text: Since my trip to the center of the island, I found new questions creeping into my discussions with the traders by the shoreline. An old inquisitiveness was reemerging. I could feel a tweak of jealousy that they were going out again to see new places and I’d ask them the same things that had gnawed at me back on Kadear. *What’s the geography like? What’s the system of government? What’s the culture? What do they eat? What are they like?* I was sitting on the Deer Drum boat. The pole beans were now a metre high, small buds growing from the stems, soon to be harvested. Novak had borrowed Lachlann’s guitar while he was off exploring the island and was showing me the new tunes he could play. He hadn’t mastered it yet. Often the top string would be missed on the down strum, or his fingers gripped that fraction of a second too long, delaying the note. But he could play. The tunes were enough for others to recognize and hum along to the melody. I listened to Novak play, being an attentive audience. He was just finishing a rendition of an old nursery rhyme when Mirai walked up beside us. She looked out to sea with a smile on her face. “Oh, I’d recognize that boat anywhere." I pulled myself up and looked over the edge of the boat to see Alessia sailing towards us. Xander stopped attending to his plants and ran up to join as the boat pulled up alongside. “Well, if it isn’t the greatest merchant in the Archipelago returning to grace us with her presence.” Alessia scoffed. “Just throw us a rope.” We tied the boats up and lowered a ladder so Alessia could join us on the deck. “I thought I’d meet you later at the apartment,” I said as she clambered aboard. “I figured you’d be here. Anyway, I only really came to say I’m heading off again.” “Already?” Mirai pouted. “‘Fraid so,” Alessia smiled. “Arrived here this morning and met a guy immediately. Asked if I could go take some goods to Sneppath Head. Practically threw money at me to do it.” “You got to leave immediately?” I asked. “I figured I could stay here for an hour or two. Cargo’s already on the boat. Gonna be a good week’s sail to Sneppath Head.” We sat down on the quarterdeck and discussed the latest island she had been to. Soon though the conversation turned though to Talin Barier. “You still going back to that town at the center?” Alessia asked. “Yeah.” I replied, grimacing slightly. “Soured this place a bit for you hasn’t it?” Her tone was somehow both sympathetic and smug. “This whole island is meant to be about choice. But, they have none. Or at least... whatever they choose, the options end up terrible. They can never earn enough to escape.” Alessia leaned back in her chair. “Freedom to choose your own poison.” I nodded as a silence briefly took hold. Xander broke it. “Alessia, any news of Sannaz?” Alessia shook her head. “He’s vanished. I don’t know. Maybe he’s dead; drowned or angered the wrong person or something. Whatever he’s up to, he’s not making any noise.” Xander looked down at his feet. “I still just want to know why I guess. Not that it’ll make the pain better, or go away, but at least it’ll make sense.” “We’ll get answers.” Alessia leaned forwards and patted Xander’s knee. “I promise you.” \ Two weeks passed. I left the apartment around mid-morning, aware that Alessia was due back today. I looked forward to seeing her again. Her recent stops had been only fleeting visits before she disappeared again. As I closed the door behind me. I saw Eda heading to her office at the far side of the courtyard. I remembered Maia and how she longed to get a job that would give a better future for her son. It wasn’t an escape, but working for Eda would improve their lives. I decided that perhaps, I could try and make a small difference. Put some positive into the lives of two people living in that cruel slum. I walked around the upper walkway that overlooked the courtyard to Eda’s office. I knocked on the thick wooden door, the sound immediately muffled to a dull thud. “Come in.” I walked inside to find Eda standing behind a desk. It was a large wooden construction of deep mahogany that took up near two thirds of the room. The gap between the edge of the desk and the wall was so small that Eda would have to shuffle sideways just to get to the other side. Across the desk were strewn towers of papers, and while at first glance it seemed chaotic, they seemed to have been organized into specific piles. It was an organization system clinging onto structure, always on the verge of toppling over. Eda grinned upon seeing me. “Ferdinand. What can I do for you today?” I took a small, uncertain step forward. “I was hoping to speak to you about a job.” Eda laughed. “If you need to work for me you wouldn’t be living here.” I smiled and forced a small chuckle. “No. I know I’m only a tenant, but I know of someone who wanted to work here. And I wanted to say that I knew them, or have gotten to know them. They’re a very good person, kind, hard-working...” Eda looked up from the notes on her desk. “And who is this islander?” “Maia,” I took another step forward. A sudden moment of stupidity hit me. “I’m afraid I actually don’t know her last name.” “Certain she’s worth employing, but don’t know her last name. Quite the reference.” Eda folded her arms. “Sorry. I know it’s strange I just-” “-Relax,” Eda grinned. She flicked through a set of papers on her desk as she spoke. “Your lady came in last week. Contract signed. She’s employed. ‘Fraid she won’t have much time for you anymore though.” She lifted up a piece of paper and passed it across the desk. I read the first few lines, glancing at the name, position. Then I read a field that was titled “length of employment”. *Permanent. Life. No resignation.* I stared at the line, trying to ignore it and let it go, but it scratched away at my brain until it burrowed out. “This bit, ‘no resignation’, what does that mean?” “Well, it means she can’t leave. I paid her a lump sum up front, and now she works for me, for life.” “Doing what?” I squinted at Eda. “Whatever I tell her to,” Eda shrugged. “For the rest of her life, she now does whatever I tell her she can do.” “That...” I cut myself off. There was an emotion rippling away under my skin that I was trying to understand, trying to control. It grew, rising up, until I could recognize it clearly. Rage. “That sounds like slavery.” “Don’t be daft,” Eda chuckled as she waved her arm. “Slaves don’t choose. She chose this.” “So that her kid would make it to adulthood she sold her life.” My tone was flat, my eyes static. Eda’s face look confused, as if I were speaking another language. “And that’s her right to choose to make that decision.” “She had a choice between death and slavery-” “-No.” Eda cut me off with a snapped tone. “She could choose whatever she wanted. Get whatever job she wants. If she had the money she could buy her own courtyard and become a landlady like me. She came to me asking for a job, any job, I gave her one, and she *chose* to accept it.” “And now she’s locked in for life. To become your servant.” Both of our voices were slowly rising in volume. “Her choice.” “And if she later regrets that choice.” I leaned my head forward with the tilt of an angry bull. “We all have to live with the choices we made in the past. I do.” Eda pumped her chest with an odd pride. “Not like this,” I shouted. “She chose this. She signed. It’s done.” Eda smacked her hand against the desk, as the papers rustled slightly from the force. She shifted her gaze back to the papers on the desk and spoke to me out of the side of her mouth. “And now get out of my office before I kick you out of your apartment.” I could feel my cheeks burning red, my teeth gritting so tightly it felt like my mouth would be welded closed. I turned and left the building, walking down the courtyard steps as quickly as I could, desperate to get away from the apartment, away from Eda, away from whatever I might want to say next. I turned a couple of corners and marched down towards the harbor. My feet darted passed slower pedestrians as I walked down to the coast. My elbow occasionally brushed against them, the anger transferring briefly as they hollered after me to be more careful. Maia was trapped. Eda had used Maia’s desperation, her needs, to create a slave. The contract that was signed had never come from a negotiation. It was a hostage taking. The crisp morning sun brushed against my fiery cheeks, sweat leaked from the pores. My face felt suffocated, drowning in its own heat, my mind racing as I tried to understand how Eda could make such a decision. It felt that the rage wouldn’t quell, that it would just boil over until I screamed it out. I wanted to get to the ocean, stand on the shoreline, and shout my anger at the sea. I wanted the entire Archipelago to hear how angry I was. But as I reached the shore, I looked out, saw a boat, and all the emotions disappeared, replaced with something new: fear. The boat was a trading vessel, perhaps a tiny bit longer than Alessia’s. However it was ruined. It limped towards the shore with half a sail intact. The bottom half of the red sheet was completely torn away and there was a gash in the top corner of what remained. The front half of the hull was charred black and I could see a large section where the wood had been ripped apart, allowing larger waves to roll over the side and onto the deck. There was one man aboard. He held the wheel in his left hand. His right arm dropped by his side, the lower half of his sleeve painted red. He leaned against the wheel, using it to prop up his tired body. I walked around the beach, heading towards where the boat was destined to land. Others, seeing the same site, had begun to form a small crowd as the boat rolled onto the sand, coming to a complete stop. Two women immediately rushed to the man’s aid, placing their hands under his arms, and carrying him back down onto the beach. “What happened?” Someone in the crowd asked. “Attack. The harbour.” The man muttered between pained breaths. “There were explosions. Gunfire. I’m lucky I lived.” The man sat down on the sand as one of the women ripped off his shirt to inspect the wound on his arm. The skin had been ripped away and all that remained was a mess of sinew, muscle and bone. “Where did you come from?” A man from the crowd asked. The man braced his body, his face contorting, as the woman pulled the shift fabric down past the wound. He paused, regaining his composure before he replied. “Sneppath Head.” \ Next chapter published December 19th.