Miners of the Tempest (Miners Mine #2)

15. HAGRIDDEN

fifteen

HAGRIDDEN

L ucetta pulled the cage’s gate open for Maji, who carried bowls of soup to take down to Oliver. Before she could step inside, she spotted a familiar figure striding down the passageway toward them. Samuel’s expression was taut with upset, yet shifted into something far more wooden once he caught sight of them.

“Going somewhere?” asked Lucetta, already knowing the answer.

“I’m leaving.”

“Big surprise,” said Lucetta. “I hope you at least said bye to Ben. That would be a hell of a lot more than I got when you left me and mom.”

He gave her a scoff, still more than before. And just like the brother she knew, just like he had done so many years ago, instead of trying to sort things out, he turned into a crosscut and left without another word. His echoing footfalls reignited the burning resentment Lucetta had carried with her for nigh on a lifetime. She had half a mind to chase after him. Throw hot soup at his back. Demand he at least acknowledge the broken state he’d left their home in.

“Lucetta?”

She closed her eyes. Pushed down every last feeling into the deepest pits of her stomach, then faced Maji. “I’m fine. Let’s go.”

“Should we check on Ben?” asked Maji.

“Probably better to give him a moment.” Safe to assume they had argued. Not unusual, although Lucetta had thought that after three years apart, some wounds would have healed. More so to herself, she muttered, “I guess not even time can fix what’s broken.”

Oliver was, to Lucetta’s grateful shock, dressed and had even tidied his hovel. Likely for the first time in five years. The one table was finally dusted, the book she’d given him a few years ago placed neatly back atop it. The bowls he’d hidden under his bed were miraculously gone, too. Oliver coyly glanced at her, setting down a dented but mostly clean kettle near the fireless hearth.

“I’d offer you tea but…”

Lucetta snorted. “We have soup.”

Whatever Oliver did, no matter how slight his movement, Tau endlessly watched. He watched while Oliver sat on the floor, watched as he devoured his chicken soup in under a minute, and watched as Maji ushered him to sit by the hearth so she could cut his hair.

That was after Tau had pulled Oliver into bed and tried getting frisky, much to everyone’s embarrassment. As a result, Lucetta had banished the Sentinel to the corner of shame, on a chair much too small for him.

She smirked at him as his head briefly turned toward her, like he could sense her thoughts. He probably could.

“You’re being intense,” Lucetta said conversely from where she lounged on the bed.

He did not acknowledge her beyond that singular glance, his focus returning to Oliver. Were it not for the fireflies he’d cast specifically for her and Maji, she might have considered the possibility that Tau was upset with her. Whatever for, she could only guess at.

“Shave the sides,” said Oliver, flapping around his left hand. “You know, the way I like it. This isn’t short enough.”

Lucetta watched the two, their deportment unchanged, like they hadn’t endured a living nightmare less than a week ago. She’d started to feel better as soon as entering the hovel, and now she could finally close her eyes and not worry about reliving things.

“If you don’t stop trying to take the scissors out of my hands, I’ll take your arm and beat you with it,” snapped Maji.

“Hey! I need it. It’s my only one.”

Sliding off the bed, Lucetta stretched and walked to the Sentinel. She reached out to graze fingertips down the gold trim of the dark hood. A sense of relief flooded through her, and she lightly shivered. Finally, she understood why their resident delinquent kept doing it.

Said delinquent watched her closely. Lucetta caught it from her peripheral.

“I’d like to have a chat, if that’s alright?” When Lucetta regarded Oliver, he swiftly moved to sit back, as if he hadn’t just been monitoring her. “And if it’s alright with you, Ollie?”

“‘Course it is,” he said all too casually over Maji’s muttering that she’d mucked up a cut. “He’s his own man, he can do what he likes. Doesn’t need my permission for anything.”

Lucetta turned and startled back. Tau had stood curled over her. They were going to have to put a bell on him or something.

“Take me away, then?”

Her words fell into darkness. She took in her surroundings—an entirely pointless effort, since there was nothing to see. Other than Tau, although he too looked more like a shadow, faintly illuminated by his own perpetual glow. With a simple wave of his hand, a light sphere ballooned from the centre of his palm and slipped off to float midair.

“You sure take commands well, for a Sentinel.” Lucetta fingered Sigma’s stellated magic inside her jeans pocket. Then, in a moment of daring, added, “No wonder Oliver’s been walking with a pep in his step.”

Tau made a strange noise, sounding a little like he was being strangled.

“Oh, so you can feel embarrassment. Good. You can’t go around groping that idiot just anywhere. We love him, but that doesn’t mean you should do those things in front of us. Do you understand?”

Tau stood in absolute silence and staticity. “Understand.”

“I hope you do. I never want to see Ollie in that position again.” Lucetta rubbed her eyes as if that would banish from her mind the memory of him dangling upside down.

“Culpable.”

Lucetta stilled, her gaze fixing on Tau’s black triangles. His voice was as mellifluous as she remembered, but there was an unmistakable bite to it. She gasped. “You’re—What are you blaming me for, exactly?”

“Made Oliver leave.”

Her jaw dropped in shock as anger solidified inside her chest. He was blaming her for what happened between Oliver and Lauper? Lucetta fought the instinct to immediately argue, instead tucked her fingers into the coils of her hair, giving them a shake. She turned away from him, huffing out a breath. “Yeah. Maybe you’re right.”

“Yes.”

She squared against the Sentinel. “ And it’s your fault.”

The slightest of twitches in Tau’s claws was the only sign he’d heard her.

“That’s right,” Lucetta continued, anger permitting her to disregard caution. Even though she remembered, very clearly, how Tau had reacted on the bed in Idosburgh, as if he’d been ready to maim her. “You could have gone with him and done your duties as a Sentinel. But no, you were hiding in Maji’s hovel.”

Twitch, twitch. Light glinted off the dark metal like a threat. Then, “Yes.”

Lucetta crossed her arms. “I’m glad we agree. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, I wanted to talk to you about… Well, everything. Is that alright?”

Tau nodded. He lowered to the darkness and sat with his legs crossed. Lucetta followed suit in front of him, leaving the length of the Sentinel’s arm between them, just in case.

“Can you tell me why no one stopped us from leaving your homeworld? I have a feeling that if they had wanted to, they could have. So why didn’t they?”

A singular shrug, and an entirely useless answer.

“Don’t you think it’s strange that they let us grab the mantle and Nu’s and Sigma’s magic?”

“Yes.”

Lucetta closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Exhaled her building frustration. “What do you make of it?”

Tau had always been good at mimicking a monolith. Stationary, silent, and completely useless. Although he was a particularly powerful example of it just then. It was not something she would ever get used to. Why couldn’t he at least pretend to breathe?

“One light.”

Her brain was going to shatter like selenite. “What does that mean?”

Tau pointed a claw at himself.

“You’re–You’re the only light? With light magic, you mean?”

A nod.

“That makes you pretty special, doesn’t it?”

“Advantage.”

“It gives you an advantage because you’re the only one?”

Another nod.

So, Tau could get away with certain things because he was the only one of his kind. Lucetta snorted lightly. “That doesn’t really answer my earlier question, but then why did they let Ondine do those things to you? Wasn’t there a possibility you could die?”

“Not Elder. Powerful.”

“Ondine?” Lucetta supposed Ondine had to be powerful in some way, if she got a hold of Tau the way she had. “Right, but what I’m asking is, if you’re so special, then why risk losing you?”

“No risk. Study only.”

Lucetta stared. He’d said it so casually. Not that Tau ever showed emotion, but he’d not missed a single beat.

“Ondine is experimenting on you?”

He nodded again, and Lucetta’s heart broke for him. This was one piece of information she would be hesitant to relay to Oliver, who would destroy his entire body if it meant he could get at whoever else intentionally hurt Tau.

“To what end?”

Tau shrugged again. At least he understood the concept of it.

It occurred to Lucetta, much too late, that Ondine might have intentionally set him loose in his crazed, shadowy state within the mine. For study. And maybe that was why they were able to make the journey to Malimoure without interference, and how they were found in the landfill.

“She has a way of observing you,” Lucetta murmured, more so to herself. Never mind how . A spy, maybe. “Do you remember how you escaped Ondine?”

There came a contemplative noise, followed by, “No.”

“You mentioned before that you transport all Dire things to the Elders, and that you do it so they can eliminate them safely, but… That’s not true, is it?”

The Sentinel’s silence stretched on for so long, Lucetta wondered if he’d managed to fall asleep. Her heart skipped a beat at his sudden, “No.”

“Did you know?”

More immediately, “No.”

“So you had no idea what Malimoure is?”

Tau shook his head, and Lucetta’s lips thinned into a line. A question burned the inside of her mouth, needing to be asked. The possible answer, however, scalded worse.

“Have we been helping the Elders do what they do? Do we…do we have a hand in creating what we saw there?”

“Yes.”

Her voice clipped, Lucetta muttered, “Ran out of sugar to coat that one with?” A tilt of the Sentinel’s head was all she got. “Do you remember anything about becoming a Sentinel or uh, a Guardian?”

Tau lowered his head, seemingly staring at his knees. “Yes.”

This was a doozy, she knew. “Will you tell me what you remember?”

“Pain.”

“I’m sorry.” Lucetta sighed. “I don’t know what else I was expecting.”

It would seem Tau had known little kindness in his time. Somehow created from pain. Spent at least half a century without knowing touch at all. Tortured by his creators for study—and that was only what Lucetta knew about. Whatever else he’d endured in his years of silence… she was certain she wasn’t prepared to know. It was of little wonder, then, Tau had latched onto Oliver as hard as he had, when Oliver was the only one who had shown the Sentinel any sort of kindness.

“You and Ollie are a lot alike, you know,” said Lucetta. “He doesn’t come from a happy background either. It’s not my story to tell, but you can count on him to love you unconditionally.”

“Grateful.”

“You’re welcome. One last question, if that’s alright?” At his nod, she continued, “Do you want to stop what the Proxies and Elders are doing?”

A pause. “Yes.”

“Alright, then we’ll try to put a stop to it. Any idea how?” With no response forthcoming, Lucetta ventured, “I know their plan wasn’t very effective, but could we get Emergence to try again?”

“Maybe. Find Emergence?”

“Yeah. I don’t know where they could have gone, though. Do you?”

“Mindless realm.”

“What’s…a mindless realm?”

Once again, Tau remained reticent, maybe searching for a way to describe his meaning. He made a frustrated noise.

“Never mind. I’m sure we’ll figure it out. Ready to get out of here?”

Maji had finished with Oliver’s hair. He stood peering into the broken mirror by the bed, carefully brushing through shortened tresses. The second he got wind of their return, he whirled around and an odd, sheepish expression crossed his face. Lucetta quickly moved to sit back on the bed before Tau got any ideas, while Oliver nervously glanced between her and his Sentinel boyfriend.

She smirked. “We mostly talked about you.”

“You did?” Oliver sounded so panicked, Lucetta couldn’t help but laugh.

Tau snapped forward, descending upon Oliver like a ravenous beast. Claws scraped along closely shaved sides and tucked into hair to pull him close for kisses and Lucetta knew where this was headed.

She snapped her fingers. “Tsss! Off!”

So much for understanding.

Oliver ducked out from under Tau’s fervent mitts to sit on the bed, embarrassment burbling in his laughter. Maji’s mirth, on the other hand, was as pure as everything else about her while she knelt, sweeping up hair with a whisk broom.

“What did he say?” squeaked Oliver.

Lucetta tossed him a sugary smile before filling him and Maji in on what she’d learned. With hesitation, she also divulged Tau was essentially an experiment. Information that had Oliver clenching his fist so hard, she worried he might break his fingers.

“The thing we got stuck on is how to find Emergence,” said Lucetta. “He said ‘mindless realm’ but I have no idea what that means, and he can’t explain it.”

“Oh, that’s easy,” said Oliver. “You mean the Wandering Horror place, don’t you?”

Lucetta cast the nodding Sentinel a look of disbelief. She threw her hands up in exasperation. “Wandering Horrors, man. Next time just say that.”

Maji laughed from where she had claimed a spot on the floor by the bed. She startled—as much as Lucetta herself—when the door flung open and Anna and Helen entered. Neither of the two looked surprised to see them all there, not even when they caught sight of Tau in his naughty corner. Helen, at least, had the decency to look apologetic for the unannounced intrusion.

“I knew I felt something familiar every time I walked past here,” said Anna.

“We’re so sorry for bursting in.” Helen swiftly shut the door behind her with a snap. “We thought you should know that Benji stormed out. I think he resigned.”

Lucetta took the note Helen held out for her. Hastily, or maybe angrily written, ink smeared across crumpled paper. “All it says is, ‘I’m done.’”

“Resigned, like Helen said.” Anna warily eyed Tau. The last time those two had seen the Sentinel was while he’d been possessed and trying to kill everyone. And before that, he’d finished Nu off right in front of them.

“What, why?” Oliver moved from where he’d fruitlessly been shielding Tau from view.

“It probably has something to do with Sam leaving,” said Lucetta, tiredly.

“He did what?” Oliver fretted, hurrying to grab the coat Lucetta had let him borrow—keep, by now. “We need to find Ben.”

“I’ll keep the note, if you don’t mind.” Lucetta regarded Helen and Anna. “Does Pavlov know yet?”

“No, we wanted to check with you guys first,” said Helen. “Took us a bit to find you and we kind of…debated about whether we even should. Sorry.”

“Now that those two are gone again, can we rejoin your group?” asked Anna, to which Helen smiled apologetically.

“Everything’s a bit up in the air right now, but we’ll let you know.” Lucetta looked at Maji. “We’ll find Ben and talk to him about… things .”

Oliver was by Tau again, grabbing hold of the robes. “Where do you think he went?”

“Marcy’s, probably.” There was nowhere else for him to go, Lucetta was sure. “Thank you both for bringing this to us first. We’ll catch up with you later.”

A hint for Anna and Helen to leave, although Anna wasn’t catching on. Fortunately, Helen gently guided her fiance back out of the hovel. They closed the door on their way out, and Lucetta waited for their shadows to slip past the drawn curtains before speaking up again.

“Right. We’ll go get Ben, catch him up on everything, and then figure out a way to get into the Mindless Realm . Would you mind taking us to the back alley again, Tau, like you did for me so I could do a shop?”