Morning did not bring relief.
It only made things visible.
The light crept over the holding area in thin layers, revealing what the dark had concealed rather than softened. Stakes driven into hard soil. Ropes stretched tight enough to bruise when pressed against skin. Carts positioned with deliberate spacing, their wheels sunk deep so they could not be moved quickly or quietly.
She rose when the chain did.
No command was given. The movement passed through the line the way tension traveled through metal—one body reacting to another, posture adjusting before thought had time to form.
Someone stumbled. Someone else caught them, not out of kindness, but because falling pulled everyone down.
The guards struck the chains with iron rods, sharp enough to rattle teeth. The sound was not meant to hurt. It was meant to remind.
They were marched a short distance from the pen toward a flattened stretch of ground where nothing grew. The soil there was packed smooth by repetition. Marks from countless boots overlapped until no single path remained.
This was where sorting happened.
They were ordered to stand in rows, chains of fifty aligned shoulder to shoulder. The guards paced slowly, eyes moving not over faces, but over posture, injuries, responsiveness.
Mara of the Wagons observed from a distance.
She carried no weapon. Her hands were clean. She spoke quietly to the clerk beside her, a woman holding a thick ledger bound in cracked leather. The clerk's fingers were stained with ink. Her eyes moved faster than her hand.
"Mark the ones that limp," Mara said. "Separate the coughing. I don't want rot spreading before the third checkpoint."
The clerk nodded and wrote.
She understood then that survival here was not about strength alone.
It was about usefulness.
The first group was pulled forward.
Five guards stepped in, unhooking the master locks with practiced speed. The chain loosened in segments, five people at a time peeled away and directed toward the carts.
She watched closely.
The locks were heavy but not complex. Identical teeth. Shared keys. A design meant for repetition, not resistance.
The people chosen first were young, broad-shouldered, quick to respond. They were given water immediately and pushed toward wagons marked with a crude symbol burned into the wood.
Road labor.
The next group contained those who moved slower but still stood upright. They were marched toward a different set of carts.
Field camps.
The third group was smaller.
The injured. The coughing. The ones who took too long to understand commands.
They were not beaten.
They were simply marked.
A strip of red cloth was tied loosely around their upper arms.
She saw Iren receive one.
The cloth did not mean death.
Not immediately.
It meant delay.
And delay, in war, was often worse.
When the sorting reached her section, a guard stopped in front of her and lifted her chin with two fingers. His grip was rough but not cruel.
"Eyes clear," he said to no one in particular.
Another guard pressed a thumb briefly into her side, just below the ribs. Testing for reaction.
She did not flinch.
The guard grunted and moved on.
She was not marked.
That meant nothing yet.
They were marched again, this time toward the far end of the holding area where a line of shallow trenches had been dug. Latrines. Wash basins filled with murky water. A place to be cleaned enough to continue working.
She knelt when ordered and splashed water over her hands and face. The cold bit sharply, driving the last of sleep away. She scrubbed until the smell lessened, though it did not disappear.
Nearby, Talo fumbled with his bowl, spilling water over his wrists. He muttered an apology to no one.
A guard kicked the bowl aside.
"Next," he said.
The boy swallowed hard and moved on.
They were fed again before midday.
This time, the porridge was thicker. More grain. Less water.
She noticed the difference.
Food distribution followed purpose, not mercy. Those selected for immediate transport were fed more. Those marked for delay received less.
Fuel was allocated where it would move fastest.
She ate slowly, watching the guards rather than her bowl. One of them argued quietly with another near the carts.
"They're sending word again," the first said. "Something's burning further east."
The second spat. "Always burning."
"Not like this."
Mara approached, voice cutting through the murmur. "If there's movement east, we adjust routes. We don't wait for orders that won't arrive."
She paused, eyes sweeping the pen.
"War doesn't pause," she added. "It only reroutes."
The phrase lingered.
It was not philosophy. It was procedure.
By afternoon, the heat became oppressive. Sweat soaked through clothes already stiff with dirt and blood. Flies gathered thickly, unafraid of hands waving them away.
Work resumed.
They were taken back to the field.
Not the same section as before.
This area held bodies that had been dead longer. Skin stretched tight or split open. Equipment scattered where it had fallen, rust already forming on exposed edges.
She worked without looking directly at faces.
Looking slowed hands.
As she lifted, she listened.
Guards spoke freely here, assuming no one listened closely enough to understand.
"They're pushing again on the western front."
"That makes three times this month."
"Doesn't matter. They'll pull back by winter."
"Why fight at all, then?"
There was a pause.
"Because stopping costs more."
That was the closest thing to an answer she heard all day.
A body slipped from someone's grip and struck the ground with a wet sound. The man cried out in shock rather than pain.
A guard struck him across the back.
"Pay attention," he said.
The man nodded frantically and returned to work.
No further punishment followed.
Mistakes were corrected, not avenged.
Efficiency again.
Later, as they dragged another cart toward the edge of the field, she noticed something new.
A line of scorched earth running diagonally across the ground. Not from fire. The soil there had fused into a brittle crust, cracked in unnatural patterns.
No bodies lay directly on it.
Guards walked around it without comment.
She filed the observation away.
Some damage was not meant to be touched.
As evening approached, the wind shifted. Smoke drifted in from somewhere distant. Not from fires here—those had burned out—but from something larger.
The guards grew more alert. Orders sharpened. Patrol patterns tightened.
They were marched back to the holding area as the sky darkened.
Water was rationed again.
This time, a fight broke out near the far end of the pen. Two men argued over position, tension snapping under exhaustion. One shoved the other.
The chain jerked violently.
A guard responded immediately, striking both men with equal force. They collapsed, gasping.
No attempt was made to determine fault.
The system punished disruption, not intent.
Night settled fully.
Torches were lit. Guards rotated. Keys clinked softly.
She lay down when ordered, chain pulling tight as bodies pressed together. The ground was colder than before, damp with evening moisture.
Nearby, someone whispered prayers in a language she did not recognize.
Further down the line, someone sobbed quietly.
She watched the guards instead of the sky.
She counted steps.
She counted pauses.
She counted how often attention drifted toward the wagons, toward the road, toward the distant glow on the horizon.
The chain system was not just iron and locks.
It was timing.
It was fatigue.
It was the way fear was distributed unevenly, applied where it would do the most work.
She understood now why escape failed so often.
Not because the restraints were unbreakable.
But because the system trained people to act at the wrong moment.
As the night deepened, a scream rose from beyond the wagons—short, sharp, then cut off.
The guards reacted instantly, forming tighter patterns.
Orders were shouted.
Torches flared.
She did not look toward the sound.
She watched the guards.
She watched how many moved.
She watched which directions were left thinner.
She did nothing.
Not yet.
The system rewarded patience before courage.
She intended to survive it.