The Sixth Epoch: Chronicles of the Released
Chapter 3: Copper and Calluses
The seven o'clock bell found Lucian and Kaal already at Pier Seven, standing among a cluster of approximately forty men waiting for work assignments. The morning air carried the bite of salt and the promise of physical exhaustion.
Galvin emerged from his office with a clipboard, his mustache twitching as he surveyed the assembled workers. His eyes were the eyes of a man who'd learned to assess human value in terms of productivity and expendability.
"Right," he called out, his voice cutting through the murmur of conversation. "Hendricks, you're on the Meridian Runner with team three. Darius, warehouse inventory. Petrov, you're overseeing the coal shipment—and for the love of the Storm Lord, don't let anyone light pipes near the cargo this time."
A few workers chuckled. A stocky man with a thick beard—presumably Petrov—grinned and sketched a mock salute.
Galvin continued down his list, assigning teams to various vessels and cargo types. Lucian noted the organizational structure: experienced workers got the complex or valuable cargo. Newer workers handled the simple but physically demanding tasks.
"Lucian, Kaal—you're with Hendricks on the Meridian Runner. General cargo, basic hauling. Five copper each at day's end if Hendricks says you pulled your weight."
They followed Hendricks to a mid-sized merchant vessel moored at the northern section of the pier. The ship had clearly seen better days—weathered wood, patched sails, and a name painted on its hull in fading letters. The Meridian Runner. Three other workers joined them: a tall, thin man with prominent adam's apple, a shorter heavyset worker with powerful shoulders, and a teenage boy who couldn't have been older than sixteen.
"Right," Hendricks said, gathering them at the gangplank. "Cargo manifest says we've got textiles, pottery, and grain. Standard procedure—textiles come off first, they're lightest. Then pottery, careful like. Grain sacks last." He pointed to each of them in turn. "Thomas, you're on count. Every crate that comes off this ship gets tallied. Marcus, you and the new guys are hauling. Riley, you're runner—any problems, you fetch me or the foreman."
Thomas—the tall thin one—nodded and produced a small notebook and pencil stub from his pocket. Marcus cracked his knuckles and spat over the pier's edge. Riley, the teenager, looked simultaneously eager and terrified.
The work began.
Physical labor, Lucian discovered, operated on principles of leverage, rhythm, and strategic pain management.
The textile crates weren't particularly heavy, but their awkward dimensions made them difficult to grip properly. The trick was to lift with the legs, keep the core engaged, and move in synchronized pairs. Marcus demonstrated wordlessly, gripping one end of a crate while gesturing for Lucian to take the other. Together they hauled it down the gangplank, across the pier, and into the warehouse.
Lucian's muscles burned within the first hour.
'Catalog the sensations,' he thought, maintaining the analytical framework that had become his primary defense against overwhelming circumstances. 'Lower back strain. Shoulder tension. Hands developing pressure points that will become calluses. The body adapts. Pain is information.'
They fell into a rhythm. Lift, carry, stack. Return. Repeat. The sun climbed higher, heat building despite the morning's chill. Sweat soaked through Lucian's shirt. His hands began to blister.
Beside him, Kaal worked with grim determination, his expression locked in concentration. Neither spoke—conversation required breath they couldn't spare.
By the time the noon bell rang, they'd unloaded perhaps a third of the textile cargo. Lucian's entire body felt like one continuous ache.
The lunch tables felt like salvation.
Today's meal was the same watery stew, supplemented with small portions of salted meat that might have been pork. Lucian ate mechanically, his hands shaking slightly from exertion and low blood sugar.
Darius appeared beside them, setting his bowl down with a thunk. "You survived the morning. Better than some."
"Some?" Kaal asked.
"Had a new worker last month. Lasted three hours before he collapsed from heat exhaustion. Galvin docked his pay and sent him packing." Darius tore his bread into pieces with methodical efficiency. "The docks don't care about your limitations. Either you keep up or you're replaced."
Marcus joined their table, followed by Thomas. The big man studied Lucian and Kaal with the assessing gaze of someone calculating their usefulness.
"You two are stronger than you look," Marcus said. His voice was surprisingly soft for someone his size. "Thought for sure you'd be dragging by now."
"Still might be," Lucian admitted.
Thomas had pulled out his notebook and was making marks with his pencil. Up close, Lucian could see he was perhaps forty, with the lean, nervous energy of someone whose mind never fully rested. His fingers bore ink stains.
"One hundred and forty-three crates so far," Thomas said without looking up. "Textiles average twenty-two pounds each. That's three thousand, one hundred and forty-six pounds hauled across an average distance of seventy feet. Accounting for the gangplank angle..." He continued muttering calculations.
Marcus rolled his eyes. "Tommy here used to be a clerk. Bank or something. Had a breakdown, lost his position, ended up on the docks."
"Accounting firm," Thomas corrected, still focused on his notebook. "And I didn't have a breakdown. I made an error in the ledgers. One error. The senior partners decided that constituted grounds for termination and blacklisting."
"One error that cost them eight thousand pounds," Marcus said, but his tone was more amused than cruel.
"Eight thousand, two hundred, and forty-seven," Thomas said. "Plus interest. If we're being precise."
Riley, the teenage runner, approached their table hesitantly. "Mr. Hendricks says we're starting the pottery after lunch. Says to be extra careful."
"Of course he does," Marcus said. "Pottery means if we break something, it comes out of our wages. And pottery crates are heavier than they look."
The boy sat down at the table's edge, positioning himself slightly apart as if uncertain of his welcome. He had dark hair that curled at his temples and the kind of thin build that suggested either youth or chronic malnourishment. Probably both.
"First week?" Darius asked him.
Riley nodded. "Third day. My da' worked here before he..." He trailed off, his expression closing.
"Before he what?" Kaal asked gently.
"Drowned," Riley said quietly. "Fell off the pier during a storm. They never found his body. Ma says I need to take his place, earn what he would've earned. We've got my younger sisters to feed."
An uncomfortable silence settled over the table. The casual cruelty of the statement—a boy forced to replace his dead father, carrying the weight of his family's survival—required no commentary.
Marcus broke the silence by pushing his portion of salted meat toward Riley. "Here. Growing boy needs it more than I do."
Riley's eyes widened. "I can't—"
"You can. I'm not asking." Marcus stood, stretching his massive shoulders. "Besides, salt meat gives me indigestion. You'd be doing me a favor."
It was an obvious lie, delivered with enough gruff conviction that Riley could accept without losing pride. The boy took the meat with a whispered thanks.
Lucian watched the interaction and filed it away: Marcus was more than he appeared. Beneath the rough exterior and casual violence of the docks, something resembling compassion survived.
The bell rang. Lunch was over.
The pottery crates were indeed heavier than expected.
Each contained multiple items wrapped in straw and cloth, packed with a density that spoke of expensive cargo and careful shipping. The crates bore stamps indicating origin from somewhere called the Gargas Islands, known—according to Thomas's muttered commentary—for their distinctive blue-glazed ceramics.
"Careful with those," Hendricks warned. "Each broken piece comes out of the team's wages. Split evenly."
They worked more slowly now, Lucian and Marcus lifting each crate with exaggerated care. The psychological weight of potential financial penalty added to the physical burden.
Three crates from the end of the pottery shipment, Riley came running.
"Mr. Hendricks!" The boy's voice cracked with urgency. "There's something wrong with crate forty-seven!"
Everyone froze.
Hendricks moved immediately, his casual demeanor evaporating. "Show me."
They followed Riley to where a pottery crate sat on the pier, seemingly identical to all the others they'd unloaded. But as Lucian approached, he felt it—a subtle wrongness that raised the hairs on his arms. The air around the crate seemed somehow thicker, as if reality itself had become viscous.
Hendricks pulled a small brass device from his pocket—similar to what Lucian had seen the church official use yesterday, though simpler in design. He held it near the crate, and the device's needle spun wildly before settling on a red mark.
"Contaminated," Hendricks said flatly. "Everyone back. Riley, run and get Galvin. Tell him we need a church official immediately."
The boy sprinted away. The remaining workers retreated to what they hoped was a safe distance, though none seemed certain what "safe" meant in this context.
"What's in it?" Thomas asked, his notebook forgotten for once.
"Don't know. Don't care." Hendricks kept his eyes on the crate, his brass device still pointed at it. "Could be something that slipped past inspection at the origin port. Could be something that became contaminated during transit. Either way, it's above our authority."
Lucian studied the crate from his position fifteen feet away. It looked ordinary—just weathered wood and metal banding. But that feeling persisted, a subtle pressure against his senses that shouldn't exist.
'This is what contamination feels like,' he noted clinically. 'Not visual. Not audible. Something else. A sixth sense humans aren't supposed to have.'
Except he had it. And judging by the way Kaal had also stepped back without being told, he had it too.
Galvin arrived minutes later, moving with surprising speed for his age. He took one look at Hendricks's brass device and swore. "Church of Storms or Evernight?"
"Storm's closer," Hendricks said.
"Get them. And someone find Captain Tellis on the Meridian Runner. She's going to have questions about how her cargo got contaminated."
The next twenty minutes felt simultaneously endless and instantaneous. Workers stood in clusters, speaking in low voices, casting nervous glances at the isolated crate. Ships continued loading and unloading at other piers, but Pier Seven had gone quiet, everyone aware that something dangerous was in their midst.
Riley returned with a church official—not the man from yesterday, but a woman in gray robes marked with lightning bolt symbols. She was perhaps thirty, with severe features and the kind of posture that suggested military training. A short sword hung at her hip, and she carried a leather satchel over one shoulder.
"Storm Cleric Vasquez," she announced, her voice crisp with authority. "Everyone maintain distance. Foreman, what are we dealing with?"
Galvin showed her Hendricks's brass device readings. Vasquez frowned, produced her own—much more elaborate—detection equipment, and began a methodical examination of the crate.
Lucian watched her work with fascination. She moved with practiced efficiency, her hands tracing patterns in the air that left brief, glowing traces. Not the golden light of the naval officer or the silver of Sister Marisol, but something bluish-white that crackled like static electricity.
'Different churches have different abilities,' he observed. 'Or different tools. The lightning patterns suggest storm association—electricity, weather, perhaps wind?'
Vasquez completed her examination and turned to Galvin. "The contamination is contained within the crate. Moderate threat level. Whatever's inside has been exposed to something from the spirit world—likely during transit through a storm. The Meridian Runner sailed through the Sonia Sea, correct?"
"According to the manifest," Galvin confirmed.
"That explains it. The Sonia Sea has thin points in the spiritual barrier. Ships passing through sometimes collect... attachments." Vasquez pulled a sealed glass vial from her satchel, its contents swirling with that same bluish-white light. "I'll neutralize the contamination. Standard procedure. The cargo itself is probably destroyed, but the crate can be salvaged."
She approached the crate, uncorking the vial. The light poured out, expanding into a sphere that engulfed the entire crate. Thunder rumbled—impossible thunder from a clear sky—and the pressure Lucian had felt vanished as if it had never existed.
Vasquez corked the vial again. "Neutralized. You can resume work."
She left with the same crisp efficiency she'd arrived with, not waiting for thanks.
Galvin exhaled slowly. "Right. Back to it. Marcus, you and Thomas open that crate. Carefully. We need to document the damage for insurance purposes."
They opened the crate to find pottery shattered within, the pieces covered in a thin layer of what looked like frost despite the warm day. Whatever had contaminated the cargo had also destroyed it.
"Total loss," Thomas recorded in his notebook. "Estimated value based on similar cargo: three pounds, seven bronze."
That was more money than Lucian would earn in two months.
The Meridian Runner's captain—a weathered woman in her fifties with sun-damaged skin and calculating eyes—arrived to inspect the damage. Her conversation with Galvin involved raised voices and threats of legal action, though Lucian couldn't hear the details.
Eventually she stormed back to her ship, and Galvin returned to the workers with a grim expression.
"Captain's claiming the contamination happened at port, which means it's Harbor Authority's responsibility. Harbor Authority will claim it happened during transit, which makes it the ship's problem. They'll argue about it for months." He waved a hand dismissively. "Not our concern. Get back to work. We're behind schedule."
They returned to hauling pottery crates, each one now requiring a moment of hesitation as workers checked for that subtle wrongness. The incident had cost them perhaps thirty minutes, but the psychological impact lingered.
Riley worked with renewed nervousness, jumping at every sound. Thomas counted crates with even more obsessive attention to detail. Marcus remained steady, but Lucian noticed him giving each crate extra space, leaving wider margins for error.
They finished the pottery by mid-afternoon and moved on to the grain sacks—heavy burlap bags that required two men to lift and left a fine dust coating everything they touched. By the time the six o'clock bell rang, Lucian's entire body felt like it had been disassembled and poorly reassembled.
Galvin distributed wages at his office, doling out copper coins from a locked box. Five pieces each, as promised. The coins were warm in Lucian's hand, tangible proof of survival.
They stopped at a small market stall on the way back to Mrs. Marsh's building. The market was a chaotic affair—temporary structures and carts crowding the narrow streets, vendors calling out prices for everything from vegetables to secondhand clothing.
Kaal purchased bread—fresh this time, not the hard dock variety—and a small wedge of cheese that wasn't as tangy as Mrs. Marsh's. Lucian bought two apples from an old woman whose prices were written on a chalkboard in numbers only, no words needed.
Total expenditure: three copper coins. Remaining: seven.
They walked through the evening crowds, anonymous among hundreds of other workers making their way home. The city felt different now—not less foreign, but more comprehensible. They were part of its rhythm, however small their role.
Mrs. Marsh was already home when they arrived, sitting at the small table in the common room she shared with three other residents. She was sewing something by lamplight, her needle moving with mechanical precision despite her obvious exhaustion.
"You survived," she said without looking up.
"Barely," Kaal admitted.
"First week is always hardest. Your bodies will adapt." She finished a seam and bit off the thread. "Did you see anything strange?"
Lucian and Kaal exchanged glances. "Contaminated cargo," Lucian said finally. "Church official came and neutralized it."
Mrs. Marsh nodded as if this was expected. "Happens more often lately. The spiritual world is unsettled, people say. Echoes from the Fifth Epoch's end." She set aside her sewing and stood, moving to a small cupboard. "Here. For the blisters."
She handed them a small tin of ointment that smelled of herbs and something medicinal. "Rub it on your hands before sleep. Won't heal them, but it'll help prevent infection. Can't work if your hands are festering."
"Thank you," Lucian said. "How much do we owe you?"
"Nothing. Consider it an investment. If you can't work, you can't pay rent." She returned to her sewing with the air of someone who'd said all that needed saying.
They retreated to their room. Lucian applied the ointment to his blistered palms, the cool sensation a relief against the burning. His reflection in the window glass showed someone who looked more tired than he remembered being, even accounting for the previous day's observation work.
Kaal sat on his bed, counting their remaining coins. "Seven copper. We need to give Mrs. Marsh thirty by Sunday. That's five days away. Five copper per day each means we'll have fifty copper total by then. Twenty left over after rent."
"Assuming we don't miss any work. Assuming we don't get injured. Assuming no other expenses arise." Lucian flexed his hands, feeling the ointment sink into his skin. "We're operating on margins too thin to accommodate any mistakes."
"Most people here are," Kaal observed. "Riley's entire family depends on him earning five copper a day. Thomas lost everything because of one accounting error. Marcus probably has his own desperate situation. This city runs on desperation."
Lucian moved to the window, looking out over the Stacks. Lights were coming on in windows, creating a constellation of human life struggling against darkness. Somewhere a child was crying. Somewhere someone was laughing. The sounds of survival and persistence.
"We heard more today," he said quietly. "About the spiritual world. Thin points in reality. Contamination from things bleeding through. Storm Cleric Vasquez manipulated energy like it was natural as breathing."
"She was a Beyonder," Kaal said. "Had to be. Normal people don't summon lightning from their hands."
"Which means Beyonders are real, documented positions. The churches employ them. They have ranks—Cleric suggests a hierarchy. They have specialized tools and abilities." Lucian turned from the window. "And we need to understand that system. Not just to survive, but to understand why we're here. What we are."
A knock interrupted them. Mrs. Marsh stood in the doorway, holding a folded piece of paper.
"This was slipped under the building's door," she said, her expression troubled. "It's addressed to 'the new arrivals in room twelve.' That's you."
She handed Lucian the paper and left without another word.
The paper was cheap, the kind used for common correspondence. But the handwriting was precise, educated:
You were noticed at the docks today. Your reaction to the contaminated crate revealed more than you intended. We should talk. Come to the Brass Compass tomorrow evening, eight o'clock. Come alone—both of you, but separately. Don't bring attention.
A friend with answers.
No signature. No identifying marks.
Lucian handed the note to Kaal, watching his friend's expression shift from curiosity to concern.
"It could be a trap," Kaal said.
"It probably is," Lucian agreed. "But it's also the first lead we've had about what we are and why we're here."
"So we go?"
Lucian thought about Storm Cleric Vasquez's efficiency. About Sister Marisol's cold mercy. About the churches that monitored mysterious arrivals and executed those deemed contaminated.
They were exposed. Someone had noticed them reacting to something normal people shouldn't be able to sense. Their window of anonymity was already closing.
"We go," he decided. "But carefully. Very carefully."
That night, Lucian dreamed of fog and distant voices calling names he almost remembered. He dreamed of a vast gray castle with doors that opened onto nothing. He dreamed of a figure with eyes like distant stars, reaching toward him with hands that weren't quite solid.
He woke with his heart racing and the certain knowledge that something was watching him.
But when he looked around the room, there was only Kaal, still asleep, and the gray light of dawn creeping through the cracks in the walls.
Just another morning in Port Vedas.
Just another day of survival.