“This is the East Gate camp, Newcomer,” said the old man. “And beyond its bounds,” he pointed to the ruins expanding into the horizon, “is the most dangerous place in the world.”
A cart stopped outside a large tent, and slaves rushed up to it. Two brunettes were first, unloading a sack of flour between them. Flour dust coated their hands as they carried it out, backs straining. A slave driver with a grey beard scowled at them, under his unibrow. He drew back his whip and cracked it in the air.
Under the large tent, two men were arguing. One kept stabbing his finger at a clay tablet. The other shrugged and told him where he could put it. A scribe sat beside them quietly, checking off scrolls and inscribing a clay tablet. Behind him, sacks and barrels were stacked to the top of the tent. Avenues had been left between them. In one, a dark-skinned girl loaded stoppered clay jars into a rope-drawn sled. In the next, men in desert robes examined a pickaxe.
“What’s all this, Grandfather?” asked Fogrim, squinting in the bright sun. “What is it for?”
“Tomb raiding,” the old man picked his teeth with bone. He was sitting on a chunk of eroded masonry. On the fire before him, a skinned, desert snake was roasting. “This is where the search bands gather before they go to pick at Aymund’s bones.”
Beside the supply tent was a junkyard. Right at its entrance was a large statue of a seated king. A man stood on its lap, chiseling out its emerald eyes. Another sorted through a pile of old swords, they clattered as he tossed blades aside. A slave stopped to marvel at a sculpted scene on a bronze jar. She cried out as a slave driver’s whip wrapped around her throat and yanked her back.
Away from the supply tents and the junkyard of treasures, were tall rubble heaps. Children in rags climbed and poked through them, holding up found artifacts to the sun-
-and flinging them away. They dived back into their piles, stuffing small treasures into net-bags. A dirty-faced, six-year-old boy carried his finds to a bearded man on a bench. Beside the man was a sack filled with small, ancient, trinkets. In front of him in stacks, were bronze and iron coins. The man studied the child’s finds, picked out several, and gave him a single coin. The child glared but the man waved him off.
“All the high priests want are scrolls and tablets, anything with a bit of scribble. They’ll pay anything for them. The rest, the raiders keep. The priests don’t care.”
Fogrim frowned.
“It thought the ruins were unsafe and filled with dark beasts.”
“They are,” the old man grinned. “Which is why so few become tomb raiders. Fewer still will come back.”
The dejected six-year-old came up to them. He gave the coin to the old man, who put it in a pouch.
“You’ll have to do better if you want bread today,” the old man was stern.
The child ran back to the spoil heaps, weeping.
“You will not feed him?” Fogrim said to the Fagin.
“Of course I will, and it does not matter what he brings. But I won’t tell them that, or they’ll bring nothing - and then we will all starve.”
The sound of men chanting came from down the path. Up walked ten cultists. Their faces and heads were covered in black tattoos. They wore dusty robes of undyed fabric. Their feet were barefoot and bleeding. One wore a crown of iron thorns, blood trickled down his forehead. His chest was bared; a symbol of the Mi-Go had been cut into his skin.
The group of zealots went into a supply tent. One started handing shovels to the others. Another collected coils of rope. Iron Crown stood in an aisle, hands together, muttering prayers.
“This lot doesn’t even care about treasure,” the old man shook his head. “They’ll find old tablets, or die out there, trying. They’ll do anything for the Mi-Go.”
“Grandfather, why are there children here, at all?”
The old man raised an eyebrow.
“You are a newcomer. These children are discards. The dancing lights sometimes bring them back from their raids. The children the priestesses like, they raise as their own. The rest are turned out. I go looking for them. These are all my children, now.”
A second child came up with a handful of bronze coins. The old man took them, reached into a cloth sack, and pulled out a loaf of bread. The child’s eyes lit up.
“Share it,” he handed it to him. “Even with Little Sen.”
“Little Sen didn’t find anything today,” piped the child, a blue-eyed boy with a serious frown.
“Share with Little Sen.”
The child left. Others gathered around him and he tore the loaf into shares.
“I do not know if you are a saint or the worst man I have ever met.”
The old man chuckled and turned his snake meat.
“You ask a lot of questions, Newcomer.”
“I am new here.”
“No one ever asks about the children.”
Several cultists with spears and hide shields came up the road. Marching between them, hands bound behind their backs, was a group of scruffy-looking men. One had a black eye, another, a cut lip. One staggered from side to side, a spearman kept shoving him forward.
The prisoners were marched to a stone crypt at the camp’s edge. Strange, tentacled beasts were carved into its faded stonework. A wooden door replaced the stone one, which lay shattered on the ground.
Two guards were standing outside the crypt. They opened the door, and the prisoners were marched in. Their attendants left and the crypt door shut and barred.
“What is that about?” asked Fogrim.
“Drunks and troublemakers,” said the old man. “Few men willingly join the search bands. But, you were telling me why you are here when it is plain you should not be.”
“I am looking for a boy,” said Fogrim. “Four years of age, this tall,” Fogrim indicated with his hand. “His name is Ahrten. He has my eyes.”
The old man shook his head.
“Your boy does not work for me. If he lives, the priestesses have him.”
“Where can I find them?”
The old man looked about, eyes darting.
“Lower voice, or see those who would wish us both harm, supplied ample reason,” he whispered. “The priestesses are in the black tower, behind the temple of Tsathoggua. Do not think of going there - only the Runa are allowed in - it is where all the high priests stay.”
“What do they want with children?”
“Who can say? Some think they are raising them to be their janissaries, loyal only to them in the wars ahead.”
“Wars are planned?”
“There are always wars. All that matters is what men like you and me will do about it.”
“Why are you helping me?”
The old man smiled and held out his hand.
“I have nothing,” said Fogrim.
The old man lost his smile.
“I do not know if you are a beggar or the worst man I have ever met.”
Outside the largest supply tent were a group of ten men, an eleventh on horseback, and twelve slave girls. The men on foot carried packs on their backs and heavy waterskins. Each carried a bow or a spear. The slave girls were split into two teams of six each. Each team stood hitched to a sled laden with supplies. The girls were naked but for a tight, leather harness each wore, not unlike a straightjacket. Its shoulder and waist straps met at a metal ring behind the back. The slaves’ arms were pulled back and bound at their wrists, to the rings.
The man on horseback barked a command and moved off towards the ruins. The men followed, unsmiling. Two cracked whips and fell in behind the sleds. The slave girls grunted, strained at their harnesses, and followed the marchers. Fogrim watched the band pass through a cleared pathway and into the ruined city.
“I was forgotten,” said the old man. “Hungry in the streets, my farm taken from me. But, the cult fed me. I followed their rice here, not their gods. Look around you - there are more who would tell the same tale.”
Fogrim said nothing.
“You do not judge?”
“It is for Yog to judge you,” Fogrim replied. “But he doesn’t care and know that he never has. Take their rice and their coin. But know it comes at a price. One day, you will have to pay it.”
Fogrim gave him his travel rations and left.