Beginnings, part 3

The armed guards hustle you (excluding Crockus and the sick man) and the other slaves out of the door in a line. Outside the cell door, a large hall hewn from solid rock. Shadows cast by the several torches flicker across the walls, and in the guttering light you can discern other iron doors set on both sides of the hall. You have little time for speculation, however, as one of the guards shouts a command, reinforced by the crack of a cat-o'-nine-tails, and you are marched along the corridor and away from your cell.

In the dim and shifting light, it is difficult to get an accurate sense for the space you travel through. The guards drive you along a curving corridor that intersects with a larger, straight one in which your footsteps echo slightly and crunch on chips of stone. In this space, you can make out the sounds of other people--grunts, cries, feet both bare and booted over gravel and rock--as well as, perhaps, the squeal of iron on iron.

You are marched further, across an array of trolley rails built into the floor, and down other corridors, some with rails and some without, all rough-hewn and strewn with stone chips. (Those of you wandering barefoot will likely scrape and cut your feet.)

Eventually, you are called to a halt at the intersection of several corridors. Several other guards loiter about, and lanterns are hung on pegs hammered into the stone walls. There is a wooden cart big enough to carry two or three people, resting on rusted rails near one guard. The one you know as Haran steps forward to speak with the cart guard.

"New recruits again."

The other guard chuckles. "Alright, you lot. C'mere and grab yer tools. And don't try anything or you'll end up like 'im." He tosses his head to his left somewhat. Behind him, in the space between two lanterns, a spear has been planted in a pile of small rocks. Impaled upon it, a man's tar-coated, open-mouthed visage leers at you. The guard laughs. "Right. First up!"

At his word, one of the other guards shoves the first of your line, a thin, dazed man, over to Haran, who grabs a pick-axe from the nearby trolley and shoves it into the slave's arms. The man holds the tool vacantly until Haran gives him another push in the direction of one of the corridors (where other guards wait) and growls "Over there. Use it on the wall at the end."

The guards repeat the procedure with roughly half of you, while the rest are told to fill the trolleys with what the pick-axes cull. Shortly [unless you wish to intervene in any of this somehow], you are shuffling down the corridor to do your work.

Meanwhile, the authoritative guard at the cell stands in the doorway, staring at Crockus expectantly.