The gods hate weakness. Khyan bit his lip, trying not to cry. The black mist around him was thick and dank. A palpable darkness. He lay huddled with his sister, shivering and hungry. They hadn't eaten in three, maybe four, days. "Mut, mut", his sister whimpered, but their mother never came. "Stop crying", scolded Khyan. "We must be strong. The gods hate weakness."

It came suddenly, the black mist. Well, not exactly suddenly. Nothing was sudden anymore. Since the fateful day they found blood in the water, they lived in fear of the next catastrophe, a perpetual foreboding. Infestation, disease, natural disaster. The gods were angry, that much was clear. The slaves were rebelling, the king undermined. They had been too soft, all of them. The gods hate weakness.

That's what his father always said. His father, who was brave and mighty and fierce. Who'd go off to the labour camp, with his whip and blood-encrusted boots. The gods hate weakness, he'd say. Just look at the slaves. Weak and cowardly, the lot of them. He had died a hero, quashing a mutiny at the camp. They say he killed five slaves with his dying breath.

The door creaked. Khyan started. A slave. There were rumours of them wandering about, looting under cover of darkness. Cowards. Khyan trembled. The gods hate weakness. He would be strong. He fumbled round for the first thing he could find, and crept toward the door. He felt the breath of another, heard a faint "please" in a foreign tongue. Then Khyan, brave and fierce like his father, plunged blindly into the darkness, striking with all his might. The slave fell, and Khyan after him, striking, striking, until he could feel the breath no more.

Khyan got up, the mist began to lift. He stared down at his bloody hands. He had been strong. Perhaps the gods have forgiven. Perhaps all would be well.