Act III: The Hollow Victory

THE COMMUNIST MANIFESTO: A Revolutionary Fairy Tale

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Author Note: I made a slight tweak to Lily’s age during the book. In the previous chapter, Lily was around 5-6. I’ve decided to change her age at the beginning to around 10. I’ve gone back and made slight adjustments to the first two acts, but they did not significantly change the story. If you’ve already read them, you are not missing anything critical, and if you haven’t read them yet you wouldn’t even know the different anyway!

The change is leading up to a critical moment at the end of the book. Hang on to your hats.

Now, on to Act III.

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This chapter follows the escape of the Gray Quarter workers as they flee the oppression of the Merchant King and establish a revolutionary settlement in the caves beyond Laboria’s borders.

Eliza and Lily join the exodus, leaving behind the Mills for what promises to be a society built on equality and cooperation. At first, life in the caves flourishes under shared labor and collective decision-making, providing a glimpse of the future they had dreamed of. But as leadership consolidates power, small privileges become entrenched hierarchies, and ideological purity is enforced with increasing severity.

As the revolution turns inward, paranoia and surveillance replace the hope that once sustained them. Lily, now a Youth Sentinel, becomes a tool of the movement, while Eliza struggles to protect her daughter from an ideology that demands loyalty above love. The very system they sought to destroy has found new life in their midst, and Eliza must face the painful truth: the revolution may not have freed them—it has only changed their masters.

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Act III: The Hollow Victory

Spring arrived in Laboria, slipping through the kingdom like a thief taking the cold but leaving little comfort in its wake. In the Gray Quarter, the new season brought no relief. The Merchant King, alarmed by reports of unrest, had decreased rations further "to encourage productivity" and doubled the Palace Guard's presence around the Mills. Workers now entered their shifts through corridors of armored men, each face scrutinized for signs of rebellious intent.

The Guards had developed a new technique: standing perfectly still, then suddenly shifting position when a worker passed. It startled the nerves, made people flinch. Those who flinched too violently were pulled aside for "loyalty verification." Most didn't return to the shift line. Fewer returned to their homes.

For Eliza, the new season meant watching Lily grow thinner despite the seasonal abundance that should have followed winter's scarcity. At twelve years old, Lily was still too thin, but she no longer had the ghostly frailty of younger children in the Gray Quarter. Her collarbones remained sharp beneath her skin, but her posture had straightened, and a wiry strength had begun to take hold. Dark circles shadowed her eyes, giving her the appearance of someone far older, a miniature adult trapped in a child's failing body. Yet when Eliza suggested skipping a Collective meeting to rest, Lily protested with surprising vehemence.

"I'm a Young Sentinel of the Revolution," she insisted, her small face pinched with determination. Her left foot tapped a rhythm against the floor—tap-tap-pause-tap—a new habit that emerged whenever she recited revolutionary phrases. "We're making cards to identify class enemies."

The words sent a chill through Eliza that had nothing to do with the spring rain seeping through their cottage roof. That roof had developed seven distinct leaks, each with its own personality. The one above the door dripped in perfect rhythm, like a timekeeper. The one near the hearth made no sound at all, water simply appeared in expanding circles on the floor, as if materializing from nowhere. The worst was the one above Lily's bed. It was irregular, unpredictable, sometimes stopping for days before releasing a sudden cascade precisely when they'd convinced themselves it had healed.

Lily had begun bringing home drawings from the children's meetings, crude sketches of Palace Guards and nobles being punished for their crimes. The figures were rendered with the odd proportions of young artists—awkward limbs and oversized heads—but the violence depicted was disturbingly specific and anatomically accurate. Guards with eyes gouged out. Nobles hanging from makeshift gallows, tongues protruding at precise angles. Merchant families drowning in pools of their own blood.

Sometimes the sketches depicted ordinary Gray Quarter residents too, labeled with red Xs and phrases like "hoarder" or "thought-criminal" that a child Lily's age shouldn't know, let alone use with such casual certainty. The phrases were always written in perfect cursive, clearly added by adult hands guiding the children's "educational art."

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