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It took another full day to get there. Perhaps they could have gone faster if they were taking a more obvious path--one of the bigger tunnels, for example--but they preferred to stick to the narrower ones. The abundance of the ardor in the rock made it more difficult for the enemy to keep track of them here, and if they got lucky, the bastards might even lose track of them completely.

That was the hope, anyway. It hadn’t exactly worked out so far.

Taj struggled to keep himself steady. On task. In charge.

There were only five others left, not including each of their reapers, but he could see the way they were all watching him now. Looking to him for leadership.

What a farce. He was barely old enough to withstand the heat down here unaided. He could barely protect himself, let alone anyone else. Four of the others were constantly fighting the heat, perpetually sweating and being clearly uncomfortable. A couple were even in visible pain, having to constantly materialize--or have materialized for them--a cooled metal coating.

The last one, Juda Mateen, was only better off because he’d apparently managed to snag a climate suit for himself before escaping.

At first, there’d been some noticeable resentment toward him from the others. Taj had thought that it was simple jealousy--and perhaps it was, in part--but after listening to an earlier argument, he realized that there was a bit more to it.

Juda wearing that suit meant that a non-servant wasn’t wearing it.

In other words, he’d taken the place of a non-combatant who could have potentially escaped down here with them.

But in recent days, that resentment seemed to have died off. And Taj could understand why. If it wasn’t clear before, it certainly was now.

Any non-servant that might have taken Juda’s suit would almost certainly be dead by now. And they couldn’t have afforded to slow down for them, either. If they’d tried, they would’ve all been killed a long time ago.

Or at least, that was how Taj saw things. Maybe he was overthinking it. Maybe the others were just too tired to fight among themselves now. He certainly wouldn’t blame them if that was the case. Even on the rare occasions when they were able to sleep, he never felt rested after waking up.