Like lights, trapped in the fog...

The city was built on the backs of Rakers. Beasties, they called us, because we had pointed teeth and pointed ears, and we talked different, and we stood different. Beasties, beasties, they called.

So we were the slaves who placed every paving stone, piled every brick, clicked together every gear that clicked, tick, tick, tick, to make the city run. We even built the train and the rails... the train that we weren't allowed to ride. We had to stay in the city. Keep it ticking. The taller the city grew, the more reliant it was on the Rakers.

I was born there. Just a little nothing Raker-girl, little beastie girl.

I was supposed to clean the streets, but I hid in the alleys, because the watcherboys would come. I ran, and ran, and ran, those boys whose jobs were to keep an eye on the Rakers, make sure the Rakers did their work... they just liked to be cruel. I saw 'em... do awful things.

The only light in the darkness of that life was family, but my parents died when I was little. All I had was my Grandma and my little sister.

I was twelve years old when Grandma told me to run. It was afternoon, and the watcherboys were mad about something. "They're after you, the watcherboys're gonna kill you," Grandma said, tears in her eyes.

The sun was setting on that foggy evening, and the streets were chilly. I could hear the harsh laughter, rough, angry cruel laughter from the watcherboys. When you're a Raker... you know it when you hear it.

I knew the side streets, I knew the tunnels, I knew that little crack where I could squeeze between the buildings and get closer to the train.

I could hear the train. And it was leaving. But louder than even the train engine was those boys' laughter. "Haw, haw, haw, we got you, we got you, little beastie!" I heard them say, and I ran.

I tripped, and I ran some more. I felt someone grab at my jacket but I shed it from my arms, and I ran, and I ran, and I ran.

The streets are windy, and close, and the houses lean over the streets like heavyset giants, blocking any light, and the smoke coming from the chimneys rides low to the ground, it makes you cough, and wheeze, and it made the watcherboys' laughter harder.

I was almost there. I turned a corner and I could see the raillway headed out of the city, in the only opening out. I raced toward it.

One boy managed to get around and get in front of me. His face twisted into an expression of cruel joy and he reached out to me, his hands like claws, ready to rip me to shreds for some wrong that he imagined, but I was wild, and I was crying, and I was so scared, and I swung with all my might, and I might have hit him in the nose or the eye, but all I know is he yelped and clawed at me, but I kept going.

I ran alongside the railway until the train passed me. It was going so fast I didn't think I'd make it, but the last car on the train had the handbar next to its steps, and I jumped forward, my arms out, and grabbed for that bar like it was my life, because it was.

I made it. I squeezed my eyes shut and crouched on those steps, the ground rumbling beneath me, the steady chugga chugga, telling me that this was real, that this was happening. I don't know how long it was, but I stayed there, until finally, ever so carefully, I opened my eyes.

No watcherboys to punch and kick me, to scream at me for being who I was, for not pleasing them. I was... free. The train was carrying me out, out, away from that wretched city, away from the watcherboys. But... away from my Grandma too. And my little sister. I climbed higher onto that train cart and looked behind me. The sun was setting on the city, but the city still glowed, a dull, aching yellow, like the lights were trapped in the fog and smoke.

Like lights trapped in the fog.

I wondered if I would ever see my lights, my Grandma and little sister, again.