Chapter 52: The Price of Life [1]

In one of those small houses at the end of the narrow alley in the slums of Thorhaven city.

A middle-aged woman named Lina continued to scrub the clothes with her cracked hands in the same mechanical motion.

The washbasin in front of her was filled with grey, soapy water that had long gone cold, but she didn’t seem to notice anymore.

Her mind was somewhere else.

The house around her was small, with two rooms -- walls that let in the wind and a roof that leaked when it rained.

The floor was packed with dirt as a single candle burned on the windowsill.

Its flame guttered in the draft, casting long shadows that made the space feel even smaller than it was.

Across from her,

A small girl knelt beside a second washboard as her tiny hands struggled with a shirt that was nearly as big as she was.

She was Lily, Lina’s seven-year-old daughter.

Her fingers were blistered, and her shoulders hunched with exhaustion.

Every few minutes, she would pause to flex her hands with a small wince.

"Mama, I’m tired, My hands hurt." Lily said quietly.

Lina didn’t look up from her work and replied with...

"Then use less soap and more water."

"But Mama—"

"Lily." Lina said in a sharper voice than she intended. "We have to finish these by evening. The merchant won’t pay us if they’re not clean."

Lily fell silent as her small shoulders slumped, and she returned to her work.

For a few minutes, the only sound was the soft splash of water and the rasp of fabric against the washboard.

"Mama?" Lily tried again.

"What is it?"

"I don’t want to do this anymore."

The words came out in a rush, as if she’d been holding them back for too long.

"My hands are bleeding, and my back hurts, and I’m tired all the time. I want to read books. I want to go to school like the other children. I want—"

"Books."

Lina let out a hollow laugh, devoid of any real humor.

"Books are for rich people. You think the rich folk up in their marble houses spend their days washing other people’s stains out of shirts? They sit in their libraries and read while people like us do the work they’re too good for. That’s how the world works, Lily. The sooner you understand that, the easier it will be."

"But Papa said—"

"Your Papa said a lot of things."

The words came out harsher than Lina intended as she saw Lily flinch as guilt twisted in her chest.

Lily’s lower lip trembled. "Where is Papa? When is he coming back?"

The question hung in the air like a thick, suffocating smoke as Lina’s hand stilled on her washboard and her fingers curled into the wet fabric.

She stared down at the murky water as her reflection distorted beneath the soapy water.

"He’ll be back soon." She said without looking at her. "Finish the shirt."

Lily sniffled and went back to her scrubbing as her small shoulders hunched and trembled.

Lina watched her for a moment, then returned to her own work.

She understood her daughter’s exhaustion better than anyone.

Her own hands had been cracked and bleeding, the knuckles swollen from hours of wringing and scrubbing.

Her back ached from bending over the basin, and her eyes burned from the lye soap that splashed up whenever she worked too quickly.

But none of that mattered.

The rent was due at the end of the week, and the debt collectors had already come twice this month.

The debt.

Her husband.... Thomas had borrowed money to buy their cart and their horse, to secure the permits he needed to work as a carriage driver.

It was a good, sensible plan.

The city was always in need of carriage drivers.

Thomas had been so hopeful about what the extra income would mean for them.

He’d talked about moving to a better neighborhood, about sending Lily to a real school, about the books he was going to buy her.

And now he was gone.

It had been two days since he’d walked out the door with a smile and a promise to be back before dark.

Two days of waiting, of hoping, of standing at the window every time she heard hooves in the street.

Two days of telling herself that he would come back like he always did, that he was probably just delayed somewhere, that he’d walk through that door at any moment with an apology on his lips and a coin in his pocket.

But Thomas hadn’t come back.

She’d gone to the city guards on the first day and stood in front of their station with Lily in her arms.

She tried to explain that her husband was missing, that he’d never stayed out this long before, that something must have happened to him.

The guard at the desk had listened to her for exactly thirty seconds before dismissing her with a wave of his hand.

"Missing persons reports take time." He’d said, not even looking up from his paperwork. "Come back in a week if he hasn’t shown up."

A week.

As if she could just sit at home and wait for a week while her husband was out there somewhere, possibly hurt, possibly dead, possibly needing her help.

But what could she do?

She had no money for a private investigator.

No connections among the city’s elite and no power to demand the kind of attention that rich folk received as a matter of course.

She was just a washerwoman in the slums, which the city didn’t care about.

She tried to ask Thomas’s fellow carriage driver, named Lucas, who had worked the same route as her husband.

If anyone knew where Thomas had gone, it could only be him.

But Lucas’ behaviour was strange when she asked him about Thomas.

He’d been sweating when he answered the door, his eyes darting around as if he expected someone to be watching

"I don’t know anything" He had said quickly. "Thomas didn’t tell me where he was going. I swear, Lina. I don’t know anything."

But the way he’d said it—the way his voice had cracked on the last word, the way he couldn’t meet her eyes—told her something else entirely.

He did know something, and he was terrified about it.

That was when she understood that something must have happened with Thomas, and someone powerful was involved in his disappearance.

She reached one conclusion from that: either Thomas was already dead or wishing he was.

She wanted to break down that, wanted to cry.

But she held herself back for Lily’s sake.

So instead of breaking down, she’d pulled herself together and gone back to work.

Rents and debts were still due.

They still need money to afford food.

Suddenly, a knock echoed inside the small room, making Lina flinch.

She looked up as her heart pounded against her ribs.

It was too late for visitors.

Knocks on the slums were barely good news.

Who could it be, landlords, debt collectors?

"Stay here."

She whispered to Lily and rose from her feet.

She wiped her wet hands on her skirt as she crossed the small room, her eyes fixed on the wooden door.

Another knock sounded, making her stomach clench.

She reached for the door handle and pulled it open.

A man stood on the other side.

He was middle-aged, with a round belly that strained against the buttons of his uniform.

The city guard insignia gleamed dully on his chest, and he held his hat in both hands, turning it over and over like a man working up the courage to speak.

His face was pale, and there was something in his eyes that made Lina’s blood run cold.

"Good evening, ma’am." The man said. "I’m Sergeant Feen, from the Thornhaven City Watch."

Lina’s blood went cold.

"What’s happened? Is this about Thomas?"

The sergeant hesitated as his eyes flicked toward Lily, who was peering around her mother’s leg, then back to Lina.

"May I come inside?"

"Yes. Of course. I’m sorry—the house isn’t much—" She stepped back, ushering him in with nervous gestures. "There’s nowhere to sit, I’m sorry—"

"It’s fine, ma’am." Feen stepped inside, ducking his head slightly under the low doorframe. "I won’t be staying long."

She stepped aside to let him in.

Feen stood awkwardly in the center of the room, his presence too large for the cramped space, and for a long moment, no one spoke.

Then Feen reached into his pocket and pulled out something small and silver.

It was Thomas’s locket.

Lina’s heart dropped.

"I’m sorry," Feen said, holding the locket out to her. "We tried to save him. But by the time we got there...."

He didn’t finish the sentence.

Lina’s hand trembled as she reached out and took the locket.

It was warm from being in Feen’s pocket, but the warmth felt wrong somehow, like heat rising from a cooling body.

She opened it with numb fingers and saw the tiny picture inside—her own face, Thomas’s, and Lily’s, all three of them squinting into the sunlight on the day they’d had the portrait taken.

They’d saved for weeks to afford it. Thomas had insisted they get dressed up and make a day of it, even though the photographer had overcharged them.

"I’m sorry," Feen said again.

Lina looked up at him as her vision blurred with tears she refused to let fall.

"The noble who was involved... I’m not allowded tell you his name. But he wanted me to give you this."

Feen reached into his coat and produced a heavy leather pouch, which he set down on the rickety table by the door.

"A thousand gold coins as an apology. And he’s made arrangements for your daughter’s education. Her schooling will be paid for—all of it, through to the academy if she has the talent. He said it was... it was Thomas’s last wish, that Lily should get the proper education."

The words didn’t make sense to her.

None of it makes sense.

A noble had been involved in her husband’s death, and he was offering her money.

A thousand gold coins was more than she’d ever seen in her life.

It was enough to pay off every debt and even live comfortably for years, maybe decades.

And Lily’s education, all of it, was paid for.

It was blood money.

That’s what it was.

The price of life.

The price of life handed over in a leather pouch by a city guard who couldn’t even meet her eyes.

She wanted to throw it back at him.

She wanted to scream and rage and demand to know the name of the noble who had taken her husband from her, who had left her daughter without a father, who had reduced her family to this....

A pile of coins on a broken table and an apology delivered by a stranger.

But then she looked down at Lily.

And she saw the future stretching out in front of her.

The debt collectors are at the door—the landlord’s threats.

The endless hours of scrubbing that would eventually destroy her hands and her back and whatever was left of her spirit.

Lily would grow up in the slums, uneducated and unprotected, just another poor girl in a city that ate poor girls alive.

But with this money...

With this money, Lily could have a different life.

A better life.

She could go to school, learn to read, and become something more than a washerwoman.

She could escape the slums and the poverty and the crushing weight of a world that didn’t care whether she lived or died.

It was also Thomas’s last wish.

Lina’s knees buckled.

She sank to the floor, the locket clutched against her chest, and for the first time since Thomas had walked out that door two days ago, she let herself cry.

Great, heaving sobs that shook her entire body as tears streamed down her face and dripped onto the silver locket.

Lily stood beside her.

She didn’t fully understand what was happening, but she could tell it had something to do with her Papa, and that whatever it was had broken something inside her Mama.

Wanting to help, she wrapped her small arms around Lina’s neck and they held each other as the grief poured out of them like water from a broken vessel.

Lina didn’t know how long she had cried.

It could have been minutes or hours.

But when she finally looked up, Feen was gone, and the leather pouch was still sitting on the table.

She stared at it for a long time.

Then, slowly, she reached out and pulled it toward her as her fingers closed around the heavy leather.

It was blood money.

It was the price of her husband’s life.

But it was also her daughter’s future.

And in this world, that was the only correct choice that mattered.

******