Rondal is the second narrator the reader encounters and the second most prolific. Though born before the coal companies seized the region, Rondal's earliest memories are of life in the coal camps. He remembers his father not making any money despite his hard work, though Rondal does not understand the situation fully while still a child. Though a good student, economic hardship forces Rondal's father, Clabe, to remove him from school and take him to work in the coalmines. Rondal finds the experience exhausting and terrifying, and after witnessing an accident that kills his father's partner, Rondal is able to leave the mines and go live with family friend C.J. Marcum