Naereah could hear her mistress call. Though a part of her mind remained her own, she did not resist the compulsion; defiance had long been beaten out of her. She was a slave come what may. It did not matter who her master was. At least with the serpent, her servitude would be short. The hidden place where she was tucked away would soon dissolve, and she would melt away completely into the corrosive will of the Temptress.

‘I live to serve you, my lady,’ the words broke from her lips, but it was not her voice she had heard. She had long forgotten her voice. She was no longer sure it was ever hers to begin with; assuredly not now, not since her exile from Celestius, perhaps not since her cries upon leaving the womb.

Her body lifted itself up and shuffled towards the glow of the battlefield. Feet dragging beneath her, she moved towards the tunnel’s mouth. Naereah could not fathom what need her mistress could have to call upon a broken toy like her. Hers was a place to be discarded. The final dwelling for the Temptress’ prey. When the last light of her will had flickered and died, mind, body, spirit, and soul, she would be consumed.

No longer fit to feed the serpent’s ego, Naereah was set aside to satiate the Temptress’ other cravings. The first of her group to be discarded, she had clung to herself as long as she had for the chance to see her first mistress similarly renounced. Minutes, hours and days had fled; her tunnel, once cramped, became hauntingly spacious, yet Lucia had yet to arrive.

“Tend to me!” No word had been spoken, it was simply understood. Even now, the alien swarm of the Temptress’ call was beyond Naereah’s imagination. It was a stranger to reason, the Temptress’ voice. Naereah could never call it familiar, yet in the moment it was more foreign still. Impossible as it was for a monster so great, the Temptress’ voice carried a tremble. She was afraid.

A wisp of hope flared in the hidden depths of Naereah’s mind but quickly it faded; the monster who could slay her monster would surely end her, also. Freedom was not to be longed for. Hope only salted the wound.

She had been freed before. When the purity of her Harmony had been graded as poor, liberated from the expectations of her father, the adoration of her people, her birthplace and freedom she had become. Sold as a novelty to the house of Desmond, she had been emancipated from kindness and unshackled from worth.

A trail of blood slipped from her bare feet, painting the grey stone of her tiny world. The cold and the pain could not find her hidden place; she was an object, her body not her own. So stripped of herself, she could barely register the whiff of urine and excrement which surely trailed her passing—a small comfort.

“To me!” Strained the psychic call of her mistress. Urgent and demanding, Naereah could not have resisted if she tried. She was close enough now that the sounds of battle reached even her.

It was strange. The serpent was not shy of challengers. In the time since Naereah’s ensnarement, she could recall the howl, growl, bark, and roar of numerous dungeon-spawn prior to the inevitable crunch and pitiable whimpers heralding the Temptress’ triumph. But the sounds from beyond her world were not those of a beast. The grunts, shouts, and steps were distinctly the sounds of a person.

It was not as though there had been no human contenders but the sounds they had made were of reverence for her mistress. Praise torn from their lips, they would sing, clap, dance and cry while withering away like rotted fruit. None as of yet as rancid as her....

There was one… When I was still a living thing, there was one who got away.

With the back of her hand, the Temptress had stroked her cheek and beckoned her to watch. There was little left of her at that point. When the ones from before had similarly soured, her mistress had done the same. Charming her out to the open, Naereah had been commanded to watch her lady enrapture her replacement.

With a crimson blade in hand, at the sight of the Temptress, he too had fell still, but where Naereah had bowed, he stood tall.

Dressed in blood-soaked rags, holding a sword appearing eager to shatter, Naereah did not believe the boy would last an instant against her mistress. Even if he could resist the pull of her mind, he would not avoid the lash of her tail. She could remember the whip of air when the Temptress struck. She could recall the bitter concoction of horror and anticipation which had swirled inside her. However, what she could not forget was how he survived. Decisively, he had dived to the ground; fearlessly, he returned to his feet. Wisely he had made to retreat, and fortunately, he was able to do so… Marked by her mistress’ claws, but free and living.

Her mistress could not be pleased that night. The chants of worship and songs of praise could not placate her ire. Deep enough to satisfy, not one of her adorers could bow, not even with the Temptress grinding their heads into the stone.

“He escaped!” The Temptress had screamed at her, lifting her by the cheek, the hiss of her tongue mingling with the buzz of her thoughts.

‘A fool, my lady! A blind fool,’ were the words ripped from Naereah’s mouth. ‘Your beauty is unequalled; your majesty’s sublime.’ She had said as her cheeks creaked between the pincer of her mistress’ hold.

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Naereah could remember how she smiled. From ear to ear, desperate and deranged. Tears had salted her buds as she wilted. Singing of the Temptress’ beauty, she was carried off and thrown away.

Naereah stepped into the light and gasped. Buried as she was, she was gripped. Tugged up from the depths, an entangled cluster of emotions surfaced.

Cloaked in splendour, spear in hand, the boy dove from the downward thrash of the Temptress’ ivory tail. He did not fall, rather, catching himself with one hand, he pushed up to his feet and struck out against the temptress. The tip of his spear spilled sickly blood onto the moss draped foundation.

The boy retracted his spear and made to strike again. Before he was able, an orb of raging flames hurtled towards him, demanding his retreat.

Mouth wide, heart thrashing, Naereah observed the scene. The Temptress was not alone in her fight. Glassy-eyed and without expression, her first mistress, Lucia took to the Temptress’ side. Golden threads dangled from her fingers reflecting the moss-light. With leathered wings, and black scaled arms, Lucia’s fiance rose to the sky. There were three others gathering around their lady. They had been fellow servants of their beautiful queen, but having lost so much of herself, she did could no longer recall their names. They all lived to serve; they needed no names.

“Attend to me, you fool!” Her mistress wailed. On instinct, Naereah moved her foot forward but stopped. She lifted dirtied hands in front of her eyes. Open then closed then open again. Her fingers obeyed.

A sting in her eyes. A knot in her throat. Tears trailed her cheeks.

Her fingers obeyed, but for the first time in a long while, she had not.

***

Softly panting, Havoc lifted his spear and pointed, one by one, at his gathered foes. They slowly dispersed and made their way to circle him. It had been difficult enough when it was he and the snake. He did not know how he would fare against the newcomers.

His grip tighten around the pole. He shifted a foot; the thralls raised their weapons. Two swords, an axe. A pair of claws, and ten golden threads dangling on the tips of a woman’s fingers. Only one was unarmed.

Loose threads, torn garbs, not one of the thralls could be called presentable. The Selenarian was least of all. Her dress, grey and dreary, was tattered and torn; bloodied and stained. Her light-blue skin was marred by sweltering patches of green. So thin as to vanish upon sideways viewing, she looked as though she could be felled by a decisive gust of wind.

The fire spitter, he could understand. Sharp and scaled fingers, black and red leathery wings, even in his haggard ensnarement, he was imposing. Hovering over the Temptress’ arena, his value as an ally was clear; the Selenarian’s was less so.

She’s not moving.

The others were. Like circling beasts, they sized him up. A ravenous reflection, waiting, eager, but cautious; a perfect echo of their serpent charmer. But the Selenarian held still.

Open and closed, she stared at her hands as though unparalleled mysteries were held in her palms. She was shaking; pitch-black eyes glistening and wide. They were not the empty whites her peers.

‘No!’

***

‘No!’ Naereah could not believe the word. She glanced around. It could not have been her voice. But as she repeated the sound with rising conviction, she could not deny they were her words.

She had refused the order.

She had refused an order.

It was not as though she had never resisted, but the marriage of rebellion and the rod was an absolute union. Their firstborn, pain acted as tutor to their second, compliance.

Shackles loose around her ankles. The clink of chain hitting chain. Bound to her fellow slaves, she had been forced from her home. From the shining city of Celestius to the unknown place they had called Stone Garden, they would need to ascend two floor of the Dungeon. She had known escape would be difficult. The first thirteen levels may have sheltered the bereft, but the Dungeon was home to nightmares. Her purity was poor, but she was still an inheritor. She had nearly drained herself to heal her broken ankles, but in the moment the irons had slipped past her toes, the honeyed wine of liberty had dulled the pain.

Under the pale light of the night-sun, unnoticed, she had distanced herself from the Slaver’s caravan. The disgrace of her family, she had known she could not return home.

But perhaps she could find another.

Celestius was the capital of her species. Before her enslavement, she had never seen the world beyond its shining towers, but she knew it existed. Beneath the settled floors of the Dungeons stood many vanguard territories. From those outposts, Inheritors rested, worked and traded. Her anchor, The Bandaged Heart, gave her the ability to heal. Little was her power, and recovery remnants were not so scarce, but the vanguard, ever perilous and unstable, would find a place for her…

She would have never gotten there alive.

Outside of Dungeon Cells, it was the rare dungeon-spawn which was more than a solider within the settle floors. The bereft were still helpless but they were not undefended. It did not take many Inheritors to assure safety. From the fourteenth floor down, true horrors stalked each corner.

She had resolved to ascend.

The nearest flight would have been a three day walk. She had recalled at the time it connected the tenth to the third. There she would find others of her people.

It was the second night they found her. Over the following three days, her slavers had laboured to educate on the wages of resistance. She had learned her lesson well.

But stood in a monster’s lair that boy held firm. Surrounded and outnumbered; dauntless and resolute. The passion of his cry as he charged against the odds. Naereah could not stay tucked away as he set alight her hidden place. The fumes of hope smoked her to the surface. Sucking deep the sweet air of a freedom she had forsaken, with tears running down her eyes, she shouted.

‘I don’t know who you are, and I know there’s no reason, but please…’ Wiping the wet from her eyes with the back of her forearm and flinging the tears to mossy ground, her voice trembled.

‘Save me!’