More had survived than I thought.

Calamities always seem worse at first glance, and this had been no exception. Plenty of those I’d thought were dead had turned out to be alive.

Morbid and cruel it might be to think, but that had caused more problems. A mad scramble developed to get the wounded out before the water came crashing down.

Not all of them lived. The survivors who could walk pulled the others screaming and shuddering, and carried them roughly across floors while others tried to bandage them on the move. What they needed was a hospital. What they’d gotten was a dirty old storage room under the earth, pulled roughly across it till they couldn’t take anymore.

A lot of screaming and yelling and crying. I couldn’t relate that much. Frustration, yes, that so many had died but most of these, we were too far from help. Their wounds were too serious. The walking wounded would make it. Maybe one or two of the others. The rest were dead already, lingering on because Malstein was determined not to lose anymore.

Another had died because of that insistent. We’d pressed right against the deadline given by Givens trying to get them all out. The sudden rush of water had swept us off our feet again, a three-foot wave that sent people down the hallway. One Watchwoman, already grievously injured, had rammed her head against the stone of the tunnel wall. Split open, her head turned the water red as the rest of us got to our feet.

Death had come swiftly at least.

The retreat down the hallway brought us more time at each doorway. Our path was slowly heading uphill. After the initial bursts of trying to rush every which way from the pressure, it started flowing down into the earth, away from us. Sudden sweeps of water threatening to take us off our feet ceased to be an issue.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t our only issue.

We were still in the underground, flooded with all kinds of monsters since the dwarves had abandoned it. Numbers had kept them at bay before, but now the basilisk had cut us to a fragment of our former strength. And worse, we were carrying injured with us. Injured who had bled. Injured whose scent would be spreading through these underground passages to any nose more sensitive than a human’s.

There were far too many creatures who matched that criteria.

We had a dozen mostly uninjured, a half dozen walking wounded, and a half dozen too wounded to walk. I knew better than to even attempt arguing at leaving them behind. Even suggesting doing so with guards and in an easy-to-protect location would draw Malstein’s ire.

His gaze hadn’t cooled. Malstein had said nothing about the Watch that had died at my hellfire, but I knew better than to think it forgotten. The chaos of that fight and the inability to tell where I’d been aiming protected my hide. Best not to test that protection.

So most of us were carrying impromptu litters loaded with men and women Dawes had stitched up and treated as best he could. He and Kalasyp traveled between them, offering what help they could.

The alchemist was little more than a spare set of hands, constantly shaking as every little noise set him off. His time in what could have easily been his tomb had clearly unsettled him.

A half dozen too injured to walk. A dozen carrying them. Kalasyp and Dawes attend to their needs on the go. That left a mere four to guard, me, Malstein, Givens, and a random watchman named Verns.

And I got to take the vanguard. On the one hand, it made sense. I could hit the hardest among us, I had better hearing than anyone here thanks to my tinkering. On the other, my leg felt once again like a hammer had been taken to it. The dressing on my shoulder did plenty for the bleeding, but nothing for the pain from the bite wound that went from the biceps to the neck. My stomach still felt it had been ripped from the inside after that tail swipe. Oh, and I was still covered in goop, slime, and rotting basilisk and would need a week-long bath when we got back to the surface.

If we got back to the surface. My leg at least didn’t hurt too much. The crawl we’d been reduced to had caused that.

Luckily, the first ten minutes passed without the flood of hungry monsters I’d feared. After a second to shove my anger aside and think, it made sense. A basilisk’s presence would scare away most monsters from the area it prowled. Little protected from the danger of petrification. If its eyes met yours, you were stone for it to munch.

That swarm of monsters wouldn’t come till we were further out.

However, we had an additional problem as I turned a quarter. A pair of dead Watch officers were on the ground ahead, blood poured all over the floor.

Not turned to stone. Everyone tensed, Malstein and the Hydrologist following behind me as I approached the pair of corpses.

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I eyed the two dead bodies, then examined them carefully and with respect.

“Someone cut their throats,” I reported. “I realize that’s obvious, but while the blows nearly severed the head, it resembled sword strokes more than a claw. They didn’t have blindfolds, and neither showed any signs of petrification, so good odds this wasn’t the basilisk.”

It was entirely possible the basilisk had happened upon them without being detected. It was also possible that my aunt was secretly the high priestess of an arch-devil. Basilisks could move quietly in certain environments. Enclosed tunnels where the sound of exposed claws scraping on stone would echo were not one of them.

Malstein has joined me now, looking down stonily at the two bodies.

“Dr. Dawes, can you confirm that?”

I held my tongue despite the spike of rage that had gone through my heart at that. Sure, I was nowhere near the anatomist or doctor that Dawes was, but neither was I blind.

Dawes gave me an apologetic look as he came over from treating the patients, checking the two bodies.

“The blows were dealt by someone taller than both men,” Dawes noted. “The cuts show the blow was from the front and it goes lower as it travels to the back of the neck. They could see whoever struck the blow.”

I checked their revolvers, opening the cylinders. A look at each confirmed what I already thought from the lack of gunpowder residue on the barrel or cylinder face.

“They didn’t fire a shot. Dr. Dawes, would Captain Malstein have been the right height for these blows?”

That caused a stir from some of those in the back, but thankfully the Captain himself picked up on my line of thought.

“Shape-changers,” he growled.

“It makes sense,” I said. “They came just before us. They must have also had someone here to bring the basilisk, or set up some mechanism to do the same. One of them talked too long, has to make it past the guards here, and assumes your shape. Takes advantage of the confusion to deliver two blows and leave. Doctor?”

Dawes had been eyeballing the Captain’s height, then the bodies below.

“Without a rather morbid recreation of the events, I think Miss Harrow is right,” he said. “This one, officer…?”

“Parks,” Malstein barked.

“Parks,” Dawes said calmly. “Rather tall, possibly one of the tallest in your unit, excluding yourself. Although I think perhaps the changer increased their height, or more likely their size, as they swung. The angle is a bit too steep.”

“Too bad we no longer have the world’s greatest detective to confirm that,” Givens noted bitterly.

Me and Dawes traded looks and now the Doctor seemed nervous. Tagashin’s absence had not been missed. I’d hoped the sheer number of bodies would cover it up, or that petrification or torn apart ones would make the lack of a body not in Watch breastplate less obvious.

I don’t know if either Malstein or Givens had noted the lack of a dead Voltar as we’d rushed about in those ten minutes. They were firmly convinced he was alive and had fled the battle when it had started.

They weren’t wrong, just who had actually fled. That Kitsuné was going to get shot if she popped up soon. The actual Voltar’s reputation was about to take a hit, although I couldn’t force myself to care too much. The Watch officers didn’t seem to blame me or Dawes, who’d actually stayed and fought. Voltar could endure a few dings to his reputation, and Tagashin a few dings to her hide if she showed up again.

Continuing past the dead Watch officers after Malstein collected their badges, we made it another hundred feet and turned a corner before I could hear a concerning noise.

Squeaking.

“We got rats ahead,” I said. “Weapons out.”

Weapons were drawn. By the two of us that could hold weapons. Kalasyp shrank back, heading towards the rear of our group.

“Do you think they’re a danger?” Malstein asked.

“I think that with shape-changers, you can’t take any chances. I also think two normal rats being alive in a monster-infested underground is very suspicious!”

“Rats survive in all kinds of places,” Dawes noted.

“Yes, and that’s no reason not to be cautious?” I said. “Shoot the rat. It’s a bullet.”

“Or you could blast them with hellfire, and if they are shape-changers, it’ll have more effect than a single bullet,” Malstein said.

A fair point, but voicing why I couldn’t invite an attack if the rats were listening in. I walked closer, then paused. Had the wall next to me rippled? I gave it a second look as another ripple traveled through.

The hells? The same earth spirit? Very unlikely, but it gave me a good idea as I walked near where the brief ripple had been.

“I’d suggest you clear off,” I said. “We’ve both lost a fair bit today. No need to make it any worse for either of our sides. You lost your pet, we lost many people. Leave it at that, or it will hurt.”

I held off conjuring Hellfire, waiting to see what the rats would do.

My supply wasn’t inexhaustible. I’d been using it like it was recently, and truthfully being the daughter of a Duke gave me a leg up on most people. My focus did more to help as well, but there was still a limit. A point where when I pulled on something to fuel the spells, I’d be pulling on myself.

That had been my fix to diabolism, blocking off my access to that internal pool. Stuck, sacrificing body parts or organs every time I wanted to tap into my hellish ancestry.

Rotting the Basilisk had taken a lot out of me. More than killing Hawkins had, as while Hawkins had been massive and able to regenerate, the basilisk’s hide had been resistant to both magic and decay.

I’d come out of the fight at the party tired, exhausted, and low on diabolism. It would have been long before I started melting body parts again. I was closing in on that again.

One rat squeaked angrily at the other, and I rolled my eyes as the second squeaked back.

“It’s the best offer you’re getting,” I told them. “And that’s on the generous end.”

More squeaking, and I moved close to where the elemental had been. If there would be a surprise attack, it would be violent and dramatic. Enough to rouse the elements spirit’s fury? Maybe. A risky gambit, but I didn’t have enough to handle two shape-changers, assuming I lived long enough to try.

A scream rose from behind me, and I shoved down that instinct screaming at me to turn around.

“Changer behind!” someone screamed.

I ducked, and one rat exploded, flesh bursting out of them and swinging where I’d been.

The wall shattered and a deep booming roar shook the tunnel as I hurried on hands and knees to the other side. Cracks had already formed in the walls and the floor underneath me as the earth spirit roared once again.

Time to see how much rot I had in me.