Seventeen
Myst City Dungeons
The one thing Umbra noticed immediately as he was dragged off to the prison block was the stench of rats and urine.
There was a half dozen iron-barred cells, only a few were vacant and to his relief the jailers threw him into an empty cell.
"I was only trying to feed my eight kids with the cart of bread I took!" a grizzled prisoner in dank clothes protested as the guards walked past his cell.
"You don't have any kids, Mickey," Mickey's cellmate laughed. "You aren't even married!"
The jailer clanged his baton on the bars to shut them up while the cellmate snickered from atop the bunk bed.
"Shut up, you horrible lot!" the jailer bellowed. He was an ugly, chubby man in mismatched leather clothes and an eye patch. He marched off back to his wooden chair in the corner
An assassin sat cross-legged on the floor in the cell next to Umbra, the cell floors were carpeted in old straw infested with rats. With one open eye, the scary looking killer glared at Umbra sitting uncomfortably on the edge of his bunk.
Umbra sat in his dirty black robes pretending not to notice the assassin's stare.
"A witch-boy," the assassin sneered when he noticed the brand on Umbra's hand. "I bet they'll cook you up nice and crispy," he taunted to frighten Umbra.
Marin won't let that happen! Umbra kept reminding himself as he ignored the heckling assassin.
Umbra lay on his bunk and stared up at the grimy bricked ceiling. He hated having to sleep; since he'd eaten that disgusting organ from the heart tree, he had nightmares of hellfire and rotting corpses every night.
And lately as he drew closer to his last days of life before his soul was taken, the infernal night terrors had become more vivid and real.
He heard one prisoner vomiting a few cells over and held his nose.
It's going to be a long night.