Chapter 4: Warm Waters of Pleasure
The passage of tongues led them down, always down, following the fever-heat and the coppery taste. The realm’s architecture shifted from biological horror to something more eerily serene. The dripping walls smoothed into polished, dark stone veined with that same pulsating gold. The air grew humid, thick with the scent of minerals and something sweetly herbal that clung to the back of the throat.
The rhythmic thumping, which had been a distant, unsettling heartbeat, now resolved into a new sound: the steady, bubbling churn of water.
They emerged from a narrow fissure onto a wide, rocky ledge overlooking a cavern so vast the ceiling was lost in a misty gloom. Below them, illuminated by glowing fungal growths and cracks in the stone that leaked liquid gold, was a hot spring. It was enormous, easily the size of a swimming pool, its water a cloudy, opalescent blue. Steam rose in great, rolling clouds, catching the light and painting rainbows in the murky air. The rocks surrounding it were smooth, shaped by water and time, but the overall impression was less of a natural cavern and more of a sacred bathhouse built by a mad god.
The group stood on the ledge, panting, wounds aching, the memory of the card-soldier fight a sharp sting in their muscles. The pervasive magical pressure here was different. It wasn’t a violent push towards arousal, but a heavy, seductive pull towards release, towards soaking away the grime and terror.
“Holy shit,” Maryam breathed, wiping sweat from her brow. “A hot tub. In hell.”
“It’s a trap,” Portia said immediately, though her eyes were fixed on the steaming water with a naked longing. “It has to be.”
“Obviously,” Stacy said, her voice tight with fatigue. Her own body screamed for the heat, for a moment of weightlessness. She assessed the situation. They were exhausted, injured, and magically depleted. Charging forward in this state was suicidal. Tobias, wherever he was, had herded them here. This was the next stage of his game.
Fat Aunt Jan sagged against Rick, her face pale. “The water… it’s saturated with the realm’s energy. But it’s diffuse. It could… stabilize us. If we’re careful. If we cycle the energy instead of letting it build up.” She looked at Stacy, her green eyes earnest. “We need to ground ourselves, Coach. Or the next thing he throws at us will break us.”
Stacy hated it. Hated the loss of control. But Jan—this Jan, the one who’d been drained on the throne—was right. They were running on fumes. She made a decision.
“Alright. Listen up.” Her ‘Coach’ voice cut through the steam. “We soak. Naked. Skin contact with the water to let the excess magic bleed off. No funny business.” She glared around the group, her gaze lingering on Rick, on Portia, on the younger faces. “We use it to heal, not to get distracted. Ten minutes. Then we move. Understood?”
There were nods, muttered agreements. The promise of the hot water was too potent to refuse.
They descended a natural stairway of slick stone to the spring’s edge. The heat radiating off the water was intense, a physical force. Without ceremony, they began to undress. There was no lewdness to it, only a grim, practical exhaustion. Clothes, stained with sweat, blood, and other fluids, were shed in piles on the dry rocks.
Stacy peeled off her tank top and leggings, her skin pebbling in the steam. She avoided looking at Rick as he stepped out of his jeans, but the memory of him pounding into her in the clearing was a live wire under her skin. She slid into the water first, a sharp hiss escaping her lips as the heat enveloped her. It was perfect—scalding at first, then deeply penetrating, easing the ache in her shoulders, her lower back.
The others followed. Kim and Maryam, their identical bodies slick and gleaming. Calista, her silver hair fanning out in the water like a halo, her elven features relaxing. Mandy winced as the water hit the cut on her arm, then sighed as the heat soothed it. Ben, Franklin, Bruce, Cody, the girls—they all submerged with varying groans of relief.
Rick entered the water last, his eyes finding Stacy’s across the mist. He sank in up to his chest, his shoulders broad and tense.
For a few minutes, it worked. The water’s magic was a gentle thrum, a neutral medium. The exhaustion began to leach away. The pervasive horniness of the realm faded to a distant buzz.
Fat Aunt Jan eased herself into the spring with Portia’s help, settling on a submerged rock shelf with a deep, groaning sigh of relief. “See? Just… just need to stay calm. Let it flow through.”
But Tobias’s realm was not designed for calm.
The change was subtle. The sweet herbal scent deepened, becoming cloying, musky. The veins of gold in the water began to glow brighter, pulsing in a slow, rhythmic cadence that matched a resting heartbeat. The steam seemed to thicken, carrying not just heat but a tingling, aromatic charge that settled on the skin and seeped into the lungs.
Stacy felt it first as a warmth in her belly that had nothing to do with the water. A familiar, treacherous heat. She clenched her jaw, trying to focus on the rock wall across the spring.
“The water…” Jenny murmured, her voice dreamy. “It’s… it’s changing.”
Amanda, beside her, let out a soft whimper. “Jenny… I feel weird.”
“Don’t fight it,” Fat Aunt Jan said, her own voice taking on a strange, melodic quality. “Fighting makes it worse. You have to… embrace it. Let it happen. It’s the only way to process the energy.”
Stacy’s head snapped towards her. That was the doctrine, but the tone was off. It was too placid, too encouraging. The Jan she knew would be cracking a joke, making light of the horrifying compulsion. This Jan’s smile was serene, knowing. Her hands drifted under the water, between her own thighs.
A cascade of shivers ran through the pool. Felicity moaned, her head falling back against Bruce’s chest. He wrapped his brawny arms around her, his stubbled jaw nuzzling her neck. Mai and Cody moved together in the mist, their mouths meeting in a hungry kiss. Kim and Maryam turned to face each other, their foreheads touching, breaths mingling.
The directive was back, but smoother, more insidious. It didn’t feel like an invasion. It felt like the most natural, obvious conclusion in the world.
Rick was moving through the water towards Stacy. His expression was no longer conflicted. It was dark, intent, filled with a possessive hunger that made her breath catch. Behind him, Portia surfaced, her short brown hair plastered to her skull, her deceptively innocent face set in lines of stark need. And to the side, Benedict watched, his young body taut, his cock already hard and jutting from the water as he stared not at Calista or Mandy, but at Stacy.
A triad of attention, focused solely on her.
“Stacy,” Rick growled, the water sloshing around his waist.
This was the trap. Not a fight, but a seduction. To drown in this, to lose the mission in a haze of pleasure.
“Stay back,” she warned, but her voice lacked conviction. The heat was coiling tight inside her, a spring ready to snap. The sight of them—Rick’s raw desire, Portia’s focused intensity, Ben’s youthful worship—was gasoline on the fire.
“You’re so tight, Coach,” Fat Aunt Jan purred from her shelf, her eyes closed, her fingers working more visibly now beneath the shimmering surface. “All that control. Let it go. For the mission. You need to bleed off that energy.”
For the mission. The words twisted in Stacy’s mind, warping justification into command.
Rick reached her. His hands, big and hot, found her hips under the water. He turned her, firmly, pushing her chest against the smooth, curved rim of the spring. The stone was warm. She didn’t resist. Her mind was fracturing, the last vestige of tactical thought screaming into a void of pure, physical want.
“Please,” she heard herself rasp, pushing her ass back against him.
He needed no further invitation. He positioned himself, the broad head of his cock nudging against her entrance. She was soaking wet, her own arousal mixing with the magical water. He pushed inside with a single, relentless thrust, burying himself to the hilt.
Stacy cried out, her fingers scrambling for purchase on the slick stone. He filled her completely, stretching her, the delicious burn of it cutting through the fog. He began to move, a deep, measured pace that shifted the water around them in heavy waves.
“Fuck, Stacy,” he grunted into her ear, his body plastered to her back. “You take me so good.”
She could only moan in response, her world reduced to the slide of him inside her, the slap of his skin against hers, the steam burning her lungs.
Then Portia was there.
The no-nonsense time agent sank to her knees on the submerged ledge in front of Stacy. Her hazel eyes, sharp and clear despite the lust, locked onto Stacy’s. “Your turn to receive, Steinberg,” she said, her voice low and rough. And then she ducked her head beneath the opalescent water.
Stacy felt Portia’s hands spread her thighs wider under the surface. Then, the hot, insistent point of a tongue licked a firm stripe through her folds, finding her clit with unerring accuracy.
The dual sensation was catastrophic. Rick’s thick cock spearing her from behind, Portia’s devouring mouth on her front. Stacy’s head thrashed, a string of filthy, broken curses and pleas pouring from her lips. “Oh god, right there! Don’t stop! Suck it! Fuck me harder, Rick!”
Portia ate her with a focused, brutal efficiency. No playful teasing, just direct, sustained pressure on her clit, punctuated by deep, penetrating thrusts of her tongue. It was clinical and ravenous at once. Stacy’s hips bucked, fucking herself back onto Rick and forward onto Portia’s face.
Ben moved closer, drawn like a moth. He stood to the side, his hand wrapped around his thick, veined cock, stroking himself in time with Rick’s thrusts. His eyes were wide, glazed, drinking in the sight: Stacy, powerful and commanding Stacy, being utterly devoured by two people at once. Pre-cum beaded at his tip, mixing with the mineral water.
“Look at you,” Fat Aunt Jan sighed, her own breathing becoming ragged. Her plump body trembled on the shelf. “So beautiful. Taking your medicine. Yes. Good girl.”
The words slithered into Stacy’s pleasure-addled brain. Good girl. Jan had never called her that. Not even in bed. Jan called her ‘Coach’ or ‘you bossy bitch’ or ‘Stace.’ Never ‘good girl.’ It was wrong. A tiny, cold splinter in the heat.
Around them, the orgy reignited fully. The spring churned with bodies. Calista rode Franklin, her head thrown back, flames licking harmlessly across her shoulders. Mandy had turned, kissing Ben deeply while he stroked himself, her good hand tangled in his short hair. Kim and Maryam were a seamless tangle of limbs and shared breaths, their movements perfectly synchronized. The cavern echoed with the sounds of sex—slapping skin, guttural moans, choked cries, the constant, wet lapping of water.
Stacy was hurtling towards her peak, the pressure building to an unbearable degree. Portia’s tongue was a magic wand, Rick’s cock a punishing piston. She was going to shatter.
But that splinter of cold held.
She forced her eyes open, blurry with steam and pleasure. She looked over at Fat Aunt Jan.
Jan was watching, enraptured, her plump face flushed. Her hand was moving furiously between her own legs. But her eyes… they weren’t on Stacy’s face, or on the raw sex unfolding. They were fixed on the energy. A faint, rose-gold glow was visibly transferring from the copulating couples into the water, and from the water into the stone, feeding the glowing veins that pulsed towards the cavern’s dark upper reaches. Jan’s expression was one of hungry satisfaction, of a farmer watching a bountiful harvest.
And she was smiling. Not Jan’s mischievous, infectious grin. This was a curator’s smile. A collector’s smile.
This isn’t the real Fat Aunt Jan.
The realization hit Stacy like a bucket of ice water. The Jan from the throne had been drained, subdued. This Jan was energized, directive, orchestrating. She’d led them right into the realm’s digestive tract. The hot spring wasn’t a respite; it was a collection basin. They weren’t bleeding off energy. They were funneling it.
Rick’s thrusts became frantic. “I’m gonna come, Stacy!”
Portia’s fingers dug into her thighs, holding her in place for the final, devastating strokes of her tongue.
Ben groaned, his fist pumping faster.
Stacy clamped down internally, a violent, conscious effort that made Rick shout in surprise. She shoved herself back from the stone, dislodging Portia and forcing Rick to slip out of her with a wet pop.
“Stop!” she roared, the command echoing off the cavern walls.
The frantic activity around her faltered. Portia surfaced, gasping, her mouth glistening. Rick staggered back, confused, his body still taut with unreleased need. Ben froze, his hand on his cock.
Stacy stood waist-deep in the churning water, her chest heaving, every nerve still shrieking for completion. She pointed a trembling, accusatory finger at the woman on the rock shelf.
“You,” Stacy snarled, water dripping from her chin. “You’re not Jan. What are you?”
Fat Aunt Jan’s serene smile didn’t waver. It simply widened, becoming something grotesque and cruel. The fond, auntly demeanor melted away, revealing the bored, amused cruelty beneath.
“Oh, Stacy,” the thing said, its voice now a perfect, chilling mimicry. “And you were so very, very close. The energy yield was exquisite.”
The form of Fat Aunt Jan shimmered, like heat haze off asphalt. It dissolved, reshaping itself into the familiar, muscular form of Tobias. He stood on the rock shelf, shirtless and smug, his mirrored sunglasses reflecting the orgy around them.
“A convincing performance, don’t you think?” Tobias said, clicking his tongue. “The rescued damsel. The wise guide. So much more efficient than crude coercion. You all wanted to follow her. You yearned to let go.” He gestured to the still-glowing veins in the walls. “And you fed me. Deeply. Thank you.”
He looked directly at Stacy, his head tilting.
“But you. Always with the rude interruptions. The gun. The inconvenient clarity.” He sighed, a theatrical sound of disappointment. “No matter. The main course is still secure and dreaming. You’re just… appetizers.”
Tobias snapped his fingers.
From the dark water at the deep end of the spring, shapes emerged. Not card soldiers this time. These were humanoid, sculpted from the mineral sediment itself, their bodies rough-hewn and glittering. They moved through the water with eerie, fluid grace, their empty eye sockets fixed on the intruders.
“Time for the digestif,” Tobias said, and vanished.
The crystalline creatures surged forward, as the group, naked, aroused, and betrayed, scrambled to fight back in the sucking, weightless trap of the spring.
The crystalline creatures surged forward, as the group, naked, aroused, and betrayed, scrambled to fight back in the sucking, weightless trap of the spring. Stacy’s shout had snapped a thread, but the lingering magic still fogged their movements, made their reactions sluggish. A mineral-clawed hand swung for Rick’s head.
He ducked, the water slowing him, and the claw grazed his temple, drawing a line of blood that misted into the opalescent blue. “Son of a bitch!” he spat, swinging a wild fist that connected with a crystallized jaw, shattering it into gravel and glowing dust. The creature recoiled, silent and horrifying.
Portia was already moving, her agent’s training overriding disorientation. She launched herself from the submerged ledge, a naked, dripping arc, and drove her elbow into the junction of a creature’s neck and shoulder. It crunched, and the thing dissolved into a cloud of sediment. “Weapons!” she barked. “Anything!”
But their guns and blades were in soggy piles on the distant rocks. They had only flesh, magic, and fury.
Calista, her silver hair streaming, thrust her hands into the water. Her elven features tightened with concentration, then flared with power. Steam erupted, not from the spring, but from her skin. “Ignis!” she yelled, and fire bloomed from her palms, not red but a white-hot blue.
She swept her arms out, and the flames, defying the water, licked across the surface in a sizzling arc. They kissed the crystalline bodies, not with burning heat but with a concussive, magical energy. The creatures froze, shimmered, and then cracked apart like overdone clay, collapsing into the spring with a series of heavy plops.
Two more lunged for Stacy. She didn’t retreat. She met the first, grabbing its wrist of rough-hewn quartz, using its own momentum to swing it into its companion. They tangled, limbs locking. She drove her knee up, a vicious blow that shattered its crystalline crotch, then pivoted and shoved the crumbling mass into the deeper water where it sank.
The second creature swung. Stacy caught the arm, twisted with a grunt of effort, and snapped it clean off. She used the jagged limb as a dagger, plunging it into the thing’s hollow chest. It exploded into harmless, glittering dust.
Panting, dripping, she stood chest-deep in the suddenly still water. The last shards of crystal settled to the bottom. The unnatural, lust-inducing glow in the water was fading, bleached out by Calista’s fire and their violent exertion. The thick, sweet musk in the air dissipated, replaced by the clean, sharp scent of ozone and scorched stone.
Kim tread water, her hazel eyes scanning the pool’s surface. “It’s clear,” she announced, her voice shaky but sure. “The magic… it’s gone. He got what he wanted from us and left.”
The truth of it settled over them, colder than the spring. They had been farmed. Milked. Tobias had feasted on their desperate, magically-charged climaxes and vanished, leaving them exhausted and violated in his wake. A collective shame, hot and prickling, warred with the lingering physical thrum of their forced arousal.
Slowly, they regrouped in the center of the spring, a cluster of battered, naked bodies. The fight had burned the last of the compulsions away, leaving only raw vulnerability. Stacy looked at them—Rick rubbing his bleeding temple, Portia’s jaw set in a hard line, Calista panting from the magical expenditure, the younger ones wide-eyed and trembling.
“We can’t keep doing this,” Stacy said, her voice low and gravelly. The ‘Coach’ voice was gone, replaced by something weary and fiercely determined. “Stumbling around this fucking funhouse and getting tricked into... that.” She gestured vaguely at the water around them. “We find Jan. Both of them. And we do it using our heads, not our dicks.”
Mei, always the one to puncture tension, gave a shaky grin. “It’s not our fault we’re all so hot. This place has a type.”
Stacy rolled her eyes so hard her head hurt. “You are definitely Yukio’s daughter to say something that ridiculous right now.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Mei shot back, wringing water from her dark hair.
Stacy ignored her, thinking tactically.
Stacy ignored her, thinking tactically. Their vulnerability wasn’t just magical; it was logistical. Sixteen bodies made noise, left trails, and presented a buffet of energy for that fucking vampire Tobias. She climbed out of the spring, water sheeting off her toned physique, and began grabbing her clothes from the pile without a trace of self-consciousness.
“The problem is there are sixteen of us,” she announced, her voice cutting through the murmurs. All eyes turned to her, standing naked and authoritative on the slick rock. “Plus Godfrey. That’s a big, loud, delicious fucking target. We need to split up.”
She pulled on her damp leggings, the fabric clinging uncomfortably. “I’ll take myself, Rick, Felicity, and Bruce. We continue down the primary path we were on before the spring.” She pointed at Franklin, who was helping a shivering Mandy from the water. “Franklin, you take Mandy, Calista, and Ben. Double back. Try that left-hand fissure we passed a hundred yards ago.”
Portia was already dressed, wringing out her short hair. Stacy met her gaze. “Portia, you take Cody, Jenny, and Amanda. Get back to Bob’s transformed office. Tear it apart. Look for any clue, any ledger, any fucking receipt that tells us what this place really is or where he might be keeping Jan.”
Finally, she looked at Kim Powers, who was inspecting the edge of her curved sword for mineral damage. “Kim. You’re with Maryam, Mei, and Beth. Scout. See if this twisted world has any other residents. Someone, something, that might talk. Or that might just hate Tobias enough to point us in the right direction.”
Mei, fastening her own pants, smirked. She elbowed Rick, who was pulling his shirt over his head. “Hey Rick. Is the Stacy from our time this hot and commanding?”
Rick’s ears turned bright red above his collar. He ducked his head. “The older Stacy? From the future? She’s… she’s actually even more awesome than this.”
Stacy finished buttoning her top and smirked, holstering her Glock with a definitive click. “I’m not sure if that’s a compliment or not.” She faced them all again, fully dressed but with her dark hair plastered to her skull. “Listen. I’m aware. The magic here… it gets in your blood. If you get tempted, if you gotta fuck to take the edge off? Fine. Fuck. And then move the hell on. We are not his buffet twice.”
“Starting to think you’re the hottest of our found family aunties, Coach,” Mei said, shouldering a small pack.
Beth finished lacing her boot and sighed, shoving Mei gently. “Oh, just shut up, Mei.” She looked at Stacy and gave a firm nod. “We’re good. We’ll find something.”
A ripple of agreement moved through the group, a new, grim purpose replacing the post-violence slump. They gathered their things quickly, the chamber empty now of its seductive heat, just a damp, eerie cave. Stacy’s plan was the only map they had.
The main group watched as Portia’s team vanished back into the fissure, followed by Franklin’s group heading the opposite way. Kim gave a sharp whistle to her sister and the others, and they melted into a side passage that smelled of damp earth and ozone.
That left Stacy, Rick, Felicity, and Bruce in the vast cavern, with only the fading glow of the mineral veins for light. Godfrey III padded over to Stacy’s leg, his tiny Maltese form a stark contrast to the realm’s monstrous scale. His telepathic voice, that familiar Scooby-Doo cadence, echoed in her mind. “Rhis place is rhotten. Rhull of bad rhunes.”
“Tell me something I don’t know, dog,” Stacy muttered, but she reached down to scratch his head absently.
The path ahead was a downward-sloping tunnel, the walls now resembling stretched muscle fibers made of stone. The air grew cooler, carrying a new scent—like rust, ozone, and burnt sugar. The rhythmic thumping was louder here, a deep, sub-auditory vibration they felt in their teeth.
They walked in silence for ten minutes, the tension a live wire. The aftermath of the spring, the fight, the revelation of Tobias’s mimicry—it all hung between them, especially between her and Rick. Every glance felt charged.
Felicity, ever the scholar, paused to run her fingers over the strange wall. “It’s not just aesthetic. This is a conductive medium. It’s… channeling the psychic energy somewhere. Like arteries.”
“Great,” Bruce said, his Scottish accent a low rumble. He hefted his steampunk wrench. “So we’re walking inside a beast’s circulatory system. Lovely.”
A low, rhythmic groan echoed from ahead, distinct from the realm’s heartbeat. It was a human sound, muffled by layers of… something. It was followed by a wet, slapping sound that was horribly familiar.
Stacy held up a fist, stopping them. She crept forward, pressing herself against the organic stone. The tunnel opened into a broader chamber, lit by the same faint gold veins.
In the center of the chamber was a mound of what looked like glistening, black latex or living rubber. It pulsed. Tendrils from it stretched out, anchoring to the walls. And partially embedded in its center, up to his waist, was a man.
He was muscular, sweat-slicked, his head thrown back in agonized ecstasy. The substance had molded itself around his lower half, forming a perfect, gripping sheath. It was fucking him. Rhythmically, relentlessly, the whole mound pistoned around his hips, milking his cock with a disgusting, wet squelch. The man’s hands were trapped at his sides, fused into the mound. He was sobbing and moaning, his body jerking with forced, uninterrupted orgasms.
“Christ,” Bruce breathed, his face pale.
The man’s glazed eyes rolled towards them. His voice was a broken rasp. “Please… it… it doesn’t stop… it just takes… please…”
This was Tobias’s farm. A more permanent, harvesting version of the spring.
Rick shifted, his hand going to the makeshift club he’d fashioned from a piece of rusted rebar. “Do we… help him?”
Stacy assessed. The man was ensnared by the realm itself. Freeing him could trigger an alarm, or worse, release some kind of toxin. The sobbing groans continued, the slick, fucking sounds nauseating. The realm was feeding.
Before she could decide, a new voice, smooth and amused, slithered from the shadows behind the mound. “Now, now. No tampering with the livestock. It’s rude.”
Tobias stepped into the faint light, no longer pretending to be Jan. He leaned against a pulsing wall, arms crossed, a smirk on his face. His mirrored sunglasses reflected the terrible scene. “He made a deal. Wanted unlimited pleasure. I provide. He pays. A fair transaction.”
Felicity stared, horrified. “You’re harvesting human life force.”
“A crude term for a sublime metabolic process,” Tobias sighed, pushing off the wall. He looked at Stacy, his head tilting. “You’re the persistent one. I usually break persistent ones. Turn them into the best trees. Their roots are so deep.”
Godfrey growled, a surprisingly deep sound from his small body.
Tobias’s smirk widened. “The little time-lost ghost. Even you are just a snack here.” He snapped his fingers.
The walls around them quivered. From the fibrous stone, more of the glistening, black rubbery substance began to weep, forming thick, ropey tendrils that slithered towards their ankles.
“Run!” Stacy shouted.
But the tendrils were fast. One lashed around Bruce’s boot, yanking him off his feet. Another snaked towards Felicity’s leg. Rick swung his rebar club, smashing a tendril that recoiled with a squeal, spraying a sticky, clear fluid.
Stacy didn’t run. She charged Tobias.
He laughed, ready to sidestep, but she didn’t aim for him. She dove past him, towards the trapped man in the mound. She raised her Glock, not at the man, but at the thick, central mass of the pulsing, fucking substance right above where the man was embedded.
“Close your eyes!” she yelled to the man.
His sobbing stopped. He squeezed his eyes shut.
She fired three rounds in quick succession. The reports were deafening in the chamber.
The black substance exploded. Not with blood, but with a geyser of that same clear, sticky fluid and shrieks of tearing membrane. The tendrils recoiled instantly, withering. The mound deflated like a punctured lung. The man screamed as the grip on his lower body released, and he slumped forward, free but covered in slime, weeping uncontrollably.
Tobias’s amusement vanished. “You bitch,” he hissed, his voice dropping into something non-human. “That was a prime collector!”
“And now it’s garbage,” Stacy spat, swinging her gun towards him. “Where is Jan O’Connor?”
The chamber trembled. The walls shivered with his rage. “She’s the heart of the feast! You’ll never reach her!” Shadows pooled around him, deepening. He began to sink into them, his form dissolving. “Your teams are already lost. They’re walking into my larders. I’ll come for you last, Stacy Steinberg. I’ll make you watch them all be consumed.”
He was gone.
The tremors subsided. The only sounds were the freed man’s ragged weeping and the drip of fluid from the ruined mound. The gold veins in the walls dimmed, as if the realm itself had been wounded.
Bruce helped the shuddering man to his feet. Felicity was examining the withered tendrils, her scholarly mind already analyzing the residue.
Rick moved to Stacy’s side, his shoulder brushing hers. “He said the teams are walking into larders.”
Stacy ejected the magazine from her Glock, checked it, and slammed it back home. The click was final. “Then we don’t have time to go slow. We find the heart of this place. We cut it out.” She looked at the sobbing, rescued man. “And he’s coming with us. He might know where it is.”
The man, Cooper, looked up, his eyes hollow. “I… I know where the energy flows,” he stammered. “It all goes… down. To the pit. Where the screams are… pretty.”
The four of them exchanged a look. The path was clear, and it led into deeper darkness. Stacy led the way, the others falling in behind her, leaving the deflated harvest-mound and its fading stench of sex and despair behind.