XI

Age 13

Kameiwa Prison was a men's-only facility located on Hoshido's Kumanoha Peninsula, located roughly 150 miles east of the border with Nohr.

Notable for being the largest prison in Hoshido, it was a main source of employment for Kumanoha locals. The prison could officially house up to 12,000 inmates—though it's censes data rarely reflected its actual populace. Many ex-convicts could speak extensively to it's overcrowding and lack of resources.

During his 12-year reign, King Ryoma cracked down on communities who did not conform to Hoshido's cultural ideal; the Flame Tribe was chief among them, and their villages were targeted for a food redistribution policy designed to slowly funnel resources away from the tribe to the mainland. Flame Tribesmen caught trying to circumvent the policy were captured and sent to Kameiwa.

In the weeks following King Ryoma's death, King Takumi instituted a policy relocating Hoshido's Nohrian minority to pre-designated enclaves in the country's inland, splitting up families and marching communities at the border from their ancestral homes. The majority complied, because those who did not were captured and sent to Kameiwa.

Village life was difficult for even the most traditionally-minded Hoshidans. Those who were convicted of theft, gang activity, trafficking, smuggling, bootlegging, conspiring with Nohrian agents, or in any way acting out of accordance with Hoshido's Objective Harmony Statement were captured and sent to Kameiwa.

Warden Reina was appointed to her position by King Sumeragi after her exemplary performance as a general during the Second Hoshidan Civil War. It was said that she believed social harmony was only attainable if self-determination wasn't worth its potential cost. She instituted a number of in-house measures in accordance with that philosophy.

For example: prisoners who became ill and vomited were forced to eat their waste. They were then locked in solitary confinement for a week without food or water. The ones who survived the ordeal were outnumbered by those who did not.

For example: the penalty for contacting anyone on the outside for any reason was the loss of a finger—for the outsider. For the inmate the penalty was castration, because only a weak-willed eunuch needed "hope" and "encouragement".

For example: at the start of each week, Warden Reina's personal assistant chose ten convict numbers at random to be hung in the prison courtyard. Nicknamed the Hanging Square, corpses would be kept there until the weight of their bloat caused the ropes to snap.

There were a number of tools available to guards to discipline inmates who chose to provoke. Whips, ropes, thoron rods, shackles, and isolation chambers were a handful of many.

The prison was comprised of two sections. Before Reina's tenure prisoners were simply placed wherever there was spare room, but under her management she designated that the west wing be for Nohrian inmates, and the east wing for Hoshidans. This was done to exacerbate the existing animosity between the two groups and discourage any collaboration.

In the spring of the first year of King Takumi's reign, the ages of Kameiwa's prisoners ranged from 3 to 74, with a median age of 36.

5996-8216.

Percy caught sight of the number as the blacksmith arranged the small bolded letterplates. His face was swelled over pink from how hard he cried when the prison guards forced him to strip and lie down on the blacksmith's table. They tied him there with bolts around his ankles, wrists waist and neck. Percy's heart was jackhammering in his chest. It was hard to breathe.

The blacksmith took the block of numbers and heated them over the brazier until they became red-hot. He walked back over to Percy, looming over him like an apparition, haggard face mostly stoic but containing threads of contempt. Without warning he pressed the numbers hard into the center of his chest.

Percy's scream wretched up from the pit of his stomach. Smoke rose from the cite of the branding. The blacksmith held steady while Percy struggled, leathery face hard with determination as if trying to stab Percy through with the block.

It was ten seconds that felt like an eternity. When the blocks were finally lifted the pain that had been focused on his chest radiated out to his midsection and arms, reaching as far down as his fingertips. Percy continued to wail his agony as his burn wounds glistened angrily in the open air.

The blacksmith undid his bindings and ordered Percy to get up. When Percy did not, the guards who had been standing by at the door marched over, bound his wrists with rope, and dragged him off to endure his first punishment for insubordination.

It was Warden Reina's belief that lukewarm punishments only lead to recidivism.

Percy was a foreign inmate accused of attempted kidnapping and trafficking; his actions were so brazen that they caught the attention of a royal family member. That he disobeyed a direct order so soon after arriving only spoke to his exceptionally willful spirit. They would break him of that.

They took Percy to a solitary cell and tied him by the wrists to some overhead bars, using their leather straps to whip him with hard, quick blows. Still reeling from the branding, Percy could do little else but sob wordlessly as he tried to dodge their hits. He missed a few, but it was never enough. He couldn't escape.

When they broke skin, one of the guards got so worked up at the sight of blood that he pounced on Percy, slapping his face and burn wound, punching him in the gut, kicking his groin and then laughing at the scream it tore out of him. The others soon joined in and they worked Percy over like a punching bag, like a training dummy, like one of the Hanging Square corpses they'd use as target practice. After a while he stopped crying and went limp.

Growing up, Felicia and Arthur never spanked him. He and Dwyer didn't play-fight. He was never involved in any Ice-Flame skirmishes. Even Beruka always used a training weapon on him. The branding and beating was so far beyond anything he had ever experienced that he was simply overwhelmed. He felt like an oozing sack of meat, agony permeating his skin and his insides and down into his very soul. Only when he wet himself did they leave him alone, bound bleeding and naked in a standing position.

They left him there until the next day.

At that point it was a week since he had last eaten. They knew he couldn't move his limbs so he was dragged out into a secluded open area, sun glaring down on his exposed body. A prison sorcerer dosed him with an intense water spell whose pressure sent him skidding across the ground. He hit the wall hard and could only whimper as every bit of dirt-blood-piss-shit was hosed off.

When he was cleaned to their satisfaction, one of them came over and dragged a shirt down over his head, grabbing his hands and roughly pulling them through the sleeves. Percy moaned from some deep place in his throat, unable to do anything to alleviate the infinity of torture radiating from his arms. The guard dressed Percy in a pair of pants that matched his shirt, shackled his ankle to the wall, and threw a handful of undercooked rice at his feet.

It took him over an hour to worm over to the rice. He ate it off the ground like an animal.

Another two days passed before someone came to see him.

The guards thus far had all blended together—just tentacles of some larger beast—but there was something different about the man who came to see Percy on that third day. He wore his wavy salt-and-pepper hair slicked back, warm amber eyes peering down on him with… pity? Endearment? Compassion? His shoulders were broad enough to block out the guards behind him, and for the first time since coming to Hoshido Percy felt like he could breathe again.

He crouched down to meet Percy at eye-level. "You may call me Saito. I'm a part of Kameiwa's Promotion of Harmony and Prevention of Discord Unit. I'm here to check in on you."

Check in on him? Percy never expected anyone here to show him any concern. Perhaps this 'Saito' was only following orders, but Percy still flirted with the idea of reaching for his hand.

"Are you able to sit up?" Saito asked.

Percy tried, but his arms were still too weak to support his body weight. When Saito saw him struggling he helped Percy straighten himself, smiling indulgently when the boy was finally sitting on his bottom. "Is that better?"

Percy nodded.

"Excellent. Now tell me, have you been given rice three times a day?"

"Yes."

"And water twice a day?"

"Yes."

Saito held up two fingers. "Tell me how many you see."

"Five."

"Five?"

"Yeah." Percy dared a grin. "Two up and three down."

Saito, of all things, rolled his eyes. "My son made that same quip, once."

"But I'm not wrong."

"And neither was he." Percy could tell Saito was trying not to smile. His eyes traveled down to the cite of Percy's brand, the burn still glistening raw. "5996-8216. What a mouthful. I tried to tell the warden we ought to skip this ugly process and just call you by your given names, but she's very resistant to change. Memorizing these irksome numbers is such a nuisance."

"In that case, you can call me Percy."

"'Percy'," Saito repeated, his inflection reminding him of how Arthur pronounced his name. "Short for Percival, meaning 'piercer of the valley'. A classic Nohrian name."

"I'm not Nohrian!"

"Oh? You have a Hoshidan parent?"

"Ugh, no way." He shrank when he saw Saito's placid expression twist into a sneer. "Sorry, I didn't mean it to come out like that. I just meant… um, nevermind. I'm a member of the Ice Tribe."

Saito's eyebrows rose. "The Ice Tribe. That's not something you see every day."

Something about the way Saito said that made Percy feel one-of-a-kind.

Saito frowned, petting Percy's head in a matter that was almost affectionate. "If I'm to understand correctly, your people have been at war with the Flame Tribe for over five years now, correct?"

"Yes."

Saito's eyes softened. "That must have been a nightmare for you. I'm so sorry."

No outsider—not Queen Mozu or Beruka or Lady Camilla or even Ophelia—ever told him that before. He didn't think anyone not already part of the Ice Tribe could care about them enough to express sympathy. "Thanks… but I'm alright." Percy forced a smile. "I had my pops, and lots of nice folks looking after me."

"It warms me to hear that. It's good to be surrounded by friends in trying times." Saito nodded, tension leaving his face. "Percy, I like you. I think we'd make splendid friends. Do you agree?"

Percy leaned forward, nodded eagerly. Yes—Saito was nice, and Percy wanted a friend so very, very badly.

"Wonderful. I like making friends, it helps things run smoothly. It's what my unit is for: to make sure everyone follows the rules so Kameiwa can remain as peaceful as possible."

"So, you… maintain order? A-and justice?"

Saito smiled serenely. "Most definitely. I can tell you're the sort who values justice, because I am as well. It's why we enforce our rules here at Kameiwa."

"Rules?"

"Ah, yes. The rules. It's simple: just work hard, listen to everything the guards order you to do, and don't cause trouble. Do that, and I'm sure your 15-year sentence will go by in a flash."

Percy's mouth suddenly felt dry. "15… years?"

"Yes. Isn't it grand?" Saito grinned like the sun, slapping Percy's shoulder. "The standard sentence for attempted kidnapping is 30, but Lady Hinoka instructed the warden to keep your sentence light. Believe me, that almost never happens!"

Percy could hardly wrap his head around 15 years, let along double that. He'd be 28 by the time he got out—an old man! "But… I didn't do anything…"

"I know you believe that—and in my experience, what is right and true always makes itself known in the end. But while you're here, obedience is your key to a better life." Saito stood up. "I'll recommend that you be given meat and vegetables… as well as a healing session with one of our shrine maidens. By the will of the Gods, you should be right as rain in a matter of days."

Saito visited Percy every day until he was well again. True to his prediction, Percy was able to stand on his own again by the end of the week.

"This is what I love about young people," Saito murmured, eyeing Percy over. "No matter the injury, you always bounce back."

"All thanks to you!" Percy looked at Saito over his shoulder, smiling in a way he hadn't since he came to Hoshido. "I couldn't ask for a better pal!"

"Yes, well." Saito cleared his throat, straightening his uniform jacket. "Looks like you're well enough to be taken to your cell."

"My cell?"

"Yes." The doors of his confinement pen opened, guards stepping aside. "It's where you'll be kept when you're not out on the field."

"Oh." Percy struggled to keep along with Saito's long strides. "How big is it?"

"10 by 10 feet. Enough to fit you and your two roommates."

"I… I'm gonna have to stay in a room with a couple of criminals?"

"Naturally. This is a prison after all." Saito patted his head reassuringly. "You'll be housed in the Nohrian block."

"But I'm not—"

"I know, but as far as the warden is concerned, everyone west of the border is Nohrian. But buck up, things are much better than they used to be. Had you come just a few years ago, you might have wound up in the same cell as a Hoshidan, or gods forbid a Flame Tribesmen—"

Percy stopped dead in his tracks. Saito stopped as well, giving Percy a look that was curious overall but contained strains of suspicion. "Those people are here?" he whispered, aghast.

Saito nodded. "A rowdy bunch, them. Four out of the five riots we had last year were started by those fiery upstarts. But we rooted out the worst of them, and life here has been far more harmonious ever since." He waved Percy forward. "Come along."

"This is cell #927." Saito brought out a pair of keys from his waist pocket, opening the metal doors.

Inside were two men much older than Percy—in their late 30s at least. One of them sneered scornfully when he saw Percy enter behind Saito. "A fucking kid? Really?"

Saito smiled tightly. "Percy, meet your new roommates—Nichol," he motioned to the man the one who spoke, "and Hans."

Nichol lifted his hand and waved absently, not looking up from the book he was pouring over.

"Fuckin perfect," Hans continued. "First you stick me in with this bottom bitch bookworm, and now you bring in a kid. How young is he, anyway? His sack even drop yet?"

Saito strode over to where Hans sat at the bottom bunk, hands clasped tight behind his back. "I'll remind you that Warden Reina sorts housing in such a way to maximize harmony. If she deems you three be a good fit—"

"What's he in for?" Hans interrupted. He rose from his seat, and Percy saw he was at least a head taller than Saito. "Stealing a teddy bear from the variety store? Or is he guilty of living by the border and wanting to stay in his own goddamn house?"

"Oh, Hans," Saito sighed. "You know I stay out of politics."

"Yeah. Lucky you."

"If you would, show the boy how things work around here. Depending on how he turns out, I might be able to arrange a nice little reward for you."

"I don't need your fucking bribery."

"What a shame. I so prefer the carrot over the stick." Saito had his back turned to the door, so Percy couldn't see his expression when he leaned in close to Hans and said, "beware, prisoner: I'm close friends with Warden Reina's personal assistant, and her numbers aren't always chosen at random." He took a step back. "You'd do better to remember where you are, 3498-1938."

Hans ground his teeth so hard it was auditable, face red and taut as a blister. Saito turned back to Percy, unlocking his chains. "Do your best, my boy. We'll speak soon."

Saito left cell #927, locking the door behind him. Once they heard the heavy steel doors of their cell block open and close again, Hans grabbed Percy's arm and yanked him closer. "'We'll speak soon'?" he repeated. "You in his pocket?"

"H-huh?!"

"Listen close, bitch!" Hans barked, spittle flying. "Are you here to spy? Is he paying you off?!"

Saito hadn't given him any money, so Percy could only assume the answer was no. He wildly shook his head.

"Did he say he wanted to be 'friends' with you? 'Cause let me tell you, you can't be 'friends' with him and me at the same fuckin' time."

"He… he did, but—"

"I knew it!" He slammed Percy up against the wall, twisting his arm behind his back. Percy cried out in pain. Nichol didn't do so much as look up from his book.

Every fiber of Percy's being wanted to yell back, punch Hans in the groin, knee him in the face until justice had been served. But Percy knew where he was. All the other guards had proven to be heartless beyond measure, and Saito wasn't around all the time. Until the truth came out—as it always did—Percy knew he needed his roommates to at least be okay with his presence. "I didn't… I didn't say anything about you!" he cried, voice pinched.

"No shit you didn't say anything about me, we only met 3 minutes ago. But what did you tell him about you?"

"I…" Percy scanned the open air wracking his brain for the right answer. "Not much—"

"'Not much' isn't 'nothing'. What did you say?"

"Why do you care?!" Percy bit back.

"I wanna know what he has on you, what he can use as leverage." Hans spun him back around so they were facing each other, planting both hands on either side of Percy's face. "Spill it, worm!"

Percy took a deep breath, steeling himself. He remembered back during his training with Beruka, he once asked what he should do if he ever encountered an enemy he was truly terrified of. Just remember, she said in her low, dispassionate voice, that past all their bluster, your enemies are just as human as you: lost, afraid, and destined to die alone.

He made eye contact with Hans, his fellow human being. "Just my name and where I'm from."

"No way that old bitch let you walk away with just that," Hans sneered.

"He did."

Hans clenched and raised his fist. "Little twerp—!"

"You know, Hans," Nichol interrupted. "It's entirely possible Saito has no information on the boy, because he realized he didn't need it." He set his book aside. "Are your parents here, boy?"

"No."

"Where are they?"

"My mom died when I was 8, and my dad's back in Nohr."

"And there you have it: the boy's looking for a parental figure. Someone as astute as Saito likely deduced that before the boy even said two words to him. Listen here, Percy: you're going to see a lot of things happen in this cell. If you value your head, you won't breathe a word of it to Saito no matter how persistently he asks." Nichol rose, his wiry anatomy all bones and lean muscle. He stared his nose down at Percy. "I already have a life sentence, and I'm not afraid to die. Snuffing out a rat like you would just be another day for me."

Percy didn't sleep at all that night.

Things were far too noisy for that. He hadn't noticed it while Hans and Nichol had him on the ropes, but their cell block was abuzz with sound: prisoners talking, guards barking orders, screaming, tussles breaking out, bodies slammed against wooden floors and steel bars and over banister rails. Their cells were locked but that appeared to be mostly a formality, an allusion of competence masking the free reign the prisoners otherwise had. Hans and Nichol easily picked it and headed out about an hour after his arrival, citing some business they needed to attend to; they told Percy, between fits of barely concealed laughter, to shout for them if anyone tried to 'bother' him.

Percy didn't know what he feared more: the authoritarian guards or the anarchistic prison population. He finally decided they were equally awful, two hammers poised to come down and crush him on either side.

But even if the guards were kind and the cell doors worked, Percy still wouldn't have been able to rest. The Sun was out all the time in Hoshido, and it's harsh beams glared down on Percy from their room's overhead window. Closing his eyes did little to help, the Sun's glow burning angry orange behind his lids.

He missed Nohr and it's darkness. He missed the Moon and all Her stars. He missed the cold and the wind and being able to go anywhere at any time, with the reasonable expectation that he could do so without being attacked. He wished he could hold Ophelia's hand again, or serve the young royals their breakfast, or pour Queen Mozu her afternoon tea. It was strange—when he first arrived at Krakenburg as a servant, he never imagined he would long for it one day. Some part of him wondered if the future him—the Percy of 5 or 12 or 37 years from now—would one day miss Kameiwa. Could there be a place on Earth worse than this? It was certainly possible. If there was one thing life had taught him thus far, was life could always get worse.

Maybe there was a prison out there where captives were held underground, naked in the cold, beaten everyday as routine, tortured and sexed on and starved so bad people had to eat each other's carcasses just to survive. He tried to picture that place, that Worse-Than-Kameiwa, a place fit only for the worst evildoers but in reality open to everyone. He was always told Lady Justice was blind, but Gods—was she really this fucking blind?

As they always did when he contemplated justice, Percy's thoughts shifted to Arthur. Much of what he believed about what was right and good came not from the Ice Tribe but from his pops, the hero of all heroes. Percy wondered what his father was doing now. Was he still fighting with Aunt Flora? Was he trying, against all odds, to free those captured women? Or did he wash his hands of it all, deciding to dedicate himself fulltime to Lady Elise's service once again?

Percy turned all these empty hypotheticals over in his head, ignoring the obvious truth: that right now Arthur was worried out of his mind, tearing the Underground apart trying to find his son. Percy knew deep down, past every willful delusion he ever had, that there was nothing else he could be doing. Trying to imagine Arthur's frenzied panic, or the desperation twisting his handsome features, was like trying to stare down Hoshido's Sun: painful, self-harming, impossible. There were some things only moms and dads could understand, and he knew the pain of having a missing child was certainly one of them.

He couldn't shake the thought that, far more than he ruined his own life, he had ruined Arthur's. Even if every other condition had been perfect, that certainty alone would steal sleep from him for years to come.

Staring down reality was a point of pride for Percy. But even he had his limits.

Prime Example: he refused to look into the conditions at Nohr's prisons. Ophelia hadn't ordered him to, and that was his excuse not to do it. Reminiscing about Kameiwa alone could send him into a days-long tailspin, and he knew that no matter how badly the Nohrians wanted to look down at Hoshido's oppressive honor code they were, in truth, not an ounce better. The Hoshidans crushed the weak to maintain social harmony; the Nohrians did it for money. In the end it all boiled down to cruelty, and who better to exercise that cruelty upon than convicted felons?

Percy didn't want to know.

He didn't want to know but by the Gods, Aunt Flora did. The Ice Tribe's population shifted dramatically during the war—less of the old guard, more Strangers, more kidnapped wives, more rape babies—and she was considering building a jail in Ice Village to house anyone who deliberately broke their codes. She meant for it to only be a temporary measure until the newest generation became fully assimilated, but Percy told her that would never happen. It just wouldn't. Separate the Strangers from their families now, and their children would only grow up more inclined to rebel, meaning they would also need to be locked away, leading to more fractured families down the line… he could tell Aunt Flora heard him but didn't truly grasp it, unable expand the scope of her worldview to include the concept of generational trauma. To her there was only generational harmony, the idyllic Ice Tribe that existed perhaps only in their memories—one Percy still sometimes longed for even after knowing the evil behind it all.

Aunt Flora said she would consider his words—but what else could she do besides build a prison? Percy told her if she really wanted to screw up the Ice Tribe that badly, then as chief that was her prerogative. But in that case… in that case—

"It would be more cost effective to make every crime a capital offense."