and sore, but not wholly incapable. I wait at the lift a long time, allowing troll after troll to pass by. I pull my hair around to the swollen side of my face to hide it. I know how these people view weakness.

When the lift is finally free, I step inside and, setting my jaw, pull the rope to lift me to Unach’s level. My shoulder strains with the effort, but my few belongings remain in her apartment, as does the medicine Ritha left me.

Masking my limp as well as I can, I approach the door and raise my hand to knock, but Unach’s angry voice causes me to hesitate.

“—no surprise there.”

I hear Azmar respond softly, but it’s too quiet for me to understand.

Unach snorts. “It’s far within my rights. He can writhe and scream all he wants. One less human is nothing to complain about.”

A chill courses down my spine. After trying the handle and finding it unlocked, I push the heavy door open and nearly fall to my knees as a stabbing sensation in my leg causes me to lose my balance. Only my grip on the door handle keeps me upright.

Unach’s gaze burns like hot embers on my face. She stands near the table, her thick arms folded across her wide chest. Azmar sits on a chair, hunched over, his elbows on his knees.