[@POOHEAD189]
Hilde staggered forward into the darkness. The sound of beast was screaming in fury and each blast of intense noise was like ice pumping in her veins. The air was thick with dust and the smell of burnt hair, the fine hair on the back of her neck was gone and her neck was hot as though she had spent too long in the sun. She looped an arm around the apparently unconscious Isolde and helped Cedric drag her down the hallway.
 
“There must be a bolt hole,” she croaked hoarsely. It was a hopeful statement. If Vitas had only been planning to get underground to hide, they might never dig their way out of here. The darkness was intense and they had no light. Reaching into her pouch Hilde retrieved the strange flask. Its faint silver shimmer hardly seemed to help but it was better than nothing.
 
The sound of destruction was distant and muted by the time they began to pass rooms small rooms off the main hallway. By the feeble light of the flask Hilde searched the room and found several torches. It was the work of a few moments to spark the oil soaked cloth alight with her pistol flints. With the much better illumination of the torches it was obvious they were in store rooms somewhere beneath the castle proper.
 
“We’d better rest,” she declared, nearly sagging under the mage’s slight weight.
 
“I’m about played out and you can’t be any better.” She felt slightly sick from the adrenaline she hadn’t been able to burn off.
 
They found some cloth gambersons in a crate and with Cedric’s help she made a small bed for Isolde and lay the unconscious mage down. One of the rooms across the hall seemed to be a small lader. She gathered up several apples, some hard cheese and two skins of wine. There were casks of smoked herring and salted beef too but she left those for the moment. To tired to consider the future.
 
With bone deep exhaustion she rejoined Cedric, giving him one of the wineskins and some of the apples and cheese.
 
“There is food enough for us to stay down here a while,” she reported. Sitting heavily on an unopened crate. She unstoppered the wineskin and took a grateful mouthful, sluicing the dust and fear out of her mouth. She spat the wine into a corner and took another long drink. It tasted sour and resinous but it was refreshing. Maybe there was brandy in the larger casks. She took a bite from one of the apples and found herself suddenly ravenous.
 
“Take your shirt off,” she instructed, her voice muffled around a mouthful of apple.
 
“I’ll see to your wounds.”