(Song prompt for this chapter: The Money Song from Monty Python. Y0u may laugh, yes.)

The rains had come in torrents, bringing the much-needed relief to Carthage. Jars were dragged out in prospect of collecting the wet manna from the heavens, streams of water trickling down the earthen sides. Children jumped into deep puddles, drenched head to toe. Mothers made no efforts to stop them- they merely smiled and watched the rain descend.


Jan knew of the rain, and hated it with a burning passion. When he woke to the sound of it pelting on the roof above his head that morning, he had bit off a particularly nasty curse under his breath.

Rain spelt the end of the talks between the water merchants of the oasis and the Heidrich family. Water trading- a lucrative trade especially in the dry desert was something that the Family definitely could not help not dabbling in. The economy for it had certainly floundered- they were even more filthy rich than they were. Not that they needed to prove it; apparently, everyone took it for granted that the most influential family of Carthage had the inherent right to increase their own wealth however they saw fit. Idiots in a row.

Bloody hell. Twenty years in servitude and he’d already started thinking like them.

He kicked off the blanket, flinching as the cold air hit his skin. Sleeping amidst the rain was like drinking rat piss- possible to do if you were desperate but unimaginable otherwise. The servants’ quarters were riddled with so many leaks that one could as well be sleeping outside and not notice the difference. He swung his legs over one end of the bed, surreptitiously kicking the occupant of the bunk under him.

“Get up, idiot.”

There was a groan from below and the sound of creaking metal as limbs came into contact with the bunk edges. A swear followed. “Too bloody early. Go back to sleep.”

The servants’ bell sounded somewhere in the distance, a persistent clanging that rose even the most deadened of sleepers to a half-awake stupor. The darkness outside was still prevalent, but one could already hear the shuffling in the room as others forsook their threadbare blankets and sheets to greet the dismal weather. No time for extra rest- everything had to be put into place and perfected down to the last detail before any of the Family awoke. It was the prevalent mindset ingrained into each of them since they had entered into servitude with the Heidrich. There was no place for tardiness, no place for one to slack unless they had a wish to be nonexistent.

Slaves, as Jan’s kind was usually called, dwelt at the bottom of the food chain. The only thing lower than them were the outcasts, those who had no place in society. They were those whom had come in contact with the Under grounders (via forced or other means, it was negligible) and were considered ‘unclean’- disregarded by anyone whom they came in contact with save for their own next-of-kin who were probably living in equally squalid conditions as them anyway. No one wanted to be an untouchable.

Jan leapt off the top bunk, giving little regard for the surprised yell of his bunkmate when the entire bunk structure gave a most horrific groan, sounding as if it was all going to come apart. It wasn’t his usual manner to play the tolerant jester for a man that snored with the magnitude of a thousand simultaneous sandstorms. At least, not in the mornings in which he’d leap off the bed and land in water.

Puddles of water had formed on the hard dirt floor, mixing with the pre-existing sand and soil to form a thin muddy layer on the floor. The slush hit the soles of his feet, covering them with mud that reached to his calves. Jan could only manage a most bemused look in the darkness as he lifted a foot out of the sticky material.

His bottom bunkmate, hacked a half-laugh-half-cough from his reclined position upon hearing the splash.

“Always told you not to jump like a damn grasshopper all over,” he howled gleefully as he sat up to dangle his legs over the side of the bed. “Damn kid’s too hyper for his own good. Damn, it’s dark. Can’t we have some light here?”

A patronising candle was lit somewhere in the room, bathing the room in weak light. The other occupants in the room gave feeble complaints about the intrusive light on their retinas, but were promptly ignored as he stuck his head forward to study the water. He whistled.

“If this were all drinkable, we’d make a fortune storing and selling it off when the rains stop,” he commented conversationally. “Imagine! D’you reckon we could filter off most of the filth and still keep all this to sell?”

Jan was far too busy trying to make his way out of the door and to the communal bath than to entertain insane ramblings of a man who seemed fixated enough on selling the murky water that everyone was currently soaking their stinking feet in. It wasn’t as if he was missing out on anything. He’d throw in his last few cents on a bet that the talk he was ignoring at the moment wasn’t one from the next revolutionist of Carthage’s bumbling economy. Idiots remained idiots at this level of society.

The water sloshed around his legs as he waded through the seemingly impenetrable flooded floor. It certainly had made it harder for everyone to move around, so if he exerted a little more effort, he’d probably be able to get a spot in the bath before it was filled up for the next hour or so. He shuffled out of the door.

His bunkmate followed not long behind, muttering to himself in quiet tones. “There’s nothing quite as wonderful as money, there’s nothing quite as beautiful as cash…”

——

The second Heidrich son seemed predisposed enough that morning on making his biannual journey to the neighbouring oasis despite being faced with the pelting rain and rising water levels outside. Pleading words from the harsh-faced Madam were duly ignored as he announced his intentions to the entire Family at the breakfast table. It was notable that he had somehow forgotten to state the fact that the festival celebrating the coming of the rain was to held in the town of the oasis that very night.

“I shall go and close the talks,” he had proclaimed with a wave of his delicately decorated glass. A little tea spilled over the rim when of his glass when he gestured dramatically, staining the pristine tablecloth with a widening brown blot. He gave no notice to the spillage, only pausing to bat away the servants that had appeared to clean the puddle.

“Go away!” he hissed, flapping his hands in an almost bad parody of an ostrich attempting to take flight. More tea slopped down on the tablecloth. “You have all day to scrub like maniacs when I’m not around. Don’t touch me with your filthy hands!”

They retreated, cowed.

However, one had to admit that he at least kept to his word. After the hefty breakfast, eleven servants had been ordered to escort him on his so-called ‘journey’ to the oasis: five a side to tote the carry-carriage and one to hold an umbrella over his head once he stepped out. There seemed no reason (at least to him) why he should be wet when there were enough to shelter him from the rain that drenched all his servants from head to toe. There was no reason as well as to why the lowly servants should be offered cover when they were all given roofs over their head thanks to his own family.

They lived to serve him, not vice versa. He’d be damned if he had to slog it out there in the rain just to comfort them like tiny children.

And that was Jan’s fate for today- trotting like an obedient workhorse in calf-high water while one-tenth of a Heidrich’s weight rested on his shoulders. The rain didn’t bother him so much as the fact that he was giving his spine heavyweight duty for the sake of a man who refused to get wet. The idea itself was insane. The man was insane.

He had a good mind to let go of the pole that he was supporting on one shoulder and watch the kindly young master enjoy the wonders of feeling murky water swirling around his feet. It would bring him back to his years of naiveté and childhood, he was sure.

“Tch,” he muttered under his breath, swiping limp strands of his blond bangs back. The rain seemed to show no sign of letting up, though it had been a hefty 3 hours since it first started. There was going to be another of those flash floods again- Carthage had seen a particularly bad one last year when half the stalls in the marketplace had been swept away. Those toting the carriage behind him murmured similar sentiments, expressing worry for their families that didn’t stay in the servants’ quarters. Money was one thing; lives were another.

The pole on his shoulder wobbled dangerously as the Heidrich son shifted in the carriage, yelling out another round of instructions. Apparently, they were moving too slow and he could hire palm trees that grew faster than all of them brought together. He could hear them all talking, which apparently disturbed his thinking process.

Funny that he could think while hearing the rain hit the roof of the carriage.

Their pace quickened, though laced with suitable wariness about their footing. The flow of water was far too fast for one to be able to even walk at a normal pace in normal circumstances and a slip would spell disaster. It wasn’t the question of being swept away- well yes, there was that possibility of losing one’s footing and being swept down to the oceans that apparently lay miles away from Carthage with a daunting journey back- but something else in the mind of others at the moment. No one wanted to be the first to be dismissed from the Heidrichs’ service.

Rule number one of Carthage society: If you’re low, don’t try to get lower.

It was bad enough that all of them were so-called slaves. No one wanted to make it worse by being an unemployed slave and having to mix around with the untouchables.

(And in Carthage amidst the rising water and perched precociously on a table, Lukas sneezed.)

The rain kept on coming, like tiny bits of stone thrown from the heavens.
It was inevitable. A warning cry rose to warn of the accidental slip, and the remaining nine staggered as the pressure on their shoulders increased twicefold. The weight on the shoulders rose to an excruciating point. Knees bent, straining against the slippery ground, hands released.

The carriage hit the ground in knee-high water.