FROM PITS TO THRONE: A Crown Forged In Chains

Chapter 12: Life in Nidus

The free city of Nidus rose from the southern horizon like a glittering mirage with white walls baking under a relentless sun, domes and minarets catching the light, and the harbor a forest of masts from a hundred nations. There were no kings here, only the Merchant Council, and gold was the only law most people respected.

With chains on her wrists and her heart still raw from the separation, Calista Walton stood on the deck of the slaver ship as it docked. The voyage from Miraolden had taken weeks, cooped in the hold with other captives, fed on weevil bread and brackish water. She had hidden her royal bearing the best way she could with her head down, eyes dull and answers short. But fear gnawed at her constantly. Robert Hawks had arranged for her death, just as he had done for Liam and Tamira. Hers was to be an accident at sea with a quiet knife in the dark, so she had expected it, at everybody until this day when the ship docked. Yet none came because greed had once again intervened.

The slaver captain, a fat man named Corren, saw profit in a pretty, educated girl, and thought to himself ‘Nidus merchants like clever house slaves,’ so he told his mate. “Trained ones fetch triple price, so there's no sense wasting her on a corpse.”

So Calista lived, and now the gangplank thudded onto the quay.

The slave market was a chaos of noise and color with auction blocks beneath striped awnings, buyers in flowing robes of silk or linen, guards with curved swords, the constant cries of hawkers selling fruit, spices, and human flesh. Calista was herded with six others into a pen, stripped to a thin shift, oiled and combed to look presentable.

She kept her gaze on the ground although her eyes missed nothing.

When her turn came, the auctioneer dragged her onto the block and began.

“Fine lot here! Young, healthy, literate in three tongues, trained in a noble house! Suitable for accounts, music and companionship. Bidding starts at two hundred crowns!”

Instantly voices rose. Three hundred. Four. Five. All bidding for her.

Calista’s stomach twisted, as she thought of her mother’s last embrace, of Liam’s promise, of Tamira clutching Silas, they seemed to make her cry, but held back those tears.

Finally, a clear voice cut through the crowd. “Eight hundred crowns.”

The crowd murmured. Eight hundred was a fortune for a single slave.

The bidder stepped forward, a man in his late thirties, lean and dark-bearded, dressed in expensive indigo silk. Rings flashed on his fingers; a gold chain hung at his throat. His eyes were sharp and calculative, showing those of a man who weighed every word and coin. He stared at Mival Lawson, merchant prince of Nidus, one of the wealthiest traders in spices, silks, and rare gems. Then the hammer fell. “Sold.”

Calista was led down, branded quickly on the shoulder with Mival’s mark which was a stylized wave. The pain was brief, but the humiliation was lasting. Then she was bathed, dressed in a simple blue tunic, and loaded into a covered litter borne by four silent bearers.

The journey through Nidus was her first glimpse of the city’s wonders. The streets were paved with colored stone, fountains splashing in courtyards, markets overflowing with goods from every corner of the world, ivory from the south, furs from the north and spices that scented the air like perfume. Music drifted from open balconies and laughter spilled from taverns.

Mival’s compound lay in the wealthier quarter, behind high walls painted turquoise. The compound had shaded gardens with lemon trees, a central courtyard with a mosaic pool and rooms opening onto colonnades. Slaves moved quietly here, he had dozens of them, some born to it, others captured like her.

Mival received her in a cool receiving chamber, reclining on cushions while servants poured chilled wine.

“So,” he said, voice smooth, “you are the costly one ha. What is your name?”

“Calista,” she answered, keeping her tone neutral.

He studied her for a moment and concluded. “Educated. That much was true. You will work in my counting house. Keep ledgers, tally shipments, write letters. Do it well, and life will be tolerable. Fail, or cause trouble…” He shrugged, reserving his comment for her imagination to run wide before he added. “Nidus has quarries too.”

Calista bowed her head. “I understand, master.”

He waved dismissal. “Lena will show you your place.”

Lena was a slave woman of about thirty years, tall and graceful, with skin like polished ebony and a calm, watchful manner. She had served Mival since childhood and now oversaw the female house slaves.

“Come,” she simply said, leading Calista through cool corridors to the women’s quarters, which was a long room with pallets along the walls and screened for privacy.

“You will sleep here,” Lena indicated a free spot. “Work begins at dawn. Baths there, latrines beyond. Food will be served three times daily. No stealing, no fighting, no wandering after dark. Any questions?”

Calista hesitated. “Is the master…cruel?”

Lena’s expression softened a fraction. “Not cruel like some. He beats for disobedience, sells for repeated trouble. But if you are useful, he is fair. He bought me when I was eight and I'm still alive.”

The word ‘Fair’ in slavery was a rare one.

The work began the next day.

Calista was given a stool in the counting house, it was a shaded room lined with scrolls and wax tablets. Mival’s steward, a freedman named Dario, tested her skills with reading contracts, calculating profits, writing in the common script and two older tongues used in eastern trade.

She passed all tests easily since her palace education far exceeds what most slaves received.

Dario grunted approval. “Good. You’ll handle the spice ledgers. Errors cost gold. And gold lost means pain.”

She learned quickly the rhythms of Mival’s trade, caravans arriving from the desert with saffron and pepper, ships unloading silks from across the eastern sea, gem cutters in the workshops turning rough stones into fortune. Calista recorded weights, prices, taxes paid to the Council and bribes slipped to harbor masters.

Through it all, Mival noticed her competence.

One evening, months after her arrival, he summoned her to his private study. It was a room of cedar panels and thick carpets, lit by oil lamps.

“You write a fine hand,” he said, glancing at a letter she had copied. “And your sums are never wrong. Where did a slave girl learn such things?”

Calista kept her voice steady. “In the house of my former master, lord. He valued education in his servants.”

Mival’s eyes narrowed, but he did not press. “Good. From now on, you will read my correspondence aloud and take dictation. You will sit at my table during certain meetings. Speak only when spoken to.”

It was promotion, closer to power, closer to knowledge.

Soon, she began to see the man behind the merchant.

Mival Lawson was ambitious, ruthless in trade, charming when it suited. He had no wife, rumors said he preferred variety and no children. His household ran like a ship, efficient and disciplined. He treated slaves as tools, the valuable ones he cared for, and the broken ones he discarded.

Yet he was not needlessly cruel. Whippings were rare and earned. Food was plentiful. And the seriously ill received a physician.

Calista adapted to her new life and made friends cautiously.

Lena became her confidante, as they began sharing quiet talks in the gardens after supper. Lena had a daughter sold away years ago, so her pain mirrored Calista’s loss of family.

There was also young Aria, a kitchen girl of thirteen who sang beautifully while working. And old Petros, the gardener, who told stories of distant lands and slipped Calista lemons when no one watched.

But the shadow of Robert Hawks lingered no matter how hard she tried to dismiss it.

In her second year, a new slave arrived, a man from Miraolden, captured in a border skirmish. Over shared chores, he whispered news that Queen Eliza had taken her own life six months after the conquest and the tyrant ruled with iron. Rumors said the royal heirs were dead.

Calista wept that night, silently into her pallet.

But she did not believe it fully. Liam had made a promise before their separations and Waltons did not break promises easily.

So she began to hoard knowledge like coins.

From Mival’s letters, she learned shipping routes, guard schedules at the city gates, and which council members could be bribed. She noted which slaves were discontent and who had contacts outside the walls.

Lena noticed this shift with ease.

“You plan to escape,” she said one night in a low voice.

Calista did not deny it. “One day.”

Lena sighed. “Many plan the same, but only a very few succeed. Nidus is free for citizens, a cage for us. But…if you ever need help, ask.”

Calista squeezed her hand.

Years passed, four since the fall of Miraolden, so Calista grew into a young woman, graceful and composed, her dark hair braided with the blue ribbon Mival allowed favored slaves. She spoke little of her past, but her eyes held a quiet fire that some noticed, yet few understood.

By this time, Mival trusted her enough to let her handle sensitive negotiations by reading contracts aloud and suggesting subtle changes in wording that saved him thousands.

He began to speak to her almost as an equal in private.

“You have a merchant’s mind,” he said once, after she spotted a discrepancy in a gem shipment. “Pity you were born to chains.”

Calista met his gaze. “Pity chains exist, master.”

He laughed, but there was a flicker of unease.

Yet she waited patiently as stone, keeping her family name alive in her heart, because One day, the chains would fall. One day, she would go home. Or bring vengeance to those who had sto

len it. Because the gods watched and perhaps, they waited too.