Two weeks in the brickyard hauling heavy bins of wet clay meant that my back, though mostly healed, was screaming in protest, just like every other prisoner. What had I hoped for by showing the warden that the bricks could be better? A promotion?
The day after, Borin had come to me with news, his face was swollen with resentment. Mara advised me that it had been a bad idea, "You unclog one toilet, and they'll hand you the entire sewer, you'll be cleaning turds 'til your dreams turn brown." Her wisdom was proven immediately. I recall Borin's exact words: "In addition to your regular work, the Warden wants a hundred of those bricks... by the end of the week. A test batch. Don't go thinking this makes you a master builder."
There was no special consideration. No exception from hard labor. No special section where we could do better in peace, just an intolerable burden. My reward was that Borin no longer saw me as weak, but as a threat. He assigned me the heaviest loads and the longest routes, his voice a constant stream of critique at my heels. "Faster, 'master builder'! Is your great mind too heavy for your legs?" He'd spill my water ration, kick stones into my path to slow me down. Kayden and Basim were reassigned to opposite ends of the prison on pointless errands, forcing us to do the real work for the improved brick making after the work day was over, when we were already exhausted.
Elias had been forced to declare me "fit for full duty" as soon as the brick was discovered. I was assigned to move in with Kayden in the regular barracks. I kept the sandstone tablet a secret under my bunk.
The smithy's waste didn't provide enough ground basalt. For the quota, I needed a more direct source. Basim, who had worked in the quarries before his assignment to the forge, knew of a place. A section of the western quarry face, officially deemed unstable and restricted from organized excavation. Under the guise of a sanctioned nightly transfer, Basim and I took the long route past the quarry wall. Our movements were seen by the outer sentry, but ignored. They figured all we could do is get ourselves killed. Using a shovel and a bit of netting to sift with, we hurried. We chipped the rich vein of basalt. Two burlap sacks, lifted earlier from the kitchens, were filled and slung on our backs as we reentered the barracks with aching arms and soiled sandals. No one asked where the stone came from. No one cared.
On the first day of the third week, the prison's dull roar was cut short by a single horn blast announcing a visitor. A ripple of dread spread from the main gate, a palpable thing that torched the day's fragile routine before it could even begin. Guards, usually slumped with boredom, snapped to attention. My heart jumped in terror when I saw the Prince's banner being raised over the gatehouse.
Into the yard strode Prince Kareem, not with the abruptness of a surprise inspection, but with ceremony. He was flanked by four of his personal guards, their ornate armor and polished swords gleaming in the dusty sunlight, looking like figures from another world. The warden walked beside him, his posture rigid, his features set in professional deference. Borin, seeing them, transformed instantly from a predator into a fawning dog, scurrying forward with a bowed head.
Two of the Prince's guards carried a heavy wooden crate and a bronze brazier into the center of the yard. The Prince himself handed whispered some instructions and gave the warden a scroll. The warden read loudly: "Prince Kareem is making a visit of 'Royal Clemency and Moral Reformation,' to personally instruct the fallen." The warden looked like he'd eaten a bad date. He must have known what was coming.
I was near a large stack of drying bricks. I immediately turned my body away, busying myself with adjusting a loose brick, keeping my head down. I hoped that my face, caked in red clay dust and sweat, made me anonymous. The smell of the Starsuckle, conjured from memory, mixed with the intense pain of the nearly closed wounds on my back. If the son of the King recognized me, I'd be dead from another flogging. I tried my best to become just another filthy, hunched figure in a yard full of them.
But I was not the Prince's target. He gestured toward the infirmary. Two guards entered and emerged moments later, gripping Elias by the arms. They marched him to the center of the yard and forced him to stand before the crate and brazier.
The Prince addressed the assembled prisoners. "This man, Elias, poisoned the city with his words for years. Words of weakness he called 'Moral Foundations of a Just Society.' His voice was deliberately loud, meant to carry. Tell me, is it just that a traitor like you still draws breath?"
Eias's reply was far too quiet for me to hear, but his posture was unbowed. He stood calmly, his hands clasped behind his back. This quiet dignity seemed to enrage the Prince more than any argument.
"You always spoke of the importance of a firm foundation," Kareem sneered. With a sudden, swift movement, he kicked Elias's feet out from under him. "Too bad you don't have one."
I watched, frozen, as Elias collapsed. It wasn't a dramatic fall. He simply crumpled into the red dust, the impact sent up a small cloud. There was no cry of pain, only the soft thud of his body hitting the ground.
The Prince looked down at him. "The dirt is the only foundation you deserve." He turned his back on the fallen man.
I felt a hot, useless rage surge in my chest. My hands clench into fists, the grit of the clay digging into my palms. I forced myself to look down, to focus on the brick in front of me, Kael's voice repeating in my mind: Control your response. Emotion is a liability. As the Prince's party watched, two prison guards stooped and helped Elias to his feet, guiding the old man, now covered in dust, back into the infirmary.
Now that the "reformation" was complete, the Prince could proceeded with his tour. The warden, his face pale with fury, was forced to show him the kiln. Borin scuttled ahead and presented one of my good bricks. "A special project I have been personally supervising, Your Highness! A much stronger aggregate!"
The Prince ignored Borin. He picked up one of my finished, fired bricks. He weighed it in his hand. "It's heavy," he conceded, a flicker of surprise in his eyes. Then the contempt came back. "But it is ugly. It is the color of mud. It has no... royal sheen." He turned to one of his guards, who was carrying a satchel. "The lamp oil." The guard produced a large flask of expensive, fragrant oil. "This is a city of splendor," Prince Kareem declared. "Mix this into the clay. Give the King's bricks a glow worthy of his name."
Borin saw another chance. His face lit up with glee. "Brilliant, Your Highness! A truly inspired innovation! You see, men? The Prince himself improves upon your crude work! Mix it! Mix it now!"
Under Borin's triumphant gaze, the mix crew reluctantly poured the glistening oil into our carefully prepared clay mixture. The clay became slick and greasy. They molded a dozen new bricks, which now had a strange, oily luster. At the Prince's impatient command, the kiln operator loaded the wet, oily bricks into the hot kiln.
I froze. I knew instantly this would be a disaster. I could almost hear Elias's voice explaining the principle: oil and water will not bind. In the kiln's heat, the oil would vaporize, creating pockets of pressure. The bricks wouldn't just crack; they would shatter from within. I opened my mouth to speak, but I could not risk being seen by the Prince.
The kiln was loaded. I wondered if the Prince had any idea how long he'd be waiting. It was just a few minutes before he got bored and ordered his men to prepare the noon meal. The silence was tense. After a few minutes, a sharp popping noise came from inside the kiln. Then another, and another. Borin's smile tightened. When the kiln door was opened, a billow of foul, acrid smoke poured out. Of course the royal bricks were nothing but a heap of blackened, fractured shards.
A low chuckle, dangerously close to laughter, rumbled through the ranks of the prisoners. Prince Kareem's face, which had been pale with shock, flushed a deep, mottled red. He had offered them a gift of royal innovation, and they had rewarded him with failure and mockery.
"Fools!" Kareem bellowed, his voice cracking with fury. He strode toward the smoking rubble, gesturing to it as if it were evidence in a trial. "You think the clay was weak? No! Your spirit is weak! This ground is so steeped in defiance that it curdles progress. It shatters any gift it is given!"
Kareem pulled out another scroll from the satchel. "The flaw is moral, and it will be burned away! The King himself has commanded that a shrine be built in this prison. An ever-burning flame to the divine Emperor will serve as a constant reminder of the purity you lack and the authority you will obey!" He pointed over between the weaving shop and the grain mill, a location where many flammable straw bales were stored to be used by the weavers.
He let the weight of the new, absurdly dangerous labor settle over the yard. Then, his eyes narrowed, and a cruel smile twisted his lips. He wasn't finished. He returned to his original, humiliated idea, but reframed it as a consequence of the prisoners' failure.
"And secondly, to elevate the character of this prison and its inhabitants, all bricks produced will henceforth be finished with a 'Royal Sheen.' One cup of oil for every ten bricks. See that it is done."
The Warden's face reddened, his jaw so tight a muscle jumped in his cheek. He gave an almost imperceptible glance toward the workshop's inventory shed, the look of a man mentally calculating the catastrophic waste of lamp oil and the disruption to his entire production chain. That was the last I saw of him that day. He left with Prince Kareem, his stride clipped and furious.
Borin turned to me with a big grin. "Now master builder. The Prince has given a direct order. It will be obeyed." He looked at me, dead in the eye. "And there must be no reduction in the strength of the bricks."
He was certain he had broken me, trapping me between a royal edict and the laws of physics. He should have known better. As I looked from the gleaming flask of oil to the hard surface of an unbroken brick, I saw the flaw in his trap.
It was the same flaw that defined the world everywhere I went: people were obsessed with the appearance of a thing, not its substance. The edict had two parts. The first was a matter of accounting: "One cup of oil for every ten bricks." A simple entry in a supply ledger. The second was a matter of presentation: "a Royal Sheen." They did not have to be the same process.
Despite the weariness of my body. I retrieved my sandstone tablet from its hiding place. Under the flickering lamplight, my piece of charcoal moved with purpose. This was more than just keeping a record, as Elias had taught. This was strategy, as Kael would demand. I wasn't just noting inputs and outputs. I was preparing a defense.