Page 113 of The Salt King

When he opened his eyes, they were vivid black. He took her in for a moment of entire stillness, then sat up fast and pushed her away, not hard enough to knock her over but hard enough to set her back a couple of paces—Christ, but her leg hurt—and with one manacled hand, he pointed at the hole she had made in the wall. Get out.

“No, they sent me for you. Are you An El?”

Whether or not he understood English, he caught the name, and went very still.

She went back to him and touched the manacles. They were fastened into place with bolts, easily taken out, though not by him: the chain was too short for him to get his hands together.

He jolted back from her. The chains snapped tight.

“No, they sent me for you,” she said again, increasingly sure he didn’t understand. He was still looking at her as though she had explained that she wanted to lead him out to be hanged.

No doubt once you had been chained in the dark for long enough, you became afraid of daylight. Or perhaps of what those above would do if you tried to reach it.

“It’s safe,” she tried. Then she tried again in Latin, just in case, although she couldn’t imagine this haunted place had ever heard it. Down in the deep dark, something screamed.

Well, the devils could shriek all they liked.

He inclined his head, though. He had noticed that the Latin sounded different.

If he was Irish or Cornish, he would have no English. They spoke older languages. Perhaps that was even what Hreod was—it certainly sounded ancient enough and wild enough—but if that was the case, then there was no way for her to speak to him. For Christ’s sake, what had been the point of sending her down here? Those people above must have known he wouldn’t understand anything she said.

“Does this sound any more familiar?” she tried in Greek.

Whether he understood Greek or not, he did seem to understand that she was trying to find a way to talk with him rather than at him. He said something back. It was a language she didn’t know—it had a click in it—but it sounded maddeningly familiar somehow, like it was something she had overheard as a child, but it could have been anything. A thousand languages elbowed each other around the markets and monasteries of Byzantium.

Very gently, she reached out and tugged his arm, then pointed upwards. The silver gauntlet shone. It was getting warm. It was hot in the mine.

He shook his head.

She opened her hands, hoping it read as Why not? in any language.

His eyes raked up and down her, and then snagged on her pack. He held his hand out, with a flicker of a look at her, asking permission. She gave it to him. He unbuckled it and looked through, then took out an apple. He held it out in his palm for her to see. She didn’t know what he wanted her to do.

“You—can have it if you want?”

He tilted his eyes down at it, and it turned to salt. Right there in his hand. It made a minuscule crackling noise. He closed his fist, and it shattered into salt chunks that pattered onto the floor.

She had heard of miracles before. Of course she had. She heard about them all the time. She believed in them too. But she had never seen one. In stories, saints fell down into jubilant prayer, but she couldn’t move. All her joints were locked into place, and part of her mind informed her that if the world wasn’t going to work in the way everybody had agreed it did, then her bones wouldn’t be working too well either thank you; they were going to sit here until the world returned to its usual order.

He pointed again at the hole she had made. Go away.

An angel. They had chained an angel in the mine.

He said something. It was emphatic. She was certain it was Get out.

“No,” she said, and pulled the bolt from the closest manacle.

It fell off his arm. He looked down at it, then at her, and stayed still when she went around to his other side and opened the other manacle too.

“Why are you afraid? You could kill all of them.”

He looked tired, but when she took his arm and pulled to let him know she wanted him to follow her out, he let her.

Standing, he was tall. His hair fell to his waist, very dark against the white robe he wore. He let her lead him out, and up, almost all the way. When the daylight touched the path, though, he stopped and shook his head, as though he had been able to countenance the idea, but not the fact now that it was here.

“If they did this to you, I can take you away from them and you will never see them again,” she said. “Nor this place. You are . . . you do not belong buried underground.” She held her hand out.

He didn’t take it. He was standing back against the wall, out of the light. She could see he was about to run. He had been watching the uneven way she walked, judging rightly that she could go no faster than that.