75 Ashan 718
The Beneath was no place for friends or allies. There was no sense of camaraderie or a need to band together to ensure mutual survival. Within the deepest depths of the labyrinth that was Slags Deep prison, it was every man and woman for themselves. The inmates haunting the dark mine halls were nothing like the spineless thugs Maxine was used to dealing with. Mages and marked alike battled for light, resources, and wealth to both survive and earn their freedom. Every creature that wasn't her lurking in this dark abyss was a formidable enemy. The Element cultists she'd been so concerned about for their transgressions against her held no candle to the monsters that shared her new residence. The Rusalka, for all her fury and tenacity, was well out of her league.
Try as they may, one could never successfully spend their trials on the Seventh Floor totally alone forever. Running into another being in the eerie darkness was just as inevitable as it was perilous. An accidental shoulder bump leading to an all-out brawl as opposed to a pile of fresh corpses would've been considered a decent trial. The fate of such encounters was always up to those involved in it. The robust guards posted at The Run were tasked only with securing the entrance and exit. The well-being of the prisoners was not a part of their job description, and thus they couldn't be counted on to prevent one inmate from massacring another.
In the rare instances conversation was thrown into the air between strangers in place of fists, it was more so to keep sanity than to create friendships. The topics of discussion tended to repeat between each new meeting. Inevitably, someone would finally inquire what the other had done to deserve time in Slags Deep. Half would swear themselves innocent of the crimes that they were convicted of. Maxine, however, preferred to answer the same way she seemed to respond to everything now: alarming silence.
The gentle glow of a neighbor's dwindling torchlight barely illuminated the wall she swung her pickaxe into. She knew her chosen mining spot was one that held a reputation for fruitlessness. The hardened, more powerful criminals in her class had monopolized the few areas of demonstrable promise. The threat of a bleak outcome for her efforts did nothing to stop the repetitive piercing of steel to stone. Her only thoughts were those of finding precious onyx to deplete her tab, and the unyielding anger that still burned inside her kept her pickaxe viciously striking the wall. The sound was as consistent and willful as a heartbeat. Like all disturbances within the Seventh Floor, however, the obvious indication she was mining toward liberation brought the wolves sprinting to her doorstep.
"Well, well," an arrogant, familiar voice echoed out nearby. "I see our girl Max is still at it! You've been going at this for what? Ten trials straight now?" A duo of chuckles following the man's observation reminded her that he was not alone in the darkness behind her. Max paused to glance in vain over her shoulder into the black. Then she turned back to face her task and continued swinging. Her indifference was not something the other prisoners seemed to like. Not one bit. "What's the matter, eh? Can't give good ole Lenny the time of trial still?" She could feel the callouses on the pads of her hands ripping. The wounded flesh stung with sweat. The pickaxe never slowed.
"Y'know, there was a new crew that came in today," Lenny continued, his voice drawing nearer with each passing trill. "Fresh meat always talks too much, but Immortals be fucked, they had some interesting things to say about you." Max pressed her lips together. By now the trials for the others captured in the riots must've concluded. Citizens of Scalvoris Town she'd driven to violence against the Elements were likely shoved in most of the levels above the Seventh. If Lenny was about to reveal accurate information about the crimes she was convicted for, that suggested there was somehow information passed between The Beneath and the other levels after all.
"They say you fancy yourself an Element Killer," Lenny sneered. "You've got quite the body count of those pompous bastards for a little girl, too. That was some heavy stuff those boys did to you and those other women. And that riot? Bold. Guess it's true what they say about a woman scorned." The men laying in wait behind her went silent as though they expected exposing her would get a rise out of her. Instead they found her silence remained unbroken. The only sound she made was the one of her tool chipping further into the wall. Part of her had hoped they'd see her quietness as boring and go. She knew they never would. This pack of mangy strays planned to lunge at her the moment the dying torchlight revealed she'd found something of value.
"That's not all I heard," her lurking nuisance persisted in his mockery. His hand moved back to give one of his goons a friendly slap to the middle, a decided "watch this" gesture before he revealed what else the rioters spilled about her. "Stories go you had the chance to give Thorst Fall's Special Assistant a second smile before they threw you in chains. What happened, Element Killer? You choke?" One of the other men in the darkness started up with faux gagging noises while the others guffawed. Maxine's pickaxe slammed into stones with more force. The subtle change was all the encouragement Lenny required.
The brute slowly made his way into the edge of torchlight. With his arms crossed over his thick chest, he leered just a few feet behind the working Rusalka. "I'm gettin' out of here real soon though. Real soon. Tab's almost up. Man's got a hunger too, being down in a pit all these arcs if y'know what I mean." His ominous tone reverberated throughout the small tunnel space at this distance. It was as though his words were encircling her, forcing her to acknowledge something in her world other than the wall she was so concentrated on. "Maybe when I'm free I'll take a walk over to Scalvoris Town to get a look at that Special Assistant for myself; do what you couldn't after I'm finished having my way with her." Lenny turned to look over his shoulder, sneering. "What do you think, boys? I'd wager that even if I was caught for that crime, I'd at least return a king for it!"
Lenny had hardly finished getting the last word out before Maxine's pickaxe had turned to bust in his skull. If it wasn't the steel to his temple that did him in, it was certainly the momentum of the crushing blow that sent him careening head-first into the rocks. His friends staggered back with mouths agape and eyes wide. The Rusalka looked down over Lenny's body where it awkwardly laid, his limbs twitching in spasms in a way that left the others weak in the knees. Blood flowed from the side of his head like her pickaxe had struck a water source through stone. Eyes swarming with dark, feral hostility, she spun the pickaxe in her hands and brought the point down straight through his face with every ounce of strength she had.
"Crazy bitch!" one of the grieving shadows lunged toward her with inhuman teeth bared. The Rusalka's brow raised, the sight reminding her faintly of Kura before she realized the marked beast was upon her. In a trill she was roughly knocked down on her back. Only the pickaxe head pressed to her attacker's chest kept the gnashing canines up and away from her neck. Her muscles strained, teeth gritting as she desperately tried to keep the rabid man at bay. She could feel her strength ebbing away, fangs coming closer and closer to her vulnerable flesh with every passing trill the pair struggled. Max shoved the man sidelong off her rather than continue to attempt to fight gravity. Her wolfish foe went careening beside her, but his surviving friend had come to grips with Lenny's reaping and was quick to challenge the Rusalka. The stone-encrusted fist of the apparent Defier struck Max just as she started to find her feet. Once more she was cast upon the floor, gravel scraping the heels of her hands and the tops of her knees.
Shit, shit, shit!
Karem's imprisoned hunter had recovered by then. He stalked toward her with a snarl. His shin shot out into the side of her ribs, knocking her over onto her back in time for the Defier to gather more ether. The soil itself reached up to swallow her ankles, holding her in place while more snaked up in search of her wrists. She sat up to wrench her arms away from the rising stones in time to crack the wolf-man in the jaw with a fist. Her feet desperately yanked themselves free of the ground and she rose to stand. She violently backpedaled only to feel her back hit a tunnel wall.
The torchlight she'd been working in faded away completely, leaving her blind to her enemies where they stalked her in the dark. Her heart hammered with despair in her chest. As good as she was in a brawl, she couldn't beat down the punch she couldn't see coming; and come they did indeed. One of that sort careened in from her flank, stone-studded knuckles blasting first into her cheek and then into her solar plexus. They rained down upon her mercilessly. Strikes came from nearly every angle, each one as unpredictable in the dark as the first. Several cracked across her face, and by the time she’d found the sense to raise her guard to give her head reprieve, a body shot soared in to knock the wind clean from her lungs.
She bent forward with a gasp only to be wrenched away from the wall, thrown forward onto her stomach. Her fingers curled around the loose gravel and her eyes blinked as though they could will away the blackness that encircled her. Her mind screamed at her to get up. Every instinct in her body willed her to fight, even if it amounted to little more than swinging her fists haphazardly in the darkness around her in hopes one struck a ghost. The Rusalka grimaced as she prepared to force her aching frame back up. Blood dripped thickly from her lips to mix with the gravel below. Then, a bestial growl rumbled a few feet before her.
The next thing she knew, the canine-teethed man had wrenched her up from behind on her knees. The Defier grasped one of her arms on the other side. She wildly tried in vain to battle their grip, eyes frantically looking between her enemies and the creature she could feel moving closer. Its yellow eyes flashed open. What little light there was in the tunnel illuminated a set of large, agape, off-white fangs. The color drained from her face. The bloodthirsty anticipation of her strong-armed captors grew with each passing trill the wolf came close to tearing Maxine asunder.
For punishing Lenny, this would be her end.
The Beneath was no place for friends or allies. There was no sense of camaraderie or a need to band together to ensure mutual survival. Within the deepest depths of the labyrinth that was Slags Deep prison, it was every man and woman for themselves. The inmates haunting the dark mine halls were nothing like the spineless thugs Maxine was used to dealing with. Mages and marked alike battled for light, resources, and wealth to both survive and earn their freedom. Every creature that wasn't her lurking in this dark abyss was a formidable enemy. The Element cultists she'd been so concerned about for their transgressions against her held no candle to the monsters that shared her new residence. The Rusalka, for all her fury and tenacity, was well out of her league.
Try as they may, one could never successfully spend their trials on the Seventh Floor totally alone forever. Running into another being in the eerie darkness was just as inevitable as it was perilous. An accidental shoulder bump leading to an all-out brawl as opposed to a pile of fresh corpses would've been considered a decent trial. The fate of such encounters was always up to those involved in it. The robust guards posted at The Run were tasked only with securing the entrance and exit. The well-being of the prisoners was not a part of their job description, and thus they couldn't be counted on to prevent one inmate from massacring another.
In the rare instances conversation was thrown into the air between strangers in place of fists, it was more so to keep sanity than to create friendships. The topics of discussion tended to repeat between each new meeting. Inevitably, someone would finally inquire what the other had done to deserve time in Slags Deep. Half would swear themselves innocent of the crimes that they were convicted of. Maxine, however, preferred to answer the same way she seemed to respond to everything now: alarming silence.
The gentle glow of a neighbor's dwindling torchlight barely illuminated the wall she swung her pickaxe into. She knew her chosen mining spot was one that held a reputation for fruitlessness. The hardened, more powerful criminals in her class had monopolized the few areas of demonstrable promise. The threat of a bleak outcome for her efforts did nothing to stop the repetitive piercing of steel to stone. Her only thoughts were those of finding precious onyx to deplete her tab, and the unyielding anger that still burned inside her kept her pickaxe viciously striking the wall. The sound was as consistent and willful as a heartbeat. Like all disturbances within the Seventh Floor, however, the obvious indication she was mining toward liberation brought the wolves sprinting to her doorstep.
"Well, well," an arrogant, familiar voice echoed out nearby. "I see our girl Max is still at it! You've been going at this for what? Ten trials straight now?" A duo of chuckles following the man's observation reminded her that he was not alone in the darkness behind her. Max paused to glance in vain over her shoulder into the black. Then she turned back to face her task and continued swinging. Her indifference was not something the other prisoners seemed to like. Not one bit. "What's the matter, eh? Can't give good ole Lenny the time of trial still?" She could feel the callouses on the pads of her hands ripping. The wounded flesh stung with sweat. The pickaxe never slowed.
"Y'know, there was a new crew that came in today," Lenny continued, his voice drawing nearer with each passing trill. "Fresh meat always talks too much, but Immortals be fucked, they had some interesting things to say about you." Max pressed her lips together. By now the trials for the others captured in the riots must've concluded. Citizens of Scalvoris Town she'd driven to violence against the Elements were likely shoved in most of the levels above the Seventh. If Lenny was about to reveal accurate information about the crimes she was convicted for, that suggested there was somehow information passed between The Beneath and the other levels after all.
"They say you fancy yourself an Element Killer," Lenny sneered. "You've got quite the body count of those pompous bastards for a little girl, too. That was some heavy stuff those boys did to you and those other women. And that riot? Bold. Guess it's true what they say about a woman scorned." The men laying in wait behind her went silent as though they expected exposing her would get a rise out of her. Instead they found her silence remained unbroken. The only sound she made was the one of her tool chipping further into the wall. Part of her had hoped they'd see her quietness as boring and go. She knew they never would. This pack of mangy strays planned to lunge at her the moment the dying torchlight revealed she'd found something of value.
"That's not all I heard," her lurking nuisance persisted in his mockery. His hand moved back to give one of his goons a friendly slap to the middle, a decided "watch this" gesture before he revealed what else the rioters spilled about her. "Stories go you had the chance to give Thorst Fall's Special Assistant a second smile before they threw you in chains. What happened, Element Killer? You choke?" One of the other men in the darkness started up with faux gagging noises while the others guffawed. Maxine's pickaxe slammed into stones with more force. The subtle change was all the encouragement Lenny required.
The brute slowly made his way into the edge of torchlight. With his arms crossed over his thick chest, he leered just a few feet behind the working Rusalka. "I'm gettin' out of here real soon though. Real soon. Tab's almost up. Man's got a hunger too, being down in a pit all these arcs if y'know what I mean." His ominous tone reverberated throughout the small tunnel space at this distance. It was as though his words were encircling her, forcing her to acknowledge something in her world other than the wall she was so concentrated on. "Maybe when I'm free I'll take a walk over to Scalvoris Town to get a look at that Special Assistant for myself; do what you couldn't after I'm finished having my way with her." Lenny turned to look over his shoulder, sneering. "What do you think, boys? I'd wager that even if I was caught for that crime, I'd at least return a king for it!"
Lenny had hardly finished getting the last word out before Maxine's pickaxe had turned to bust in his skull. If it wasn't the steel to his temple that did him in, it was certainly the momentum of the crushing blow that sent him careening head-first into the rocks. His friends staggered back with mouths agape and eyes wide. The Rusalka looked down over Lenny's body where it awkwardly laid, his limbs twitching in spasms in a way that left the others weak in the knees. Blood flowed from the side of his head like her pickaxe had struck a water source through stone. Eyes swarming with dark, feral hostility, she spun the pickaxe in her hands and brought the point down straight through his face with every ounce of strength she had.
"Crazy bitch!" one of the grieving shadows lunged toward her with inhuman teeth bared. The Rusalka's brow raised, the sight reminding her faintly of Kura before she realized the marked beast was upon her. In a trill she was roughly knocked down on her back. Only the pickaxe head pressed to her attacker's chest kept the gnashing canines up and away from her neck. Her muscles strained, teeth gritting as she desperately tried to keep the rabid man at bay. She could feel her strength ebbing away, fangs coming closer and closer to her vulnerable flesh with every passing trill the pair struggled. Max shoved the man sidelong off her rather than continue to attempt to fight gravity. Her wolfish foe went careening beside her, but his surviving friend had come to grips with Lenny's reaping and was quick to challenge the Rusalka. The stone-encrusted fist of the apparent Defier struck Max just as she started to find her feet. Once more she was cast upon the floor, gravel scraping the heels of her hands and the tops of her knees.
Shit, shit, shit!
Karem's imprisoned hunter had recovered by then. He stalked toward her with a snarl. His shin shot out into the side of her ribs, knocking her over onto her back in time for the Defier to gather more ether. The soil itself reached up to swallow her ankles, holding her in place while more snaked up in search of her wrists. She sat up to wrench her arms away from the rising stones in time to crack the wolf-man in the jaw with a fist. Her feet desperately yanked themselves free of the ground and she rose to stand. She violently backpedaled only to feel her back hit a tunnel wall.
The torchlight she'd been working in faded away completely, leaving her blind to her enemies where they stalked her in the dark. Her heart hammered with despair in her chest. As good as she was in a brawl, she couldn't beat down the punch she couldn't see coming; and come they did indeed. One of that sort careened in from her flank, stone-studded knuckles blasting first into her cheek and then into her solar plexus. They rained down upon her mercilessly. Strikes came from nearly every angle, each one as unpredictable in the dark as the first. Several cracked across her face, and by the time she’d found the sense to raise her guard to give her head reprieve, a body shot soared in to knock the wind clean from her lungs.
She bent forward with a gasp only to be wrenched away from the wall, thrown forward onto her stomach. Her fingers curled around the loose gravel and her eyes blinked as though they could will away the blackness that encircled her. Her mind screamed at her to get up. Every instinct in her body willed her to fight, even if it amounted to little more than swinging her fists haphazardly in the darkness around her in hopes one struck a ghost. The Rusalka grimaced as she prepared to force her aching frame back up. Blood dripped thickly from her lips to mix with the gravel below. Then, a bestial growl rumbled a few feet before her.
The next thing she knew, the canine-teethed man had wrenched her up from behind on her knees. The Defier grasped one of her arms on the other side. She wildly tried in vain to battle their grip, eyes frantically looking between her enemies and the creature she could feel moving closer. Its yellow eyes flashed open. What little light there was in the tunnel illuminated a set of large, agape, off-white fangs. The color drained from her face. The bloodthirsty anticipation of her strong-armed captors grew with each passing trill the wolf came close to tearing Maxine asunder.
For punishing Lenny, this would be her end.