Chapter 22 — The Stage
The knock on the iron door was soft. Intentional. Almost… polite.
Lucien sat up, heartbeat ticking a little faster. It wasn't fear. He hadn't felt fear in a long time. This was colder. Heavier. Like the moment before snowfall, when the air goes still and quiet because everything already knows what's coming.
The door swung open. One of the quiet guards entered—an older man with silver streaks in his close-cropped hair and a gaze that didn't linger. The kind who had learned not to see faces. He didn't speak. Just stepped forward, lifted the chains, and held out his hand.
Lucien stood without needing to be told.
The cuffs were cold, the chains short. Not tight. Not cruel. Just enough to remind him that he didn't belong to himself anymore.
No bruises. No marks. He understood.
They were presenting merchandise.
They walked in silence. Two turns. A narrow stairwell. Down a corridor that didn't match the rest of the prison—walls polished smooth, tall windows letting in a filtered light. The faint smell of lavender and metal lingered in the air, like everything had been cleaned twice over to keep the illusion tidy.
Then, through a final side door, the sound hit him.
Murmurs. Dozens of voices, maybe hundreds. Low, hushed, expectant. The shifting of weight. A cough. Chains rattling softly. And beneath it all, a pressure—like the kind that comes before a curtain lifts.
He was backstage.
Lucien scanned the space, eyes adjusting to the lamplight overhead. The walls arched high above in stone ribs. Heavy curtains hung from thick rails, velvet-red and dusted with age. Rows of iron sconces cast long shadows across the smooth floor.
People stood in lines.
So many. Too many.
To the left: men and older boys, quiet, chained at the wrists like him. Many stood with their heads bowed. Some stared blankly ahead, lost somewhere else.
To the right: women. Children. The youngest couldn't have been more than eight. Some clutched hands. Some trembled. Others didn't move at all.
Lucien's gaze caught on a boy near the front of the children's line. Pale, buzz-cut, maybe thirteen or fourteen. Small. Still waiting for his bones to catch up with his face.
Their eyes met.
Lucien's breath caught.
Same age, maybe.
But Lucien didn't look like a child anymore. The Trial had reshaped his frame—tall, broad, thick with muscle carved from pain and starvation. A man's silhouette. A soldier's bearing. A face hardened into something unreadable.
He looked away first.
From the other side of the curtain, a voice rang out—loud, clear, musical in tone but unintelligible. Lucien still didn't understand the language. It flowed like water, soft around the edges, even when selling human lives.
A name? A number? It didn't matter.
A person stepped forward. Two guards flanked them, leading them through the curtain.
Then—silence.
Then the bidding began.
Lucien recognized it instantly, even without the words. The rhythm. The rise and fall. The sharp energy of people outbidding each other for something they wanted. Sharp bursts of sound, urgent and alive.
Another name. Another body. The cycle repeated.
Some of the children were taken in pairs. Siblings, maybe. Others went alone.
Some cried.
Most didn't.
Lucien didn't blink. Didn't shift.
He watched.
The curtain flared open, then closed again. The guards moved without emotion. The buyers couldn't be seen. Only heard.
Everyone in the line stood still—not from calm, but from resignation. Like they had already buried the last of themselves somewhere along the way. Like whatever hope they'd held had gone silent inside their bones.
Lucien's place in line crept forward. Step by step.
Maybe a hundred still ahead. Maybe a hundred behind.
The light spilling from the stage glowed golden beneath the curtain—warm, almost beautiful. It painted the floor in soft halos.
It made everything worse.
Lucien closed his eyes.
He thought of the way the cot had felt that morning—flat, but soft enough not to hurt. He thought of the stew, thick and spicy, of the way the butter on the bread melted against his tongue. The soap. The feel of clean clothes.
All of it had been a parting gift.
He didn't let the ache rise. He swallowed it whole.
He opened his eyes again.
The boy in the children's line was gone.
The curtain opened. Another name was called. Another person passed through.
And the light never dimmed.
Lucien stepped forward, chains whispering with the motion.
The guards didn't speak to him. They didn't need to.
He already knew his part.
The line crept forward.
And the stage drew closer.