It led her around to the back of the landing platform, where there were three large, windowless buildings with great double doors set into metal tracks in the ground—one of which was open, revealing another six flying machines parked inside, being worked on by more guards. But the trail didn’t stop there. Billie followed it carefully, sticking now to the shadows. There were fewer people around this part of the camp—but conversely a higher risk of being caught and questioned.
Behind the hangars, the trail ended at another building, which was as wide as two of the hangers put together, although with a much lower roof. It had no doors, and Billie could see as she approached that it was actually completely open on three sides. Directly in front of her, more of the wheeled carts were lined up against the wall of a loading bay, the floor of the big building as high as the bed of the carts, allowing easy loading of full sacks of Void stone, and unloading of empties. The building itself was a depot, the entire back half of it completely filled, nearly to the ceiling, with Void stone. The entire place shimmered yellow in Billie’s vision, the pull of the Sliver like a hand shoving her toward it.
She resisted, and darted for the loading bay, then ducked down behind the wall, her back to the depot. This close to so much Void stone, the Sliver felt like a burning spike being pushed through her head. She closed her human eye, and focused on her breathing for a few seconds. Soon enough, the sensation passed. Keeping low, she turned around and raised herself over the lip of the wall, just enough to get a good look at what was inside the depot.
There were no Leviathan guards here; the loading bay itself was devoid of activity, and the mound of Void stone stood unguarded. Over on Billie’s left, the open side of the depot led out to another platform, this one wide and long, and beside it stood the familiar form of an industrial rail car, with three heavy cargo loaders hitched in a train. The loaders were nothing but rectangular metal boxes: two were closed; the third had one side that hinged down completely, showing it to be empty, obviously unloaded before Billie’s arrival. As she watched, two guards appeared from farther down the platform and moved to the rear loader. They gestured to each other, then, in unison, they bent down and lifted the side of the cargo car, heaving it closed and securing the door with chains. Then, having given their handiwork a good shake to make sure all was secure, they moved back down the platform and out of Billie’s field of view. A few moments later, she heard the familiar buzz as the rails were energized and the rail car started to move.
Talk about good timing. Billie’s carriage awaited.
Checking the coast was clear, Billie vaulted over the wall of the loading dock and sprinted across the depot floor, ignoring the almost physical pull of the mountain of mined Void stone and the increasing pressure in her skull.
The rail car was gathering speed by the time she reached the last cargo loader. As the heavy train clanked over a junction in the rails, Billie leapt for the back of the iron box. She grabbed the lip with both hands and paused, her feet balanced against the back of the loader, as the rail car jolted over another track junction. Then, keeping her body as low as possible, in case one of the guards stationed in the rail car looked out of the open rear of the vehicle at the head of the train, she swung herself up over the edge and dropped into the loader. As they clattered onward, she scooted toward the front and risked a peek over the rim.
The two rail car operators were focused on their task, one working the control levers as the other, standing further forward, right at the nose of the vehicle, kept his eyes on the track ahead. Billie could see the track headed straight toward the western wall of the crater in which the camp sat, but beyond that, she couldn’t make anything out.
Even empty, the cargo loaders were heavy, built out of thick black iron, and their traveling speed was low. Billie settled into a more comfortable position in the corner of the loader, and watched the scenery pass as they headed toward what she hoped was the mine.
15
THE VOID HOLLOW
17th Day, Month of Darkness, 1853
The journey took the better part of half an hour. As they approached the crater wall, the rail car slowed to pass through a larger junction, next to which was a small collection of more prefabricated huts. Here, two black-uniformed guards stood by a set of track levers. In the rail car, the guard standing at the nose gave his colleagues a signal, and in one synchronized movement, the driver leaned on a huge lever in the cab while the two soldiers trackside did the same at their controls. The rail car shuddered, and the air was filled with the screeching of metal on metal as the heavy vehicle reluctantly changed to the other track, before picking up speed again and heading toward a tunnel mouth cut into the side of the crater.
The pressure inside Billie’s head built, the Sliver beginning the now all-too-familiar slow burn as the rail car pulled into the tunnel. It wasn’t dark—on the contrary, the tunnel was lit by huge fizzing arc lamps, their mass of cables snaking across almost every inch of the tunnel wall, rendering the underground passage in a harsh, flat white light.
Billie ducked down a little more. While she had managed to get around the base without too much difficulty, in the confined quarters of the mine operation there would be little opportunity for stealth. Getting caught in the back of one of the loaders was not something Billie could afford now.
The tunnel grew warmer the farther they rolled in, and soon the flat white light of the arc lamps became tinted with red and blue. The residue of the Void stone inside Billie’s cargo loader began to glow yellow in the magical vision provided by the Sliver, like the stuff was coming alive the closer it got to the main source.
They were reaching the end of the line.
Time to move.
The rail car was rolling slowly now, not much more than a good walking pace. Billie crabbed to the rear of the cargo loader and looked over the rim, checking their speed and looking for obstacles. Breaking a leg—or getting electrified by the live rails—was an easy mistake to make.
She moved to the left side of the loader. The main rail track was electrified, but there was ample room on this side for pedestrian traffic on a wide pavement that had been laid alongside the track. As the tunnel began a gentle curve, Billie judged her moment. She swung one leg over the edge of the loader and then pushed off, throwing her weight forward, aiming straight for the tunnel wall. A moment later she hit it, her outstretched palms stopping her from braining herself against the rough rock walls, and she dropped onto the pathway in a crouch. The rail next to her buzzing with power, she stayed perfectly motionless, watching the rail car disappear around the bend. Still she didn’t move, listening instead to the clack of the wheels and the thud of the loaders. Just around the corner it was slowing to a standstill.
So far, so good—but she had to move fast. She stood, alone now in the floodlit tunnel, but without any kind of cover. There were no openings in the tunnel walls, only the path that stretched behind and ahead. If anyone came along, there was absolutely no place she could hide.
Billie moved forward at a pace, thankful at least that the loud buzz from the electric rails was masking the sound of her movements. At the tunnel bend, she pressed herself up against the wall, using whatever slight advantage the curve gave her. As she approached the end of the tunnel, the Sliver burned in her head. The mine was dead ahead, and very close.
A moment later, she began to hear voices over the buzz of the rails. Billie dropped into a crouch and scooted forward, clearing the bend, then stopped as soon as she saw the back end of the cargo loader that had just provided her with transport. There was a heavy clunk, and the buzz from the rails stopped.
Billie ducked down and crabbed forward over the rough path, which ended in a small wall of gray stone blocks roughly cemented together. There she stopped, and surveyed the scene.
The tunnel had come to an end in a small, underground rail yard. Her rail car and the three loaders had stopped in the center of the yard, right underneath another, smaller rail line that crossed the o
pen space via a bridge made of heavy iron lattice. This rail looped around to form an ellipse with two long, flat sides—one suspended over the rail yard, the other passing beneath a large square opening cut into the rock wall just below the roof of the cavern, from which blue and red light flickered. Here, the same dust-covered laborers she’d come across at the main construction zone in Alba could be seen carrying baskets of rock, which they each deposited in turn into wheeled buckets that formed a loop running along the elevated rail, constantly orbiting the rail yard at walking pace. As the loaded buckets came into position over the empty cargo loader, they tipped over, dumping their contents with an ear-splitting roar, before continuing their journey to the opposite side of the cavern. At the wall, where the elevated track curved around, two more workers heaved at the upended bucket, righting it back into position, ready for the next load.
To Billie’s surprise, she could only count the two workers on the upper track, and maybe six more, who periodically appeared at the mine entrance with their baskets of rock. The only Leviathan guards in the mine were the two manning the rail car, the pair now standing beside their machine, watching the operation but doing little else.
No, they were doing more than watching—they were guarding. As Billie shifted position to get a better look, she could see the two rail car operators were armed, their pistols trained on the mine workers—men and women, young and old, but all clearly tired, worked to the point of exhaustion. Their clothes were ragged, and coated in thick gray dust, along with their skin, faces, hair.
Billie realized immediately who they were—workers from the causeway, yes, but the ones that had gone missing. Hearne and the two guards who were going to beat him to death had both mentioned the fact that people went missing. That was one mystery solved—Leviathan brought them here, to work in the mine.
The question was, why? The Leviathan Corporation had an entire army hidden in this place; the size of the camp and the number of guards were staggering. And if they could build machines that could fly, couldn’t they build mining equipment? Why rely on what appeared to be slave labor?
She had to get a closer look, but she couldn’t risk alerting anyone to her presence. It would have been easy to deal with the two guards, but then they would know she was here. Billie looked around, scanning for options.
Her gaze settled on the elevated rail. If she could get up onto it, the moving train of buckets would hide her as she reached the mine entrance. Once she was up there, she could grab a basket and follow the workers deeper. To help with the disguise, she reached down, scooped up handfuls of the thick gray dust that lined the cavern, and smeared it all over her black uniform. It wasn’t perfect, but it would do.
As the first cargo loader slowly filled up, Billie pushed herself off the wall, using the roar of the falling rock to cover her movements. She darted to the cargo loader, using it for cover, then climbed up the side before jumping up, her fingers catching the edge of the elevated rail. She pulled herself up, squeezing next to the buckets, the iron bridge providing a scant few inches of space for footing. With the buckets moving in the opposite direction, Billie skirted along the bridge, finally reaching the cavern wall high above where she had been hiding. She kept going, using the buckets for cover, until she was close to the mine entrance. Here, light blazing from the mine provided a deep shadow for cover, and now Billie could see a steep ramp, cut into the rock wall, allowing access up into the workings itself, a stack of heavy wicker baskets nearby.
Billie took a basket and headed up the ramp.
16
THE VOID MINE
17th Day, Month of Darkness, 1853
Billie needn’t have worried about the slave workers ratting her out. As she joined the shuffling line heading into the heart of the Void mine, she saw they were moving as if in a trance, their eyes glazed, showing not a single indication they knew someone else had joined their number.
And this close, she could see they weren’t just dirty, their clothes and skin covered with the gray dust from the mine.
They were… changing.
She’d seen it before, of course—or at least, something similar. It had been in the Ritual Hold, high atop Shindaerey Peak in Karnaca, one long year ago. There, the Envisioned, members of the Cult of the Outsider, had gradually been transformed, their long exposure to the Void affecting them like a disease, changing them slowly into beings made of the same silvery metallic rock that formed the Void itself.
It was happening here. All around her, the exposed skin of the miners flashed like polished graphite as one line carried empty baskets to the mine face, the other emerging from the blue-red light with containers fully loaded, their precious cargo—fuel for the flying machines—sparking yellow in Billie’s enhanced vision.
Billie heard, rather than saw, the mine face itself, the blazing light too bright to make out any details. But she could hear the slaves at work as they loaded their baskets, and there was another sound, a periodic crunching, which was presumably the sound of the mining machinery itself.
Then she saw them—huge, silhouetted shapes, moving in the light, throwing long, stretched shadows over the slave workers. Billie struggled to understand what she was seeing, until she was close enough, the movements of the miners blocking enough light to hide the workings of the mine face—the one part of the whole underground system that was actually breaching the Void itself.
The slaves were not doing the mining—or rather, the human slaves weren’t. Because working in the blazing light were other creatures, the last vestiges of their humanity barely recognizable in their towering forms made of jagged, angled shards of living Void rock.
They were not the Envisioned as Billie had seen them in the Ritual Hold—but they were close to it. Their bodies were elongated, their arms ending in long, thin, wickedly sharp claws. It was with these claws, not tools or machinery, that the creatures were tearing the Void stone out of the blazing maw, before turning with armfuls of the stuff, dumping their loads into an ever-growing pile that sat in the fiercely glowing hole in the world. While they toiled, although without much apparent effort, the humanoid slaves worked in pairs, one shoveling the mined rock into a wicker basket held by their partner. Once full, one helped the other heave the basket up onto their shoulder, and the process was repeated, the slave doing the loading then being the one to carry that load back down the tunnel.
It was back-breaking, bone-wearying work, but the laborers didn’t speak, didn’t let up the pace, as they worked in their mysterious trance. And if the miners themselves knew Billie was there, watching them, they didn’t show it either.
That the process of transformation was so accelerated here was a clear sign that the area was dangerous. That was why the Leviathan Company used slave labor—and looking at the state of the miners, Billie wondered how long they would last at the mine face, reaching into the blazing portal and tearing Void stone from it. Certainly, this would be causing untold damage to the Void. It was clear now that there was no technology responsible—there was no instrumentation or equipment born of natural philosophy, at least other than the device she had seen in the tower back in Alba. And if there was some arcane experimentation spawned from magical ritual, Billie hadn’t found it. Instead, what she had found was an open wound, the Void open to the world—well, one version of it, anyway—and being exploited for Severin’s war effort.
And there was no way Billie could stop it—at least, not on her own. What could she do? Free the slaves? They were entranced by the Void, not even registering her presence. Go back to the subterranean rail yard and take out the guards? They were just two men. The Leviathan Company numbered in the thousands. Any action she could take would be both pointless and suicidal. All she could do was try to get out, get back to the real world, get back to Dunwall.
The mission was a lot bigger than her. She needed help.
That was when she realized what she was doing. Lost in her reverie, she had walked closer to the mine face, the walls of Voi
d stone close enough to touch. Around her, the transformed miners continued to work, wrenching seams of rock in great clawfuls.
But she didn’t see them. All she could see was the light—blue and red and yellow—and all she could feel was the deep, aching cold, penetrated only by the sharp, white-hot point where the Sliver of the Eye of the Dead God sat, embedded in her skull, drawn to the magic of the Void, pulling her toward the mine face—
“You there!”
The voice snapped Billie out of her dream state. She turned around and stumbled, her head throbbing in time with her heartbeat, the sound of pounding drums growing louder and louder in her ears, her vision a haze of color.
A haze that slowly resolved as she regained her senses. In front of her, at the tunnel entrance, stood four Leviathan guards. Over their black uniforms, each wore a long, heavy apron that looked like it was made of rubber, the protective clothing stretching from the neck and only stopping an inch from the ground. Their faces were covered by flat metal masks, large rectangular things with only a small, circular porthole of smoked glass to see out of.
But strangest of all was the bone charm set into the base of each mask, directly below the porthole. Smaller than the circular runes Billie knew the guards had on their belts, the bone charms were irregular pieces of magical scrimshaw, held into a circular cutout in the metal of the masks by two crisscrossed straps. Each of the four guards had a different charm in place.
Dishonored--The Veiled Terror Page 13