Out of the Darkness

kissed that Unkerlanter-he’d been waiting for days for somebody to suggest shaving to him. He scratched again, then cursed again. “Powers above, maybe I will cut it off. Anything would be better than what I’m going through now. Who’s got a razor he can lend me?”

The gang boss said, “You’ll need a scissors first, to get that mess short enough so a razor will cut it.”

“If you say so,” Ceorl answered. “I don’t know anything about this shaving business. I really may cut my throat.”

He didn’t get the chance to find out for another couple of days. He carefully spent all that time grumbling about how his face itched. When he got a scissors and a broken piece of mirror to guide his hand, he snipped away at the whiskers he’d never done more than trim before. By the time he set down the scissors, he was shaking his head. “I really do look mangy now.”

The Unkerlanter called Fariulf handed him a straight razor and a cup of water to wet down what was left of his whiskers. “You won’t once you’re done here,” he said.

Ceorl rapidly discovered he despised shaving. He cut himself several times. The razor scraped over his face. Had he really had an itchy skin, he was sure what he was doing would only have made things worse. His hide, in fact, did itch and sting by the time he got done. He shook his head again. “People have to be out of their cursed minds to want to do this every day.” Reaching for the scrap of mirror, he added, “How do I look?”

His Unkerlanter was still foul. He knew that. People mostly understood him now, though. Somebody- somebody behind him, whom he couldn’t note- said, “You’re still ugly, but not the same way.”

Looking into the mirror, Ceorl had to admit that wasn’t far wrong. A stranger stared back at him: a man with a thrusting chin with a cleft in it, hollows below his cheekbones, and a scar above his upper lip he’d never seen before. He hadn’t shown the world his bare face since he was a boy. He looked as if he’d suddenly got five years younger. He also looked like an Unkerlanter, not a Forthwegian.

“How does it feel?” Fariulf asked.

Lousy, Ceorl thought. But that was the wrong answer. He splashed a little water from the cup onto his abused face and ran the palm of his hand over his cheeks and chin. His skin felt as strange to him as it looked. Making himself smile, he said, “I think it’s better. I’m going to have to keep doing this.”

Acquiring a razor of his own didn’t take long. Unkerlanter miners died all the time. Survivors split what little they had. They weren’t supposed to have razors, but the guards usually winked at that-picks and shovels and crowbars made weapons at least as dangerous. One of those razors ended up in Ceorl’s hands. Little by little, he learned to shave without turning his face into a mass of raw meat.

One afternoon, he took Sudaku aside and said, “When I give you the word, I’m going to want you and the boys to screw up the count.”

“Ah.” The blond from the Phalanx of Valmiera nodded, unsurprised. “Going to disappear, are you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ceorl answered. He slapped Sudaku on the back. “I wish you could come along. But it wouldn’t work, you know.” He wasn’t even lying; Kaunian or not, Sudaku made a pretty good right-hand man.

But Sudaku was a Kaunian, a blond. If he escaped from this mine, from this captives’ camp, he couldn’t possibly pretend to be an Unkerlanter. Ceorl could. “Good luck,” Sudaku told him, and sounded as if he meant it.

“Thanks,” Ceorl said. “I’ll let you know when.” Sudaku nodded. Ceorl knew he was taking a chance by saying even this much, but judged he could trust Sudaku so far. And the longer the head start he and Fariulf got when they broke out of this mining compound, the better the chance they had of getting away clean. If Ceorl hadn’t believed in taking risks, he never would have become a robber or joined Plegmund’s Brigade.

Then he had to get as ready as he could. Saving food wasn’t easy, not when the captives got barely enough to keep them alive. Still and all, he managed to accumulate a good many little bricks of black bread. They would be stale and hard by the time he made his move, but he would still be able to eat them. He hoped Fariulf was making similar preparations. He hoped so, but he didn’t try to find out. If Fariulf wasn’t ready once they broke out, too bad for him.

Ceorl bided his time. When he did make the move, he knew it would have to succeed. If it didn’t, he would never see a second chance. Fariulf kept asking, “When? When?”

“I’ll tell you when,” Ceorl answered. “Don’t hop out of your tunic.”

Waiting paid off. A couple of weeks after he started shaving, the runs went through the camp. Most of the time, men needed leave to visit the latrine trenches. When they were liable to foul themselves if they waited, the guards waived the rule. It wasn’t for the sake of the miners; Ceorl knew as much. It was so the guards wouldn’t have to smell the stink or watch where they put their feet. Why mattered little to him. The waiver did.

He sidled up to Fariulf in the mine and said, “Tonight, a couple of hours after midnight.” The Unkerlanter nodded without looking up; he’d learned such lessons as a captive’s life could teach him. Later that day, Ceorl managed to whisper a couple of words in Sudaku’s ear: “Tomorrow morning.” The blond didn’t even nod. He just gave Ceorl the sort of wave he would have used in the field to show he’d understood an order. This may work, Ceorl thought, and then, It had better work.

Even in the middle of the night, he wasn’t the only one heading for the latrine trenches. He didn’t want to think about what easing himself would be like in the middle of winter. He didn’t intend to be here to find out.

He didn’t hurry to the stinking trenches. Before long, Fariulf caught up with him. “What now?” the Unkerlanter asked.

“Now you get a guard to pay attention to you,” Ceorl answered. “I don’t care how you go about it-just do it. Once you manage it, we go from there.”

“Right,” Fariulf said. Then he added the same thought Ceorl had had earlier in the day: “This had better work.”

“You aren’t taking any chances I ain’t,” Ceorl said. Fariulf nodded.

Out beyond the slit trenches, guards paced beyond a deadline marked off by a rail fence. Any captive who crossed the deadline got blazed. So camp rules said. Ceorl had other ideas.

Fariulf squatted over a trench and started moaning and grunting in such a good simulation of agony that even Ceorl, who knew better, wanted to do something for him. When a guard drew near, Fariulf moaned, “I want to go to the infirmary! I’ve got to go to the infirmary!”

“Shut up,” the guard said, but his steps slowed. Fariulf didn’t shut up. He kept on giving a splendid impression of a man in distress. The guard never noticed Ceorl sliding under the fence. Ceorl had had practice killing men silently before joining Plegmund’s Brigade, and much more practice since. He slid up behind the Unkerlanter, clapped a hand over his mouth, and drew the razor across his throat. Even he had trouble hearing the whimpering gurgle that was the only sound the fellow made. He eased the body to the ground, picked up the guard’s stick, and started walking his beat.

Fariulf rose and hurried over to him. “Stay down,” Ceorl hissed. “Don’t draw eyes.” Fariulf flattened out on the ground. Ceorl gave him a kick in the ribs to remind him to keep low. “Get going. I’ll be along.”

He marched along till he saw another guard coming out of the darkness and made sure the other fellow saw him. Then he turned, as if going back along the beat. He almost went past the spot where he’d killed the guard; Fariulf had dragged the corpse somewhere out of the way. “Efficiency,” Ceorl muttered: nearly too much efficiency.

He hurried out, and soon caught up with the Unkerlanter. The trenches and fences around the mine were designed to keep captives in. Before the war, they probably would have done a good enough job. They weren’t adequate for confining men who’d faced worse barricades, and better manned ones, in Unkerlant and Forthweg and Yanina and Algarve. Ceorl killed another guard on the way out, again without a sound.

“We’re leaving a trail,” Fariulf said.

“Did you want him to nab us?” Ceorl snarled, and the Unkerlanter shook his head.

For all of King Swemmel’s preaching about efficiency, the guards took a long time to realize anything was amiss. Ceorl and Fariulf were out of the enclosure around the cinnabar mine by then, looking around for somewhere to lie up during the approaching day. “I didn’t think it would be this easy,” Fariulf said. “Why doesn’t everybody escape?”

“Most people are sheep,” Ceorl said scornfully. “Would you have tried breaking out if I hadn’t pushed you?” A troubled look on his face, Fariulf shook his head.

But the search, once it started, was not to be despised. No matter how Sudaku muddled the count, two dead