The entrance was easy to find with the white silk cloth that had been tied around one of the bars on the gate that was closed over the opening. “Fala, the key,” Jacob whispered, who unlocked it as soon as he was handed the key and pulled the rusty hinged gate back. At the entrance on the inside, two torches leaned up against a large rock that looked like it had been purposely placed there just for that reason and to keep them out of the water that ran down the middle of the tunnel floor. Jacob scraped his flint across the wall and brought the one he picked up to life, then waved his hand for us to join him. The moment I stepped in I could smell the hint of death, and knew that this would be just like the rest of the places that we had ventured into.

Derek handed Fala the second torch and he tilted it into the one that Jacob was holding and took the back. The deeper we made our way in the worse the smell thickened. It felt like the rotting death of the pile that we had climbed through was just the beginning of the horror that we would witness before our plan was put into motion. That is, if the ones we looked for didn’t have plans set in motion of their own. Jacob whispered back for us to watch our step about the time my foot felt something roll underneath it. By the time I looked down there were several things that my feet were hitting and it was very hard to miss them. Body parts were strewn about the tunnel floor. Some just bone; some with flesh still attached. One arm lay severed at the elbow with the hand still open, as if waiting to be shaken in a passing greeting.

Torsos, with more on the outside than in, lay grotesquely up against the tunnel wall; with a faceless head a few feet away. A full leg mixed together with bones that I had no knowledge of what part of the body they came from, lay up a few feet away from the torso, but not one whole body was to be seen. I wanted nothing more than to be carried at this point but my pride would not allow me to ask, so I kept the thought to myself, sliding my feet through God only knows what hoping that we would soon reach the end. Jacob put his hand behind him, touching my stomach as he came to a stop.

“Someone’s coming this way,” he said in a normal voice.

“The torch, put it out,” I whispered as softly as I could.

“It’s…” he began to say, once again in a normal tone.

“Not so loud,” I hissed.

“They know we are here,” he turned, looking at me with frustration on his face. “If I can see their torch, they can surely see mine.”

“Well you don’t have to get so pissy about it.”

“And you do not have to question my decisions, either,” he whispered.

“Oh, that you whispered,” I smirked, putting my hand on my hip.

A young man came around the curve of the tunnel and smiled at us. “It’s me Felicia, only like this I’m known as Alex,” he smiled, walking closer. He was alone and didn’t seem to care that it was just the four of us; telling me that had there been a plan to take us all prisoners that he would have asked about the others first thing. I guess it showed on my face when I refused to take those first steps when he asked us to follow him. He turned, explaining that the rest of the way was a bit tricky, so, he thought he would come show us in case that we had come this night, and that if we went the wrong way to make sure we didn’t end up in the butcher’s corner. The last statement made him laugh as he kicked a hand down the tunnel. “The butcher is the one who disposes of the bodies, but you can tell he does a sloppy job while taking them out of the tunnel,” Alex laughed like the bones he was kicking through were just an every night ordeal. And by the look of things, I guess it was.

“Where is your companion?” Jacob inquired, making me think he was going to receive the same question.

“The mistress was ordered to the high mistress’s castle, to go over the coming of, what they seem to be calling, the ‘demon seed of Martin’. Bernard was taking her to her coach when I headed down here. We were hoping you would come this night and not last night. Our owners had us very busy and there is no way we could have played. But we are as free as any slave could be this night.” The way he looked back and licked his lips was almost enough to make me lose what the stench of the dead had not.

“Do you know what they mean by that?” I asked, keeping my head low and behind Jacob.

“We were drawing the mistress her bath and heard her arguing with her sister…as if that was anything unusual. It was then that the phrase came out. Angelica claimed she knew for a fact that the one traveling to London was the very creation of Martin Vegee Lebrun himself,” he stopped, turning slightly around. “Your master!”

“He has been away for a while. I wonder if they got the bastard?” Derek blatantly asked, with me spinning on him.

“Excuse me?” I grabbed the front of his shirt before I even realized what I had done, causing Derek to take a step back. “I wanted that son-of-a-bitch to be taken by us,” I quickly added as soon as I caught on to my own actions.

“Too late, flesher…if that’s what you really are?” Alex asked. turning to the right and heading up a set of stone steps. “I told Bernard you were more than just fleshers, or Martin would not have you. He is far too picky. Hell, he won’t even allow slaves in his home.”

I think we all let out a breath that we were holding when he made that first comment, thinking he had made us for what we really were. He went on to tell us that he and Bernard had argued after we had left the first night about whether or not we were fleshers made breeders or breeders made fleshers, but neither could figure out how the breeder part of us held down the meat. I snickered out loud at not only the thought of them arguing about it, but the thought of seeing Derek actually trying it back in the beginning of his first nights as a breeder. Like the time when he drank a glass of cold tea and became extremely ill, or the time he jumped off the side of the cliff, thinking he could fly, and dropped down to the beach floor with a thud.

Bernard met us at the top of the stairs scaring me right out of my humorous thoughts and right into the defensive mode. Bernard was holding a sword that had to be four feet long with red tassels hanging off of the gold swirled handle. “She may not let me touch these when she’s here…” he smiled “but, she’s not here now, is she?” he stuck it out in front of himself and said ‘en garde’, stepping out, moving away from the door in strange looking steps, putting the same foot forward every time. Almost like short hopping moves, while swinging the sword in circles. To me, he looked quite silly, but I was glad to see he was dancing with the thing and not trying to drive it through one of our bodies.

“Did you hear Inara talking about the elders and the two they sent?” Bernard asked Alex as we exited from the stairs.

I was looking at the elaborate surroundings, while Jacob spun Bernard around by the shoulder. Bernard yelped out in more of a feminine tone than masculine, dropping the sword on the ground, showing he would be no problem taking back to our home. “Tell me what you know of these two of which you speak,” Jacob demanded not caring for a second what either of them may have thought about his aggressiveness.

“She…she said she heard word that the elders sent two assassins out from the counsel; that they now sought the ones coming this way as we speak,” he explained in such a nervous reply that his hands were visually shaking.

“She told you this personally?” Jacob asked, yanking him closer by the lace on the front of his shirt.

“No, of course not. You don’t discuss orders with things you consider your pets. She was talking to her lover while I painted her toe nails. I forget your name,” Bernard said, touching Jacob’s hand lightly.

“Jacob,” he replied, removing his grip from Bernard’s shirt.