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[b][u][center]Not as Tricky as you Think

Part 4

For Lightsun168

By Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]

Morning came with the sounds of metal clanging on metal and stone, and Kero grunted as he tilted his head off the cot. His blurry vision saw shapes pushing in through the hole in the wall, tall and thick and armored across the shoulders in a way that made them look even bigger. The lizard rubbed his eyes, trying to clear his eyes –

“AGH!”

“Out of bed, slaves!”

“I’m – nngh!”

“I said, out of bed!”

The guards were shouting, and one of the other lizards was grunting in obvious pain. Kero blinked the blurriness away to see seven guards, one for each of the slaves in the room, moving around and kicking cots or yanking sleepy scalies from their beds. Not one of them seemed to have the slightest compassion for what they were doing, and the slaves that were too slow didn’t have a chance to get to their feet before they were kicked to the ground.

It was a hell of a way to start his first day as a slave in Calditch Mines, that was for sure.

As he fumbled about, trying to get to his feet, one of the guards – a Doberman that loomed taller than he should have – reached the foot of the cot. He stomped down on Kero’s ankle before he could get his legs out of the way, and the lizard hissed through clenched teeth.

“A sluggard, eh?” the Doberman said.

“I just woke up, nnngh. Give me a second.”

“Slaves don’t get breaks without asking permission.”

The guard lifted his booth –

“Hold it!”

A familiar voice cut through it all. Kero looked down to see a gauntleted hand gripping the Doberman by the ankle, keeping him from bringing his leg down. Following it up, he saw Petyr looking around the other guard.

“If you break anything, he won’t be able to work. And he hasn’t broken any rules as of yet,” the beagle said.

“Let go of me, newcomer,” the Doberman growled.

Kero didn’t know what was going on, but he used the moment of peace to get to his feet. It was barely enough, too, as the armored boot came down again a split-second later, ripping through the fabric of the cot. The lizard huffed under his breath, imagining how he was going to sleep with that. Probably on the floor, and he didn’t look forward to that, at all.

The Doberman growled, looking down at the smaller beagle guard. He jabbed Petyr in the chest with an armored finger.

“Learn your place, newcomer. The laws of Calditch Mines are different than the ones where you come from.”

“Ignorance of the laws is not an excuse against them, I agree. But at the same time, there was no chance to avoid offending them when you’re new,” Petyr said. “Tomorrow, he will not break the rules. And if he does, you can stomp on him then.”

“Whether he breaks them or not, I might.”

The beagle and Doberman continued glaring at each other for a few seconds before the latter broke the stare. As the bigger dog waved his hands to get the attention of everyone in the room, Kero took that moment to take stock of the situation.

[i]Morning, which means they’re going to put us to work soon,[/i] he thought. [i]Surprised I managed to sleep through the whole night. Guess all that walking on the mountain was good for tiring me out. Did anything happen…[/i]

No stains on his cot, which meant that there hadn’t been any dirty dreams or any release. And his balls, now that he was awake, were quite happy to tell him that they were still filled to the brim and craving that sense of being released. He grumbled under his breath, putting that thought to the side for the moment. There were other things to be concerned about.

Like the other slaves. He saw Cajo near the door, probably the first one out of bed with all his experience. The blue-white lizard wore a smile on his face, one that Kero could tell was as fake as could be, but was just as mocking as any real one might have been.

It felt too real to look at that. It felt almost inevitable that he might wear the same thing before the year was out, if he didn’t find some way to escape.

The other slaves were all different colored, but two things united them: they were all scaly, and they were all caged and runed. That rune was in different places for each one of them, and only Kero had his right over his crotch, but they were all marked with something that made them ‘safe.’

The Doberman cleared his throat, and Kero turned his attention back to the chief guard.

“Alright, slaves. You know the drill. We’re heading down to the depths for more Deep Duty. Everyone gear up.”

“What about the new guy?” Cajo asked.

“Someone hasn’t brought him the gear yet?”

“You keep it all locked up, for safety’s sake,” Petyr said, leaning against the wall.

“…Fucking – someone get some digger-claws, for fuck’s sake,” the Doberman muttered. “Rest of you, assemble in the tunnel.”

The naked scalies did as they were told, dragging their bare butts out of the room. Their cages clattered with every step, and Kero wondered if he made the same sounds when he was walking around. He didn’t want to ask.

When he tried to follow them, the Doberman snapped his head around, glaring at him. The big dog growled, and the lizard stopped in his tracks.

“Don’t move. You keep your ass right there until you’re kitted up, slave.” The Doberman paused, looking at him a second time. “On second thought, turn around.”

“…What?”

“Turn. The fuck. Around.”

As soon as he felt the tingle in the collar, he moved. Shifting from one foot to the other, he turned in place, and –

[i]Fuck…[/i]

He felt the eyes of all the guards – all dogs – staring at him, running along his legs, up to his bare ass, under his tail. They were all over him, and it was like getting groped with every passing second as they kept…staring. Staring, all but devouring him with their eyes. It was…disturbing, to say the least. He wasn’t sure that he had felt such lust even when he’d been in the main square of Yellowridge.

And the Doberman was the worst. Being a bandit made him aware – most of the time – of when someone saw him, and from where. He’d learned how to listen to that feeling, and the only time that it had failed him had been with Petyr. This…this was the worst that he’d ever felt. The intensity coming from the Doberman sent a chill down his spine, and he barely managed to keep moving in a circle.

And then another.

And another.

Each time, he felt like the mood in the room shifted a bit more. The various guards were looking him up and down, and they were starting to grin and nod at each other. He didn’t know how fucked he was, but he knew that he was going to get fucked at some point if he wasn’t careful about how he kept his head down.

Finally, someone arrived with the digger-claws. The Doberman grunted, and Kero felt the permission to stop turning in place. He took the claws from the other guard, looking them over.

They weren’t anything complicated. It was a simple leather and metal framework, with the leather to be tied around his wrists so that the claws stayed on his fingers. They lengthened his claws by four inches, making it impossible to close his fists, and more or less turned his hands into shovels.

As he pulled them on, however, he felt the same sort of hum and tingle that he had felt before going to sleep the night before. There was…something…in the metal, the same sort of dragon magic that permeated the air and the mountain.

“Problem, slave?” the Doberman asked.

“No, sir,” he muttered, shaking his head and pulling the digger-claws on. “Just…making sure I’m putting them on properly, sir.”

“Good. Join the other slaves.”

He did as he was told, filing out of the dorm and joining the other slaves in line. The tunnel was as dim as could be, with the only source of light further down and slightly around the corner. If he hadn’t been sleeping in a room that was barely any better lit, he would have been night-blind. As it was, he was barely seeing silhouettes.

“Is it always like this?” he whispered to Cajo as he stood beside the blue-white lizard.

“They’re about that rough, yeah. Gotta be up before they get to the room if you can. Sleep in, and some of us get our balls stomped out.”

“Like…crushed?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“…Nnngh…”

“Yeah, heh, you don’t want that.”

He would have crossed his legs at the thought alone if he had time. The guards had already joined them, though, and were pushing them along. One guard per slave, one guard beside each slave, leading them further into the darkness.

[i]Helmets have some sort of darkvision spell on them or something?[/i] Kero wondered. [i]They’re not stumbling, and it’s not just knowing the tunnel. Too uneven for that. They can see, even though we can’t…[/i]

It was something else to store away in the back of his head. If he ever had a chance to get away, he might need to steal one of the guard helmets to make sure that he got where he needed to go. Otherwise, he might get stuck in the darkness and get lost. Really didn’t want that to happen.

Whether through luck or the beagle’s own efforts, Kero ended up walking beside Petyr. He let the others get a little bit further ahead before whispering to the guard.

“How do you like being Salmus’s personal dog?” he whispered.

“I did not want this.”

“Didn’t think you did. But since when does what we want matter?” Kero asked with a bitter chuckle.

“Do not start. You surrendered, and you chose your punishment. You could have had a fair death, but you decided that you wanted to live as a slave.”

“Right, because living and dying are equal options…”

“You made your choice. I did not get a choice in the sale of my contract from Yellowridge to Calditch.”

“Just like I didn’t get a choice in being sold by Yellowridge to Salmus, huh?”

“…What do you want, slave?”

“What’s going to happen down there? What’s Deep Duty?”

“I see that there is no curiosity about me.”

“Not in the slightest,” Kero admitted. “But if I gotta listen to that in order to learn what I want, I’ll lend an ear.”

“Opportunist.”

Kero shrugged. They continued to walk in the darkness, and he gradually realized that they were descending. Not quickly, and not on a huge decline, but enough that he could feel it in his legs. The rocky stone beneath their feet shifted from time to time, turning from hard stone to loose gravel and scree, making it difficult to keep his footing if he moved any faster than a slow walk. The other slaves were slightly more confident as they made their way along, but they were still slower than anyone walking on the surface.

Only the guards seemed to know where to put their boots, and that was something that he made note of, as well.

[i]Hmm…[/i]

In the extended silence, he noticed something else, too. The marks on their bodies – the magic runes – were just bright enough to give them away. It wasn’t enough to light the way through the tunnels, nor was it enough to really give them the illumination they needed to see what was up ahead, but it was enough to point them out in the dark. One more thing that he’d need to be careful of if he ever tried to get away; he’d have to cover his crotch at all times to avoid showing off the rune in the darkness.

“I hate it here,” Petyr muttered, and the sudden reminder that the beagle was next to him almost made Kero jump. “I am supposed to be a guardsman, a captain, not a slave-handler.”

“Well, you were the one that caught me and brought me in,” Kero muttered, shaking his head. “Kinda made your choice.”

“In all honesty, I was hoping that you would either fight to the death or find some clever way to run away. I did not want to handle all the problems of bringing you into Yellowridge or dealing with processing you.”

“…What?”

“I assumed that you would be more talented than you were. I [i]thought[/i] that you would have some trick up your sleeves that would let you disappear back into the forest, and I could return to town, having done my duty to the best of my ability. Instead, you were incompetent enough that I [i]had[/i] to catch you, and all your tricks that could have gotten you free were so obvious that I had to take you in properly.”

Kero honestly didn’t know whether he should have been surprised or insulted. Of all the things that Petyr might have said, knowing that the beagle hadn’t wanted to catch him was the biggest surprise of all. He shook his head wordlessly, trying to get that through his head as the beagle continued.

“I am a man of duty. I do what I am supposed to do. That means at least putting up a show of force to keep people safe. If it wasn’t for the way that the town insisted that you be dealt with on-sight, I would have simply put patrols around the walls, offered guards to the travelers going up and down the roads, and left it at that. Instead…you made yourself my problem, and that meant that I had to deal with it.”

“As a man of duty.”

“As a man of duty.”

“…That’s a shitty way to live,” Kero muttered, shaking his head. “Why would anyone want to live like that?”

“Helps you feel like the world works if you’re one of the people that helps make it work,” the beagle said, shrugging. “And now, I am stuck here. Not even a guard. Just a slave handler for a slave-master, working underground like you.”

If the beagle thought that he was going to get sympathy, Kero was just going to have to disappoint him. Sure, the lizard might have been…less skilled at getting away from real guards than he thought he’d be, but that didn’t mean that anything that happened afterward was his fault. That was just the system that the damn beagle was part of, and if he wanted to support the system, then he had to deal with others playing with it, too.

Still, it was more information. Whatever he’d done stealing from people on the road had clearly pissed someone off. Cajo had implied that, and now, Petyr had confirmed it. Someone had pulled strings to make sure that there were people sent out to find him, and Kero hadn’t taken it as seriously as he should have.

Which was why he was in this annoying little pickle to begin with.

[i]Okay, so, if we get out of this, that means we are going to have to be more careful about what we do, and to who,[/i] the lizard thought as he continued trudging through the darkness. [i]If we pick the wrong person to steal from, then they’re going to come after us with more resources than we can deal with. So, we pick mid-tier victims from now on, not the big ones with all the weapons and the pull and…everything…[/i]

“…I suppose that I should keep up my half of things, then,” Petyr said. “You wished to know about Deep Duty.”

“…You’re serious?”

“I am a man of duty. If you do me a favor, then I must do you one.”

“Take off the fucking cage.”

“I will not. That is not a favor; that is a release.”

“…Worth a shot.”

“Perhaps.”

He was half-sure that he heard the beagle’s mouth twist into a smile. Certainly, that word sounded more amused than it needed to. That was a start.

“So, what’s Deep Duty?” he whispered.

“That is the task of slaves going down to the bottom of the mountain, expanding the mine shafts and making sure that the debris from above hasn’t covered anything valuable. It is, perhaps, the most dangerous duty that the slaves can be assigned.”

“…And that is the first thing he’s making me do?”

“Yes.”

“Gods dammit.”

“I would certainly not damn the gods when they are likely the only thing that will keep you alive down there.”

Kero didn’t appreciate the slight joke in there. All he knew was that his life had been turned upside-down yet further by a scaly-hating panther that was making his fortune on the back of a dead dragon’s hoard. He gritted his teeth and clenched his fists as much as the digger-claws would let him, shaking his head as he imagined how deep down they had to be. Hundreds, if not a thousand feet below hundreds of tons of rock and earth, where even a slight mistake could bring so much of that tumbling down on their heads. He was all but blind as it was, barely given the light to see by the moving runes ahead and the occasional lump of glowing rock on the wall. If anything happened to him, nobody would come down and try and save him.

“And the digger-claws?” he muttered, lifting one hand.

“Deep Duty involves both digging further into the mountain and keeping the debris from piling up. You need the proper tools to shred through the rock and stone and earth without leaving a mess behind you. Thus, the claws.”

That made some sense, though he doubted that the guards were entirely happy with slaves having these things. Even if the mammals didn’t know about the magic – and he would be shocked if the panther didn’t have some inkling of the power in the metal – the claws were multi-inch long tools of destruction. One slave turning on their masters could probably do a fair bit of damage with them before they were caught and pinned.

[i]Well, not against the armor, but…[/i]

But those helmets left the neck surprisingly vulnerable, and muzzles, by necessity, meant that there was no face-plate to protect everything that was pushed forward and left exposed. That, and the joints –

There was no point thinking too much on that now. There were too many guards around now, and if even half of the slaves around him were like Cajo – defeated, barely keeping up any defiance – then he had a good chance of being subdued by his fellow lizards to keep the status quo from getting any worse. For now, he had to just live with it and hope for the best.

Petyr grabbed him by the shoulder, pulling him to a stop. Kero blinked, opened his mouth, then slowly closed it. He shuffled one foot forward, felt the stone under his toes, then –

Then there was a sudden drop, one that went who knew how far down. It was impossible to see, impossible to feel without taking his time to reach around for it, and it would have left him with a broken leg if he didn’t just fall down it and die.

One more horror of being in the mines.

“Long step forward. Take your time,” the beagle muttered.

Kero did as he was told, and they continued downward.

Eventually, the whole group stopped. A pair of glow-stones illuminated a small cavern, perhaps twenty feet to a side, with three tunnels that led off of it. The Doberman guard stood in the center of the room, slightly glowing in the ghostly blue light from the stones.

“Alright. You know the drill. Three each down the side tunnels, one guy down the forward one. Widen and lengthen the side ones, and just push forward in the last. Keep moving. We’ll be here, waiting for when you finish.”

“We’re going to need glow-stones in the side tunnels soon, sir,” one of the other slaves said.

“Go until you’re blind, and we’ll get one to you when you are.”

“But –”

Cajo kicked the lizard protesting, and the message was clear to the rest of the slaves: do what they were told and keep the peace.

“Alright. Move. And new guy. You’re on the forward tunnel,” the Doberman said.

“That’s the least-explored one,” Petyr said.

“And he’s the most expendable. Get in there.”

Kero could feel the pull on the collar already. Nodding as best he could, he pushed forward and walked around the guards, making his way to the forward tunnel. It was the narrowest of the three, barely wide enough that two skinny people or one broad one could fit into it. The rocks pressed in on all sides, and he had to fight his immediate fight or flight instincts as he forced himself to move further from the light behind him.

As he moved past the entrance, he could feel how jagged everything was around him. Clearly, the digger-claws were meant to be used to rake through the wall and floor, pushing things further. He ran his fingers over the edges of the rocks. Their edges were sharp, and not very stable. As he touched the ceiling, he could feel streaks of dirt overhead, and the image of all that collapsing over his head because it didn’t have enough support almost made his heart stop in his chest.

[i]He couldn’t keep this running if people were dying every day,[/i] Kero thought, trying to calm himself down. [i]It’s not like there’s going to be a sudden cave-in. It’s not like there’s bones and bodies everywhere. Everyone else is fine. They’re not terrified. It’s not…it’s not that deadly…[/i]

He kept telling himself that as he walked up to where the last digger had left off. As he rested his hand against the rugged, ragged stone, he could feel the sheer power of the mountain against him. It was strong, had stood for…well, probably longer even than the great dragons had been around. It had lasted this long; he doubted that he could bring it down with just a pair of meager claws.

[i]Okay…okay…let’s just…let’s just dig…[/i]

Curling his fingers so that the digger-claws were in position, he dragged them down, slowly. The magical metal cut through the stone like a saw through a tree, except even easier than that, because he was barely putting any pressure on the wall. New finger-lines ripped through the stone, leaving his mark on the mountain.

“Holy…”

He stared at his fingers, and then at the wall again. He could barely see the mark that he’d made on it, but he knew it was there. The digger-claws were that good.

Kero nodded to himself, set his legs, and got to work.

#

[i]Two hours later…[/i]

Kero was drained, his shoulders burned, and he slumped against the wall that he’d been cutting at. It felt hot to the touch; the digger-claws were able to cut through it with ease, but that didn’t mean that it was completely frictionless. The rock wall was hotter than a campfire, and he sweated as he leaned against it.

“Ha…ha…”

And yet, he could tell that he’d dug deep. Looking over his shoulder, the glow-lights of the stones in the main cavern were a full thirty feet further back than they had been two hours ago. He could barely make them out through the gap that he’d come through. He didn’t know if this was normal, less, or more than what the others were doing, but the very fact that he could do this without any training said a lot about the equipment.

[i]Heh…if I can escape, I’m keeping these…[/i]

Shaking his head, he turned back to the wall. He couldn’t see it anymore, but it loomed nonetheless before him. It had become an opponent, something that he could focus on as he cut his way forward. The temptation to cut sideways, to dig a tunnel that might give him an escape route, was ignored. If he did that, then the guards would notice that the main tunnel wasn’t moving forward, and he needed them to learn not to pay attention to him.

[i]Back to work,[/i] he told himself.

Three slices across the rock later, he heard a footstep behind him. What followed was a hand on his ass. Kero froze, his eyes wide.

“Don’t stop working, slave,” the Doberman growled in his ear. “Keep cutting that rock…”

The collar burned at his neck as he did as he was told, cutting from the left, then the right, shaving more and more of the rock away as the Doberman’s fingers dug into his ass cheeks. Metal digits pulled at him, forcing his tail off to the side, making him feel more and more exposed until –

Kero’s breath caught in his throat as the guard forced his ass cheeks apart. The cool tunnel air kissed his pucker, reminding him that he had nothing between him and the rest of the world back there. His cock refused to harden in the cage for now, but the fact that the guard was right there, doing this –

“Heh, I love getting to use slaves,” the Doberman muttered. “Scaly bitches like you are a menace to society, but down here…”

One hand came free, but the pressure of a cold, metal finger pressed against his hole. Kero’s eyes almost bugged out of their sockets as it pushed, grinding side to side until his hole slowly opened up. His hands kept sweeping, moving from one side to the other, clawing and digging at the wall as his hole was violated, opened up so casually, as if he was nothing but a piece of meat to be played with.

“Keep digging.”

Slice.

Slice.

Slice.

His arms kept moving, his mouth hanging open as one finger became two. They were cold, thick, and hard inside of him, grinding against his inner walls without any of the pleasure that came from the militia’s digits back in Yellowridge. As unwanted as that had been, at least that had made some sort of sense. This…this…

“Heh, nice and tight. Been too long since I had some fresh meat. And those cheeks…not too hard from work yet. Still got a bit of jiggle on those.”

[i]Oh gods…oh gods…[/i]

The fingers went in up to the hilt, holding against his prostate. They wiggled there, sending little signals right to his cock, but not enough for him to get hard. The rune prevented that, at least, but the sense of violation, unwanted pleasure, and discomfort from his hole being filled with a metal pair of fingers was more than he could take. He could barely breathe as his body continued to follow the order to dig, dig, dig –

POP!

The fingers came free, and he would have collapsed without the collar keeping him working. Some pops and snaps followed, and then something much hotter fell across his ass. His breath caught in his throat for real as he realized that it was the Doberman’s cock, resting between the cheeks, the head oozing, the whole thing slowly dragging back closer and closer to his hole.

[i]No…no…[/i]

He couldn’t believe this was happening. He…he was going to be…

[i]No, no, no, the guards didn’t let this happen in Yellowridge. This never happened in the wild. I was never…this can’t…[/i]

The head pressed against his hole. Kero’s breath came out in an inaudible whimper. It slid against him, almost popping in before its own slimy oozing made it slide up and press under his tail instead.

“Dammit…hold still…”

His arms froze. They were no longer chopping. He – he stared straight ahead and – and it was rubbing against his cheeks again. Up. Down. Up. Down. The hard, throbbing, threatening thing was right against him, pushing against his pucker again.

[i]No, no, this isn’t real. This isn’t going to happen. This can’t happen.[/i]

But there were no guards down here. No priests, no people, no law. This was Calditch Mines, the place where nothing happened that Salmus himself didn’t approve of. The guards, clearly, were allowed to do whatever they wanted, and the slaves were all marked to be punished if they pushed back, if they disobeyed. And he –

[i]No…wait…I’m not…[/i]

He was free from the dig command. He’d frozen, held still. And now –

Push.

Nudge.

Streeeetch.

The pain as the head started to slide in broke him. With a roar that was barely trapped behind his teeth, Kero spun with the claws held high. He felt them dig into something hard, then something soft, and a wet sputter filled the air…

Then a thump.

Then nothing.

Kero stood there, staring into the darkness. The light from the far end of the tunnel almost blinded him, making it impossible to see. Something warm spread across the stones under his feet, soaking his toes, and he looked down. There was a silhouette there, something…something like the guard…except…

Except it was too short.

It didn’t have a head.

He looked a bit further away. A lump that might have been a rock, or might have been a head, but it was impossible to tell in the dark. The body – blood. So much blood. So much hot blood pouring from the wound in the neck and the arm and –

[i]Oh gods. Oh gods.[/i]

Kero stared down at his fingers. He couldn’t see the blood on the claws, but he could feel it. The heat ran down his fingers, pooled against his palms, and then ran along his wrists before falling to the floor.

[i]I just killed someone.[/i]

He’d never done that. In all his time as a bandit, he’d never gone so far as to kill someone. Knock them out, assault them, beat a little sense into them, sure, but never so far as kill them. He’d never felt their blood on his body, never knew how quick it could happen. His heart pounded in his chest as he slumped back, the rocks slicing against his spine and his arms, but he didn’t care.

[i]I just killed someone.[/i]

He.

Just.

Killed.

Someone.

Even as he tried to process that, another silhouette covered the light. Someone else, another guard, seeing what he had done. Kero finally remembered how to breathe again as he heard Petyr’s voice.

“…What happened?” the beagle whispered.

[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]

Summary: Kero goes through his first day in the mines and has a serious problem.

Tags: M/M, Horror, Non-Con, Fantasy, Lizard, Doberman, Beagle, Canines, Speciesism, Slavery, Darkness, Fingering, Impending Anal, Blood, Death, Series,