Watabe Eme, Felis beastkin.

Eme coughed up a lungful of water as she lay on the rocky shore. Just moments ago, she’d flung herself from the underground river’s grasp.

Frigid water clung to her fur, wetting it against her skin with an uncomfortable heaviness. She felt like a drowned kitten thrown down a dark well. Her scrambled mind was struggling to come to terms with what had just happened. One moment she was in a desperate battle with a dragon-blood Tyrant of all things, the next moment the ground disappeared and she was falling.

This was not what she signed up for.

After coughing up a final lungful of water, Eme looked around herself.

Her feline eyes flashed in the dark. Being a Felis, Eme thankfully possessed the innate ability to see even in the darkest of places where even the sun and moons dared not to venture.

Dark wall of a smooth tunnel greeted her. It was strange, as if a massive worm-like beast had carved its way through solid rock. In the few divots and cracks, a varying collection of mushrooms sprouted like rusted nails in a pure gray canvas.

Turning in place, back the way she’d come, Eme bore witness to the rushing river that’d carried her far down into the Under-roots.

Eme held in the desire to hiss at it as her ears flattened against her skull.

It was with luck that she’d turned at that moment. As she was glaring at the black waters she caught sight of a hand floundering for the rocky shore, being torn into by the rapid river.

Eme pounced like a proverbial cat after a mouse to the water’s edge, grasping onto the hand that was moments from disappearing. Her own slim hands latched tight to the slender wrist. The river’s rage slammed into her immediately and almost tore her back into the depths.

Eme planted her feet the best she could and tried to haul the figure up. As her muscles strained in protest, she regretted skipping so many training days. In her defense, she thought the most danger she’d be in would be from too many tiny banquet desserts and overly handsy nobles.

Who would have thought she’d need to pull someone heavier than herself out of a raging river deep underground after almost drowning?

But haul she did.

Spluttering and coughing, the drowning figure’s face breached the surface. It was Delight. Eme felt a shock lance up her spine as she recognized her friend. Grunting and groaning, she pulled with renewed strength.

From the brackish waters, the Inferni dancer emerged. Feeling the air on her face, she croaked out to her rescuer. “Help!”

“I’m trying!” Eme grunted back.

“Eme?! Is that you?! Pull me up!”

“I’m trying!” Eme complained as she struggled to pull her heavier friend out of the clutches of the river. Her feet constantly slipped on the slick, smooth rock that made up the water’s edge. “You’re too heavy~”

“Shut up and pull!” Delight yelled back in indignation and fear.

Eventually, with much struggle, Eme pulled Delight free of the frigid water’s tight grasp. She swore it grew fiercer as they grew closer to escape, but escape they did. The sound of the waves crashing on the stone at their retreat sounded like foul curses to Eme. She just chalked it up to an exhausted delirium.

Collapsing onto the wet ground, Eme’s heart continued a terrified rhythm as she desperately inhaled great gouts of stale air into her complaining lungs. Her arms shook with an ache as she lay there beside her rescued friend.

Tiredly, Eme glanced over to take in the pitiful state of her friend. The grasping fingers of the icy river had robbed the dancer of most of her gear. Gone was her outerwear; the heavy coat she’d worn to keep the chill at bay was nowhere to be seen, likely it was still traversing the underground waterways. This left the poor demoness in only her thin and almost shear dancers attire. The soaked material clung tightly to her lithe form and left little to the imagination.

Tearing her gaze away, Eme took in her own miserable state.

Most of Eme’s gear was likewise gone. Somewhere in her tumble through the tunnels she’d lost her raincoat and pack, alongside all the gear within. What was far more worrying was the loss of her drums. While she wasn’t the best song-caster, without her drums she’d not be able to cast even the simplest of her spells.

Eme cast a desperate look about the tunnel where they’d come from, but all she saw was the river. It lapped at the shore almost mockingly.

“Eme?” Delight croaked out as she finished coughing water from her lungs. “Are you still there?” There was an unfamiliar tremble in the dancer’s voice. Her eyes blinked uselessly as she squinted into the darkness around that gnawed like vermin at the edges of vision.

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“I’m here.”

Eme reached out her hand to her friend, clasping theirs reassuringly. Delight clung to the proffered hand like a beggar would a discarded gold. Eme’s bones creaked painfully and she winced despite herself. The dancer looked rough. Gone was the self-assured swagger that accompanied her to many a ballroom and banquet. It was replaced by wide unseeing eyes and cracked lips.

“W-where are we? Can you see anything?” Delight asked, her voice a rare quiver.

Eme shook her head. It took an awkward moment for her to remember that her friend could not see as she could.

“I don’t know. All I remember is falling when that Dragon-blood broke the ground. What the fuck is going on Delight?! Th-this isn’t what I signed up for! Captain never said we’d be fighting like that. She said it was just going to be a few nights out in the mire. Deal with a couple of goblins. Ancestors! There was so much blood.”

Eme’s body shook with the lingering vestiges of adrenaline and fear. She gripped her head tight with trembling paws, her claws hooking into her hair.

“Fuck. I don’t know either, Eme.” Delight swore with a rough voice. “Do you see anything around us? I can’t find my pack and I’m fucking freezing.”

Another glance around revealed nothing new.

“No, all I see is a tunnel. The walls are very smooth and I don’t see an end to it. I can’t tell how far it goes, but it’s the only way; the river’s too dangerous. Do…do you have any idea where we are or where to go?”

“Do I look like I wander about underground in my off time?!” Delight huffed. The sound of her raised voice echoed down the tunnel. Both adventurers paused in fright as they listened intently. They stayed silent for a few agonizing seconds before it became clear nothing had heard them or at least didn’t reply.

“Sorry.” The pair apologized at the same time.

In an effort to avoid the awkward air, Eme picked herself up and held an arm out to Delight to help her. “Well, we might as well get going. No way to go but forwards. Right?”

It took a few awkward moments for Eme to remember again that Delight was effectively blind down here in the dark. Reaching down, she grasped the dancer’s hand with her own and hauled her to her feet. Delight only lightly grumbled at the act seeing as she could not see herself. Eme’s arms groaned at the action, surging with pain as she pulled her friend up. It took all her effort not to groan or comment on Delight’s weight.

It wouldn’t help to set the demoness off again.

Hand in hand, the pair set off down the unnaturally smooth tunnel.

Only the sound of their cautious footfalls accompanied the bardic pair as they began a long march into the bowels of the earth. The steps echoed down the monstrous borehole like a crier’s bell. Eme feared any notion of stealth was laughable.

Occasionally, luminescent mushrooms that sporadically dotted the tunnel’s cracks would pierce the darkness, but they were few and far between. Only brief moments of lighted clarity shone before the dark ate it all once more.

Delight was not doing well. Her sole forced reliance on Eme’s guidance was weathering her mind and drawing a sense of tension into their conjoined hands. Every imagined whisper or echo in the creeping darkness had her gripping the poor Felis’ hand ever tighter.

Eme winced once more as Delight squeezed tight.

“Wait!” Delight’s voice was a harsh whisper in the dark, and she drew Eme to a halt with a harsh tug as she spoke. By now, the pair had walked for what felt like hours. Who could truly know down here in the cold underworld? Eme felt like she had wandered into a desolate afterlife with a paranoid burden in tow. Not that she’d tell Delight that to her face…at least not yet. Maybe if she kept crushing her hand she might.

“What!” Eme hissed back, perhaps harsher than she’d intended.

Delight was unperturbed, her wide eyes straining fearfully in the dark. “Did you hear that? It sounds like…crying?”

Eme was ready to discard Delight’s words, as the dancer had said she’d heard such nonsense many times during their long trek, but just as she was about to deny her, she heard it as well. Her feline ears atop her head flickered towards the darkness.

There it sounded: a weeping in the deep.

It was deep and mournful. That of someone savoring regret and loss. Brassy sobs tingled at the edge of hearing and sent Eme’s fur prickling.

“Eme!” Delight hissed-whispered in her ear once more.

Eme grunted in annoyance. “I hear it.”

The sound swept through the tunnel like a haunting melody. A dirge. No matter how hard she strained with her feline ears, Eme couldn’t pick out the voice from anyone she knew. Then again she’d rarely heard people weeping so.

“What should we do?” Delight asked, breaking Eme’s trance.

Eme bit her lip in thought.

“How likely is it that it’s just one of the others? Perhaps they got washed down a tunnel ahead of us?”

Delight leveled a disbelieving look upon Eme in the dark.

“Yeah, sure. The creepy crying is just one of our friends. Haven’t you listened to any adventure horror stories? Anyway, it’s not like we have much of a choice; it’s coming from the way we have to go. Unless you see any other paths?”

Eme shook her head. “Nope.”

Steeling themselves, the pair of world-weathered bards crept closer to the sound of weeping in the dark. The sound was a cancer, growing in their consciousness as their echoing steps led them ever closer to this plague of melancholy. This tragedy of sound.

The dark embrace had them now.

Just as the crying grew to the point it rattled Eme’s teeth, they sighted that which was responsible.

An oasis of light shone down from the softly glowing mushrooms to alight upon the thick, muscular form of a naked, masculine figure. The man sat on his haunches, a mournful gaze hidden away from sight by his strong back, yet those broad shoulders shook with a heavy weight. Like a halo, a mane of thick black hair shone in the light as it rested atop bronze-colored skin. Eme’s keen eyes caught a last detail; laying limp in the shadows cast by the man’s broad form was a long cat-like tail ending in a tuft of black fur.

Disappointment flooded Eme. Despite knowing it was a long shot, she still had hoped it was someone they knew. Someone they could trust.

Before she could even start thinking of a strategy for this new obstacle, Delight clumsily tripped behind her as she shuffled nervously in place. The sound of rocks tumbling echoed down the tunnel and the crying stopped.

Eme froze in fear as the figure turned its head to face them, staring at them unbothered by the darkness.

“Who goes there?”