Before we got too far from the gatehouse, William pulled a small jar out of his backpack. Gnats flies, and all manners of other winged insects batter against the glass walls of the jar. He mutters his incantation and a red light glows through the jar, and they all stop their buzzing, battering, and fluttering. He unscrews the jar, and they pour out of it like a black mist. Afterward, he closes his eyes as they swarm down the cave.

“There’s a town nearby; no, not a town….a collection of buildings. About twenty or thirty ratmen gathered in the center, bidding, it seems, on some humans and other creatures chained up on a stage. They’re not looking this way.”

He opens his eyes and claps. I know what that means; those insects he had been controlling turned to dust and fell apart on the ground. It was something he’d been working on for a while; exploding all of his mana inside of one of his targets. For targets bigger than a dog, he’s said, all he’s managed to do was give them nosebleeds. If he was able to do it to things as big as these dogs or ratmen, he said, then he could use insects as a kind of bomb. It’d be useful for sure, in the future, but he’d need to be better at manipulating his mana.

Both Mark and I go ahead of the rest of the group as the cave wall to our left opens up into a large alcove. Carved from the stone of this alcove were large buildings with windows and doors made of the strange black wood that made up a majority of the city above ground. The pillars of the stone buildings seemed to be in the Corinthian style, but the rest of the construction was Gothic or Victorian.

Stalactites hung from the cave ceiling in the middle where there weren’t any of the carved buildings. Glowing moss hung off of and in between these in ringlets like strings of Christmas lights. It was beautiful, and if it weren’t in the middle of enemy territory, I would stop to take in the view more. Mark rounded the corner, quickly pulled a pair of arrows from his quiver, and let loose both.

The arrows found purchase through the eyes of two ratmen who manned a pair of towers near the stage that each held a large bell to raise the alarm in case anything happened. Before they could even register what had happened, they slumped down and fell down the small platform. The other ratmen turn their heads to us, and before any of them can raise a ruckus, or they could draw their weapons, I fall upon them with blade and dagger.

Red blood sprays from open throats, and flows through punctured chests as I wade through the group with all the fury I can muster. As one near me tries to draw his blade, I lop off its arm at the elbow and jam the parrying dagger up through its neck. Once I was in the thick of things, I pivoted on my heel to face the majority of the creatures. I draw in a lungful of air and wind mana and let loose into a Billow into the clustered crowd. The howling wind sweeps through them and knocks them over.

Mark’s bowstrings sang with mana as he let loose arrow after arrow. Soon, his quiver was empty, but that was fine; well over three-quarters of them were dead. One of the living Ratmen takes up his spear and lunges for one of the human prisoners. I hop in front of the point; the dark stone skitters off of the black scales as I jam my dagger up into the chin of the creature., and back out; leaving him to gurgle on the floor.

“Dance for me, o djinn."

Flame and wind breathe life around me and push those creatures around me away from the stage. Those who failed to retreat far enough were caught up in the flame-wind flows and died screaming on the ground. I push the dome forward; careening into the remaining ratmen like a wave of wind and flame; a bit of my hair catches on fire as well as it passes over me, but I pat it out before it does too much damage.

Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Those who managed to jump out of the way of the blasting inferno were laid low as the wind and flames died against the stone ceiling. I rush forward and finish off the remaining. By the time I had driven the point of my saber through the chest of the last one, Janet, Oak, and my brother had rounded the corner into the hall. Oak let out a long impressed whistle as he looked around; strands of moss turned to ash dropped down from the ceiling like rain.

I pivot on my heel and return to the stage. Behind it were cages full of humans, and other creatures; much like the cat thing that I had talked to before coming here. Nyt was her name? I pull open the cages with the humans, and they scramble out.

“Thank you, oh god, thank you…” They sobbed and cried as I broke their chains with my sword.

“What are you doing?” Janet demanded as she stormed across the town to the stage.

“Freeing them,” I answered.

“After I explicitly told you not to?”

“You told me that we couldn’t escort them out, not that we couldn’t free them from their bondage."

Janet scoffs again.

“And? What if they’re terrorists like Private Abel?”

I grit my teeth.

“Oh, you’re not going to respond, are you?”

“I don’t care if they are. Better than leaving innocent people here to die.”

“No one’s innocent.” She rolled her eyes. “But fine. I’ll let them off, but we won’t help from here on, okay?”

Janet’s dark eyes scanned the stage and the cages and those gathered on the stage. When those eyes rested on the huddled, shivering cat people, a grin spread across her face.

“Well...I won’t kill any other humans, but these?” She points one of her hatchets at the smallest of the cat people, “These, we don’t want to risk them stabbing us in the back.”

“What are you talking ab--” Before I’m even to finish off my sentence, a bolt of lightning arcs out from her raised hand and slams into the side of one of the huddled catmen.

Its body stiffens and falls down, seizing and foaming at the mouth. She hops onto the stage and swings down with one of her hatches; parting its head in two.

“What are you doing? They’re obviously prisoners.”

“A common ploy.” Janet deflected. “Pretend to be prisoners only to stab your, ‘rescuers,’ in the back.’”

One of the cat things stood up with a fierce look in its large round eyes as it used its body to block the sight of the two smaller cat people. It hissed and clicked in its language as Janet raised her hatchet over her head.

“Why? They’re not—“

crack

The wedged metal shattered the bone of the cat creature’s skull. Blood flowed freely from the top of the creature’s head. It fell to its knee, and Janet swung her other hatchet horizontally into the creature’s temple.

crack

More bone shatters and snaps and the cat creature dies. She rose her arm again in the direction of the younger creatures. I rushed forward and grabbed hold of her wrist.

“Why are you doing this? They’re obviously defenseless.”

“They’re our enemies Monica.”

“They’re children.”

“Children can be soldiers, too. I fought in Afghanistan. I should know.”

“Monica!” William placed his hand on my shoulder and pulls my arm away.

“William, what are you doing? This is wrong.”

He pulled my arm forward and leaned into my ear.

“Do you not care about mom and dad?”

I grit my teeth. That threat again. I yank my hand out of his grasp and turn my head as the children whimper.

Crack; crack.

My stomach churns.

“Kill the ones in the cages, too.” She says.

Her heavy boots clacked against the stone as she hopped down from the stage. A bright flash blared to life behind me, and the smell of cooking flesh churned my stomach once more. I walk out of the cavern as another flash of lightning takes another innocent life. What could I do? Nothing. My parent’s lives were at stake. William’s right. I shouldn’t push it. I repeat this as a mantra to quell the nausea. Shawn comes with me, as Mark and William join Janet’s grim actions. I glance back as my brother and Lawrence’s brother emerge from the alcove. I notice a look of grim certitude on the latter and catch the smallest glimmer of a grin on the other. The grin quickly vanishes and is soon replaced by his normally stoic expression.