No matter how quiet I try to be, my bare feet battering the stone ground sent a wave of noise rolling down the stone and metallic walls of the tunnels that spiraled downward into the depths of the floating island mines as I headed in the direction of the sounds of picks banging against stone, and the tips of whips cracking over the backs of enslaved men. I hurry down. How long have they been here, enduring it? For my father, it was only a little over a week or two, and he looked to be on the very verge of death. What of my mother? If she were in the prison camp below, what were they having her do? I wrap my hand around the wand in my pocket.

A ratman rushes up to meet me, possibly to see what the noise was, or what the hold up was with the other ratman and the group of slaves that I had liberated from it. As soon as its black, beady eyes rest on me it clutches the bead-braided whip in its grasp, brings it over its head, and strikes forward with it. The small stones stuck in the leather strands bounce off of the Repel that I had cast on my way down. I grab hold of the whip.

It releases the whip from its hand as soon as I wrapped it around my knuckles so that I didn’t pull the creature to its immediate death.

“Intrude—” It shouts out.

I spring forward, draw the kris from its golden sheathe on my belt, and slide it into its gut. It wheezes as all the air it held in its lung is driven from its body. Shit. I ready myself. In these narrow tunnels, realistically, only one could face me at a time. It was better to hold my ground here than go to him.

Or so I thought. The din of picks and whips faded and was soon replaced with the sound of combat. I wipe the bloody knife against my thigh; drawing a long, red streak across the blue jeans, and rush forward. Were they killing the slaves rather than risking a slave revolt? Possibly, and I couldn’t take that chance.

The tunnels open up into a large antechamber that terminates at a rock wall about half a football field’s length from the mouth of the tunnel. On the ground, in a puddle of shimmering ruby liquid, lay the bodies of two men, and a child; stab wounds to their chests. Among them, was a single dogman face down on the ground with the point of a pick stabbed through the top of its head.

I stop momentarily and swallow the vomit building in my throat. It's the first time I’ve ever seen the body of a human. I recognize the dead man; with a large gash opened up on his throat. He was a marine that had accompanied me at one time this last week clearing doors along the main streets of the town. He was a young man — about nineteen years old, if I remember what he told me correctly. How long had he been here? Surely his disappearance would have been noted by those in charge of the compound, and in charge of the corps. There had to be a traitor. That was the only conclusion in my mind.

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The other was a teenage boy. No older than thirteen, by the looks of him. I recognize him at once as one of the missing people I had seen online that I had assumed had just run away due to the stresses of the changing world. Would he still be alive if I had come sooner?

Their visages are grotesque to me. I shake the fear building in me; if I freeze up here, the other people would face the same fate. I push forward toward the group in the corner.

A group of two ratmen and four dogmen form a semicircle around a group of slaves pressed against the wall. They whip and beat the humans with wooden batons. Perhaps the killings were done as a show of force? Or perhaps the humans struck first.

One of them turns their attention towards me, and that started a chain reaction of the rest of them doing the same. I draw the wand from my pocket.

“One of yours?”

“I don’t know, get it in line.” Came the reply of another.

One of the dogmen steps forward with its baton slapping against its open paw.

“You that binds the all, move for me.”

Aether coalesces at the tip of my wand, and the Efrans look at me in shock as they understand the words I say.

“What’s it say?”

“Nonsense.” Came the reply of the approaching dogman, chuckling as it nears

I let loose the gathered aether, and the invisible force parts the dust as it passes over the ground and slams into the pit of the approaching dogman’s stomach. The black hide armor it wore bent inward and cracked. Its eyes rolls back into its head until the deep brown was a pale white. It falls onto its knees and coughs up lungfuls of blood.

“An earthen apostle!”

One of the dogmen calls, it drops its baton and reaches for its blade. Before it could draw it from its leather sheathe, a pickaxe drives into the back of its neck and strikes it down.

“About god damn time one of you boys came in here!” Came a voice that was faintly familiar. I couldn’t put a name or a face to it, but I had heard it at one point. I know that.

The two ratmen turn their heads towards the slaves. Did they believe that it would only take two to subdue me? That was a mistake on their part. Two earthen spikes jut out of the ceiling above them. The packed spikes of earth and metal slam through their skulls and pin them in place. One of the dogmen who had turned around to face me is stuck down from behind from a strong blow to the back of its head. I rush forward and jam my dagger into the throat of the last.