I Sing
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The Girl Who Must Not Sing Ch. 02 free porn video
‘The Outfliers are coming for an inspection again.’
‘Again? Hmm, I’m starting to think they might suspect us of some wrongdoing… Have the orphans said much to them in the past?’
‘Nothing unsavory, sire.’
‘And what of the men and women? Could any be spinning stories down in River Run over a mug?’
‘I can’t know for certain but I should think not. Why would they make things up?’
‘Then perhaps the guards know about our prize in the tower. At any rate, I’ll leave the details of the visit in your hands. When is he due?’
‘Some time next week. Dawn wants to make the visits as much a surprise as possible.’
‘She can try. And we have a new arrival, correct? See that he knows the process so that incidents are kept to a minimum.’
===
Eldrian’s stomach turned over when Bossman’s words finally registered. ‘She’s what?’ he asked, hoping he was joking.
From Bossman’s eyes, wide and void of the strength he’d shown earlier, he clearly wasn’t. ‘She’s looking at you! You have to hide, hurry!’
With the girl’s singing still present in his ears, Eldrian turned his head this way and that in search of shelter. All they had were beds. Run and hide, just like the rabbits back home.
His legs kicked into motion and he flew towards one of the beds on the opposite side of the room, right next to the door. The voice faded slightly as he moved and vanished completely when he dove beneath the shambled, wooden frame.
All the kids in the dorm would be watching him now but Eldrian didn’t care. Not when, any second, the Marisin’s song might find him again. He could hear his heart beating, a frantic badum, badum, badum. But slowly the drumming sank away and the singing returned. He jumped in fright, hitting his head on one of the boards above him.
‘Agh!’ Eldrian groaned. He heard a laugh echo in his ears, then the singing vanished and all was quiet. For a moment, at least.
‘Ahaha!’ roared a chorus of laughter from the room.
Eldrian pulled himself out from under the bed, only to be greeted by every boy in the dorm rolling around and cackling to themselves.
‘That never gets old!’ one laughed.
Another merely pointed, laughter stupefying his words as his face turned red.
‘They always fall for it!’ cried Bossman. He collapsed on one of the beds and hammered his fist against the mattress.
‘I don’t understand…’ said Eldrian once a gap arose for him to speak. ‘What’s so—’
‘Look, he banged his head as well!’ A sprout pointed his dirty fingers to the bump forming on Eldrian’s forehead and the uproar started anew.
He sighed and sat down, not on his bed but he doubted that anybody would care at the moment. Almost a minute passed and still the second wave of laughter showed no signs of slowing down. Some of the children were reduced to wheezing messes on the floor as they tried to catch their breath so they could laugh again.
Suddenly the door shook upon its hinges as someone pounded on it from outside. ‘Hoy, quiet down in there or the lot’ve you’ll go to punishment!’
The speed at which the room went from full volume to total silence was almost deafening in itself. Nobody dared speak until they heard the subtle slaps of booted feet moving away. When at last that sound faded too, Yoled piped up.
‘Ha, all the home shrimps fall for that.’
‘Fall for what?’ asked Eldrian.
Bossman, along with half the other kids, pursed his lips in an effort not to crack again. ‘The girl’s all the way up in her tower, she can’t hurt anyone.’
‘But she’s a Vocal, if she can see us with her voice, she can get us with her magic. They’re the same thing.’ Eldrian had always had plenty of time to read up on the basics of magic, both light and sound. And the theory behind them. And the stories, experiments and contests involving them. All the time in the world.
Almost everyone shook their heads as Bossman explained. ‘Nah, there’s too many floors, shrimp. And she has a thing on her head that… its this… Hoy Ajan, you took care of her before, explain the thing.’
Everyone looked at Ajan, a pip with green-splatted occumarks on his hood. The boy held his hands up near his head as he explained. ‘It’s this helmet thing, like what a soldier wears. Except this one’s bigger and it covers her ears so she can’t hear anything. Not even a thunderbolt crashing on the roof. And if she can’t hear, she can’t do her spells right or they might hurt her instead.’
‘That works?’ Eldrian frowned. Nothing in his books had covered this side of sound magic.
‘Ah, home shrimp, donjoo know anything?’ Bossman snapped. ‘And she’s really good at magic but it works anyway. She can’t do anything and that just makes her angrier. If they ever let her cast a spell, she’d kill everyone.’
A wave of murmured agreement passed through the boys as they all nodded their heads over the girl’s wicked intent.
‘That’s how she killed that man six years ago,’ said Bossman. ‘She blew him up with magic because he spilled her breakfast.’
‘Na!’ someone shouted. ‘She made him pop like a tomato.’
‘That’s stupid. She threw him out the window so hard that he flew through the net and got cut up into a hundred pieces.’
Bossman waved for silence. ‘Most of us weren’t here when it happened but we’ve heard Sire Mastro’s folk talking. Now it’s us orphans who have to feed her. And she can’t get us with her magic but home shrimps like you never understand that.’ The spark finished by jabbing his finger at Eldrian.
The implication seemed to be that hiding had been a stupid thing to do. But, at least in Eldrian’s mind, that made no sense. Why not hide when, for all you knew, a Marisin was lining you up for magical annihilation?
Eldrian went back to lying on his bed as the dorm returned to its peaceful calm. Nobody harassed him any further. He kept expecting to hear singing as the girl looked at him again. But she didn’t.
===
Porridge for breakfast and nothing to accompany it. Never before had Eldrian stomached porridge without at least a bit of fruit to add some flavor. This was little more than oats boiled in water. In fact, it was exactly that. Too much water, to make things worse.
‘I’m cleaning rooms this week,’ said Yoled, smacking his lips once he finished. ‘They put shrimps on something different for every day of the first week and a bit. That way you know how everything’s done.’
‘What about the classes?’ Eldrian asked.
Yoled laughed, mumbled something about home shrimps, and, without explaining anything, left the dining hall amid the throngs of other children.
Unsure of what to do, Eldrian stayed seated until he was the only one left. A man stepped through the fading exodus of pips, sparks, sprouts and flits and looked at him.
‘You’re the new spark, ah?’ he asked.
Eldrian nodded.
‘Cellar duty. You’re not scared of bugs, are you?’
‘No.’ He stood to follow the other children but the man stopped him with a hand.
‘Uh uh, through the kitchen.’
Only a handful of others had gone this way. As Eldrian traced their path, several of this weeks kitchen hands emerged and started the task of clearing away everyone’s bowls.
He wove around the tables, countertops and messes as well as the children presently engaged in clearing up the kitchen. Only one adult among them and she presently sat upon one of the counters, picking at dirt beneath her fingernails.
‘Down there, shrimp,’ mumbled a little Skytouched girl who looked no more than nine. She nodded towards a door on the north wall as she walked past, carrying an armful of dishes to a big wooden washtub.
The finger-cleaning woman sat on the counter right next to the wide, cellar door. She swung a booted foot into Eldrian’s path, as he tried to pass, and her hooded face, with aq
ua-streaked occumarks, turned to him.
‘Forgetting something?’ She pointed behind him.
On a table sat a small, limp satchel of a coarse fabric. Eldrian took it and peered inside. A piece of bread, an apple and a bit of dried meat. ‘Is this lunch?’ he asked.
The woman’s hood shifted a little as her brow creased underneath. ‘What do you think it is? Get down there, shrimp.’
So even the adults were doing it. Perfect.
The stairs descended slowly as he scampered down them and into the gloom. They were wide so that food could be brought up easily. No light occupied the stairway but Eldrian could see the telltale glow of one at the bottom.
The stones of the floor felt a lot rougher and grittier down here. There were lanterns bobbing and moving in the distance, casting giant shadows across the rows of barrels, boxes, sacks and shelves.
‘Who goes there?’ A man called from the cluster of lights.
‘Eldrian, sire,’ he replied.
‘Then you are in the right spot. Well don’t go keeping us…’
An Earthborn man and five sprouts were waiting for him. The former leaned his back against a pillar of stone while the rest were sitting, no doubt getting their pants particularly dirty. Regardless Eldrian joined them on the end and realized that he hadn’t been wrong, the children really were all sprouts, each with their darkish skin, green/brown hair and lean bodies that belied the physical might of their race.
‘Ah, so same as yesterday, shelf cleaning and checking for rot. Make sure everything’s dry afterwards or there’ll be trouble. And keep an eye out for leaks along the walls. Sire Mastro said he heard dripping when the delivery arrived yesterday. Let that be the last time he hears it.’ The man finished by staring down every child one by one. Then he barked for them to get to work.
The boys gathered up buckets and rags that they must have brought down from the kitchen. There were only five since Eldrian hadn’t brought his own. He asked if he should fetch one now.
‘Nah, there’s something else. Oh, hang on, err, Iyda! Leave that bucket and take this instead.’
The girl named Iyda turned around and exchanged her bucket and rag for an empty sack that had been on the shelf.
‘You two can go check on the traps and keep an eye out for any other pests. Eldrian, do you know how to make light in your hands?’ the man asked.
Eldrian nodded, since that spell was probably the easiest one in existence.
‘Good, you won’t need that lantern then. For now you have my permission to use that spell and that spell only. But don’t use it all the time. Just creep around the back shelves in the dark and lure out any roaches, ah?’
Iyda led the way to the back row of shelves, her feet padding softly along the ground.
‘What did he mean I have permission to make light?’ Eldrian asked.
‘What dajoo think he meant, stupid?’ Iyda snapped. Her voice sounded somewhat familiar.
‘We’re not allowed to use magic here?’
‘Ah, only sometimes… Ooo, look at this one.’
In the flickering gloom of distant lanterns, Eldrian watched as Iyda stooped down to pick something up.
‘Here, make your light,’ she commanded.
Her silhouette now held something and he feared for what it might be. Still, Eldrian made the minuscule effort of focusing energy into the suncrest in each of his palms, causing both to light up. He squinted through the glare and flinched at the object of Iyda’s wonder. A big rat with its neck crushed beneath the metal bar of a trap. Mercifully she dropped it into the sack and out of sight.
Only then, with no other distractions, did Eldrian get a proper look at Iyda’s face. ‘Hey, you shoved me yesterday,’ he said.
‘I shove lotsa shrimps.’ She set the bag down and used the light to readjust several strands of hair that had fallen out of her ponytail. Her features looked like the kind that only stopped their naturally grumpy appearance after immense effort on her part.
‘So…’ but he paused, unable to think of a response beyond the accusation and its obvious implications. ‘Why?’ he asked instead.
Iyda went back to sweeping the floor with her eyes. ‘You were in my spot and you’re a shrimp. I shoulda shoved you once for each but I was feeling nice.’
Eldrian let his hands stop glowing. Based on what that adult had said, he couldn’t shake the feeling that being in the dark meant all manner of insects, spiders and other crawling nasties were creeping up on him. Home didn’t have a cellar, only a pantry that sunk a bit into the ground. Even then, things often got in. Nothing like he imagined would happen in a place this big, though.
‘So, after this, do we have—’
‘Light,’ Iyda hissed.
Eldrian lit up his palms again and spotted several cockroaches scurrying to cover in the walls. Iyda lunged forwards to stomp on them.
‘Gah! Missed one. Wheya saying?’
His hands darkened. ‘Do we have school when we’re done here?’
‘This is school, stupid.’ In the dark, Iyda snatched up another trap and bagged it.
‘But what about learning important things. Like stories about Keladesh and how everything began and how things work.’
‘You mean book schooling? We do that on Sundays. It’s boring though, you don’t need none of that. Nobody gives anybody money for reading books, ah.’
Eldrian said nothing, too shocked to hear someone call books boring. Books were all he had had when his father was out teaching magic or healing the injured. Between learning from books and learning from father, he wanted nothing more than to grow up to be a great auromancer in Dawn’s court.
‘You should give up on that soon,’ muttered Iyda when she heard it. She checked another trap but found it empty. ‘Dawn doesn’t care about this place. If it makes you feel better, you can squash the next bugs we find.’
‘Nah, that’s okay,’ Eldrian mumbled.
‘But it’s fun. You can pretend you’re slaying monsters like zombies or skeletons and stomping them back into the dirt.’ Iyda stomped on the ground several times, huffing with every blow. ‘I’ma join the Goliath Guard when I’m done here. Then I can stomp on proper things, not just bugs.’
In the dark, Eldrian sized up the girl’s silhouette. Granted she did look rather tall for her age, even counting her being an Earthborn. But he didn’t think all that many girls made it into the Goliath Guard. Despite her having just stomped on his dreams like she did the cockroaches, Eldrian didn’t tell her this. If for no other reason than it would undoubtedly lead to a repeat of the incident in the dining hall.
‘Light,’ demanded Iyda.
He expected to hear a few thuds, maybe even a crunch, as he squinted against the brightness. Instead Iyda had her nose pressed close to the wall where the stones looked particularly slick with water.
‘I think this is the drip,’ she mumbled. Right on queue, a drop of water fell from above and exploded on the stone floor.
‘So what do we do?’ Eldrian asked.
Iyda gave a shrug. ‘Tell Sprig so the fixing kids can deal with it. It’s prolla go’be really hard too. I think we’re under the pond.’
Sprig had to be the name of the Earthborn supervising them, Eldrian presumed. It sounded like a suitable name, at any rate.
‘At least it’s not dripping near the food.’ Iyda turned around to look at the shelves of barrels behind them. ‘They don’t put food against the back wall so it’s easier to dig the cellar deeper. That’s a really hard job.’
‘What’s in those barrels?’ Eldrian asked.
‘Booze and wine for the jailers. We call em jailers when they’re not around. Otherwise it’s ‘teachers’.’ The girl flashed a mischievous smile at him then nodded to the barrels. ‘Dajoo want to try some? Now’s the best time, they won’t notice if we spill any cause of all the wet.’
Eldrian looked at her, then back to the barrels.
Maybe the frustration and world-jerking change drove his decision to smother his suncrests and plunge them into concealing darkness. Iyda went first, cupping her hands under the tap while Eldrian turned it. A dark liquid spilled out and she quickly brought it too her lips with a slurp.
Iyda gasped after swallowing. ‘Gyah, it’s so bitter. And spicy.’
Eldrian agreed immediately when he felt the liquid scald his own throat. Definitely no wine that he’d ever heard described. Some other kind of alcohol that left his tongue on fire. ‘Do you know anyone named Anahid?’ he asked while his accomplice sloshed their spillage around so that it wouldn’t look suspicious.
‘Is it a boy or a girl?’ Iyda asked.
Eldrian thought it over but he didn’t know.
‘Anahid can be a boy’s or a girl’s name.’
‘I know, but do you know anyone with that name?’
Iyda stopped kicking the floor and looked partways up at the ceiling. ‘I think I used to, maybe. Before I came here. Do they live in Rippling Moon?’
The precise location of that town was another fact that eluded Eldrian. He only knew that it sat somewhere upon the northern coast, looking out over an ocean full of vicious Nerinye. A place far further than he, or even his father, had ever been. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘It’s prolla not the same person then.’ Iyda picked up the sack and went back to stalking down the wall, only visible in the distant glow of the other children’s lanterns.
‘Why don’t we get lanterns? Why’s this better?’ Eldrian asked after another call for his light spell.
‘The shutters on them are really squeaky and don’t close all the way. Means it gives the pests more— gah!’ Iyda cried over a snap. She swung back with a trap in her hand. It had been empty. Not anymore.
The girl turned around, her eyes squeezed shut and already tearing up a bit. Eldrian took her hand to help but she shoved him away. ‘No, shrimp.’ With a pain-filled groan, Iyda grabbed the metal bar and wrested it back far enough to free her fingers. Then she hurled the trap off into the distance where it clattered across the floor.
Iyda clamped her teeth together and blew out through her nose as she assessed the damage. Already a bruise had formed and the skin on her fingers bore a long indentation, neatly spanning every digit but the thumb. She looked up and over Eldrian’s shoulder where she had thrown the trap. ‘Go get that,’ she commanded.
The hunting operation proceeded along the back wall until they reached its end. Then Iyda led the way through the rows of foodstuffs and other supplies. As long as it had taken before, locating and offing vermin around the food took far longer with so many places to hide.
A while later came the time to break for lunch. The pair sat together on some sacks of flour, piled high on a series of boards to keep them off the ground.
‘Here, you can have this,’ said Iyda as she handed him a bit of dried meat from her own lunch.
‘Why’d they give you it?’ Eldrian asked before biting into the offering. Too salty but he didn’t mind.
‘Us kids have a rule that the kitchen crew should ‘forget’, as often as possible, if the lunch they’re making is for an Earthborn. That way there’s more food to go around, even if we don’t get to eat it. Give me some of your bread, though.’ Iyda reached over and tore off a chunk without waiting for approval.
A fair trade anyway. Earthborn invariably found meat nauseating.
Eldrian’s eyes wandered to the bag of trapped rats at their feet and a thought occurred. ‘What do they do with all those?’
Iyda looked down. ‘Cut them up for the chickens. At least, that’s what they say.’
Eldrian’s chewing slowed down substantially before he withdrew the dried meat from his mouth and stared at it. Could he afford to be picky? Something told him that his future self might get mad at wastefulness. At least it tasted okay.
Once they had finished eating, the hunt resumed. The sack of rats kept growing yet it never seemed to reach the point where Iyda struggled. But they weren’t done yet. Sprig had another for them to fill and the other half of the cellar to fill it in.
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