Those Who Would Not Be Gods

10. Imprisonment: Raff

A boot sped Raff into the cell and onto his knees. Iron slammed on iron as the cell door shut. Raff spun and ran for the door, but it was already too late. The guard was retreating. Raff grabbed the bars and pressed his face against them, staring out into the empty hallway and at the dark cell opposite. Iron bars and solid stone for as far as he could see.

"Fuck you, Milo!" he shouted up the hall, in case the traitor was listening. What a little ass! Couldn't even hold back on tattling for a few minutes! He shook the bars. They refused to rattle satisfyingly. More frustrated than before, he kicked them instead. At least that set them ringing. Again, again, until he was exhausted. Damn Milo! They'd gone risking their lives, and the rat had scurried away to fuck up everything else the second they were gone! So much for trust and friendship, huh?

Other inmates appeared at the bars of the other cells, dirty faces enquiring at the ruckus. "Ay, shut up!" a man shouted from down the hall. Raff barely even heard him. He kept kicking the bars, over and over. Stupid, stupid, he'd been so stupid for trusting Milo!

He stopped when he ran out of energy and stared out at the hallway, chest heaving. Damn it! If I lose my chance at High Priest over that ass ratting us out, I swear, he thought, eyes narrowing at nothing. And he'd thought Pasquale was bad. Milo was the real snake.

"Feel better?" Sab asked dryly behind him.

Raff sighed, letting go of the bars with one hand to look back at Sab. The man was relaxing against the wall, the straw they'd been given as bedding bundled to make a seat. "Not really," he confessed.

"Yeah, I knew leaving him up there alone was a bad idea," Giada said, stepping into the light from the opposite cell. "Didn't think he'd be that jumpy, though."

Sab pressed his lips together. "Should've said something," he told her.

"I didn't know he'd tattle! Sometimes he keeps quiet. I was hoping this'd be one of those times." She shook her head. "Guess I was wrong."

Raff clenched his teeth, keeping himself from saying anything. She was wrong, and so they'd been captured, paraded through town, and stuck in a tiny couple of cells under the Shrine for the night, and his chance at being High Priest was in danger. It was more than a 'guess I was wrong' could erase.

With a deep breath, he closed his eyes and forced himself to swallow his anger. He wasn't going to achieve anything by yelling at Giada. She wasn't the one who'd tattled, after all. Silence stretched between the cells, neither side willing to break it.

"Is Cecile over there?" Raff asked, after a long moment.

Giada shook her head. "They sent her off to Lorenzo, I think," she said. "She had some burns, and they were worried about that poisoning." She made a face and held up her arm, showing a hole in her shirt and a weeping blotch of red on the back of her forearm. "I got burned, too, not that anyone cares."

A pale face materialized from the gloom behind her. Raff nearly jumped before he caught himself. It was only Edith, not a shade. "Are we going to get hung?" she asked nervously.

"We'll be hanged, not hung," Sab corrected her.

Edith somehow got paler. "Oh," she said.

With a sigh, Giada patted Edith's head. "He's joking. We won't be hung over something that minor."

"Hanged," Sab repeated.

"Or hanged. We'll probably get a demerit, but you should be fine," Giada reassured her. "It was just trespassing, not theft or anything serious like that."

Oddly enough, Edith didn't look reassured by that.

Raff snorted and stepped back. It wasn't the first time he'd gotten caught and punished. Plenty of fights with Pasquale taken too far, plenty of breaking into places he shouldn't be. He'd never been thrown into the Shrine's cells before, but as long as they were discussing punishment, he couldn't imagine it'd be too horrible for him. A demerit, like Giada said. Probably linked with a drop in rank, not that he'd ever had any. The problem was the trial. The next trial for High Priest was tomorrow. If they didn't let him out in time... he grit his teeth. That'd be the end for him.

A rock bounced off the back of his head. Raff turned, eyes narrowed, but it was only Sab. "Relax," Sab said. "They weren't that angry. They'll let you out for tomorrow."

"They'd better," Raff muttered.