"I had a dream last night," she said. "Would you like to hear about it?"

Two knocks sounded in reply.

"Well it was more of a memory than a dream. I saw my mother. She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. I will ever see. Even in death, she was beautiful. And that's all the memory I have of her, lying in a coffin with a permanent smile across her pale face. Her thick blonde hair framing her sleeping features. Her hollow body wearing a white gown. I don't feel anything looking at her. I don't remember her voice. I don't know if she had a warm hug or a cold one. I don't remember if she smelled like spice or flowers. Sometimes I barely even remember her name. But I do know I loved her."

Riella Dove. Dhulka's most beloved mistress. And by far the most beautiful. She was graceful and kind. The perfect candidate for the queen. Everyone said Zemlya would grow up to be just like her, but fate it seemed had other plans.

"How about you?" She was careful with her tone. "Is your mom still with you?"

One knock.

Zemlya frowned. "You must miss her often." He didn't reply. "Did she pass peacefully?"

He knocked twice. She sighed. They might've been worlds apart, but the love of a mother was universal.

She spoke of everything and anything and never once had he spoken back. She wouldn't dare ask him to. He was just doing his job, she wouldn't risk it. But for all his silence he never once failed to knock in reply. He had become special to her before he knew it.

"Can I give you a name?" She asked.

He was quiet a moment. Contemplating perhaps. She wondered if he'd grown tired of her.

"Am I annoying?" She said aloud. "I'm sorry I talk alot. You don't have to always listen."

Two knocks.

"Do you want me to shut up?"

One knock.

She smiled. He had no obligation to her. He owed her nothing. But she was grateful. "Can I call you, Qalbi?"

Three knocks. He wasn't sure.

"It means my heart. Your heart is yours but in a way it's become mine as well. Your heart soothes mine."

One knock. Two. Footsteps and the door clicked open. Zemlya sprang to her feet.

"My Lady, it is I Naulo."

"Hello Naulo," Zemlya bowed. "How have you been?"

"You have been summoned by Master Huo," her tone robotic and empty, "please get prepared."

~~~

"I hope I've worn it correctly." Zemlya spun. "How does it look?"

But silence followed in reply.

She froze. "Naulo?"

A sandpaper-like hand took ahold of her arm accompanird by a soothing warmth. Her hand was lifted with gentle care and placed on sturdy arms.

She didn't flinch or fight back. But she had to know. "Who are you?"

They didn't reply. Then came two light taps on her hand.

"It's you," she breathed. "Qalbi."

Two taps.

He began to walk. She followed, but he slowed his pace to match hers. Her head ended at his chest and his heart beat flooded her ears. His arm was hard and heavy. He smelled of sweet cocoa and something like ash. He had a warmth that felt almost out of place. Unusual for their kind.

"You're," she said, "not like them."

But he didn't reply. Perhaps he really couldn't talk. They walked in silence save for their sandals clipping against the tile and the distant whirring sounds of Dhulka. They enetered an elevator and climbed a few staircases. She knew they'd left the lower folds when the air became clearer above. With less dust down the lungs, breathing became easier.

They entered a hall and at once, she was bombarded with voices. Cheers and chatter, laughter and shouts. Her grip tightened around his arm. He placed a hand on hers.

"Will you be near?"

He pat her hand twice.

They moved towards the lively human sounds. She felt the threshold against her sandal and then silence. Eyes. Eyes watched her. Gazed. Studied. Scrutinized and scorned. They made their way across the now seemingly empty room.

"Welcome my dew droplet," Huo slurred. "I'm glad you were able to make it."

She was guided to a seat. "Thank you for inviting me."

"Of course, how could I not invite my darling bride!"

Gasps. Murmurs and whispers. Surprise and bewilderment.

"Yes!" Huo exclaimed. "This is the woman I've chosen as my bride. For who better than the princess of this land would signify the joining of the Cadits and Dhulka in marriage!"

One clap, two. Then a roar of applause. But she wondered if they meant it.

"Everyday we grow closer and closer to that goal. Soon the people of Dhulka and the Cadits will be able to travel freely between the subterranean and surface worlds. Soon we will live amongst one another as equals in society. No longer shall there be division and difference, but from now on, we shall be brother and sister. Rejoice, the earth shall see a new dawn!"

Just the same, there was a roar of applause. Cheers and shouts of joy. But Zemlya wondered what made them believe him. When has the Earth ever seen a new dawn, when the sun was the same since the beginning of human existence and will be still by the end of it. Men have come and gone and proven such ideals to be simply unattainable.

"Huo?" She said.

"Yes my bride, what can I do for you?"

"Don't you think they don't agree?"

Two heart beats passed before he spoke. "Why wouldn't they?"

"You aren't blind, at least I don't believe you are. So you should be able to see why they wouldn't agree. Look at me, I'm blind and scarred, I'm not worthy to be your bride."

"Who says so?"

"Not everyone but enough people."

"Then those people don't belong in our world." His words were a cold knife. And they only proved why his dreams will only remain as such, unrealistic visions for a broken world.

Zemlya smiled. She was his little toy, a tool to get what he desired. Tools don't talk back or act out of place, they were used then they were put away in their dusty little corner again.

Someone approached Huo. "Sir," he spoke in a hushed whisper with an obvious hesistance. Perhaps even fear. "One of the workers has escaped into the forest."

"Has his body been found?" Huo murmured back in a placid tone.

"Not yet, sir. We've sent men but they've yet to find him."

"Scour every inch of Drait until he is found either dead or alive. In the meantime bring me the person responsible for this."

"Sir, he is here right now."

"Good. Bring Ryke as well."

Zemlya sat as stiff as stone, taking in every word out of the two men. Keep quiet. Be used. Then back to the dusty little corner you'll go.

Everyone died. No, everyone held their breaths. But they might as well had been dead.

Clip-clop, clip-clop.

A blood curdling scream.

Silence.

"Watch, listen and never forget," Huo said, "this is what happens when you make mistakes."

His lungs filled with air only to fuel his pain. His heart hung over his head like a ticking time bomb. When it would stop he'd be gone. But the minutes ran on and it never went off. He screamed. And screamed. And cried and pleaded. But no one heard him because everyone was dead.

"Stop." She was alive. "STOPP!!"

Silence.

"Please, just stop. He's had enough!"

Her heart drummed so defeaningly loud, she could never deny that she was alive.

"Take him away," Huo said. His job was done and back to his dusty little corner he was dragged off. "Take her away as well."

~~~

O N E  D A Y  A G O

There's something so grimly tantalizing about a forest at night. Especially to a man like Baido who'd lost all freedom but that of his mind. Sure, he knew they could twist and turn the limbs of men to their liking, and make a man go splat like a pesky mosquito but his mind was the last thing he'd ever give up before he gave in to death.

Everyday at sunset, a group of men were taken to the surface to till solid dry earth. To the men from Dhulka such work was as foreign as the surface world. They never had to do, never heard of such a task. All the food they had ever consumed was manufactured in a lab somewhere, grown out of a tube under artificial lighting. But now they'd eat food their fathers, and their fathers father's and even their fathers father's  fathers had never once tasted, food grown with such primitive methods, from such natural processes.

At night they worked, not till their palms blistered or till their bellies roared like feral beast, but till the sky paled and the sun arrived once again. When the air grew warmer. And sweat soaked through their worn garments. Only then did they return their tools and return to their tiny damp cell below.

Night after night they worked and worked. Acres and acres of land tilled and sowed. And for every hour they worked, the forest beyond seemed more and more welcoming to Baido.

Now, Baido didn't know much but he knew enough:

One. The surface dwellers' vision was only useful in withstanding blinding daylight but at night they couldn't see the snakes slithering up a tree or a hare hopping through grass. They didn't have the adaptions of a population used to dimmer lighting.

Two. The surface dwellers sleep at night. They're least awake by the 6th hour of the sparing.

Three. The surface dwellers lose their abilities in the dark. And the forest at night was a pit of blackness, even under full moons.

Four. He knew nothing about the surface, except for the fact that the sun could melt the skin off his bones. If he did manage to escape where would he go that wouldn't kill him? And if he didn't and he was caught he would quickly be made an example of what not to do. Which meant he'd die either way.

But Baido was stupid. And he knew that. He'd take the risk if it meant he'd be free. He'd be alive. And not just one of the men, taken by grief and fear, following which way the gun was pointed.

When the sixth hour came and the only break they had been allowed arrived, Baido sat at the edge of a plot near the tall grass. And when the time was just right, when they're senses were at their most dulled and the darkness reached its peak, Baido was gone.

Shrouded by the tall grass and choirs of the night critters, he made his escape. By the time they noticed he was gone, he'd reached the cover of the forest. And for the next six hours he ran with what strength remained of him. And even then the forest didn't end, until he couldn't keep up any longer.

His stomach roared like a wild beast about to devour him whole. His bones ached and shivered. His tongue scratched at the roof of his mouth. And his vision, the one thing that kept him going, slowly slipped out of focus. But his vision was what saved him. For if he had never had seen that cottage he would never have met her.

~~~

A/n: hello there🥲 this chapter was sitting here for a while because I didn't know how to write Baido's escape so then I was just like eff it and I wrote this coz I didn't want to write anything intricate and planned. Which I know is lazy of me, but coincidences happen, and that's my excuse😅