With nothing to indicate which direction he should choose, Broneslav headed north. The passage was very low, barely four feet high, so he wound up crouching and crawling along it. As he progressed, the odour of ordure became stronger and stronger. It was enough to turn a person's stomach. He soon found the cause. Down a small side passage, the floor of a cistern had collapsed and the small room at the end of the passage was now a stinking mass of rotting, runny sewage.
Broneslav backed up quickly and continued northwards. At a Y-junction in the passage, he turned left, but then had to back up again when he reached a dead end. The passage to the right led to another junction. He could either climb down the ladder there to a passage heading south or continue north. He headed north once more. Ahead, he could see light filtering through gaps in the crates stacked against the exit from the passage. He stopped at the entrance and tried to peer through the gaps. He could hear the sound of digging and voices.
"Come on. I think this is deep enough. Let's get it buried and go." A man's voice.
Another man, "No, I want to make it a bit deeper. Nobody must ever find this but us."
The digging noises continued.
"Well," thought Broneslav, "That sounds shady as the depths of Limbo."
With that thought, he leapt into action. Thrusting powerfully through the crates that blocked the passage, he charged into the room. The cellar he was now in was lit by a lantern and filled with cured meats hanging from the ceiling as well as crates and sacks along the walls. As well as the tunnel he had entered by, there was another tunnel leading out of the cellar to the north-east.
Two hooded men stood with shovels in hand and a suspiciously corpse-like bundle beside them. Broneslav punched one of the men in the face, knocking him backwards. The other man sprang for the ladder to the trapdoor above and scuttled up it like the hounds of Hel were chasing him. His companion followed. Broneslav leapt after him. He grabbed the man's leg and pulled hard. The man lost his grip on the ladder and fell heavily to the floor. He did not move after that.
Climbing the ladder with the other man possibly waiting at the top seemed risky, so Broneslav chose to investigate this cellar. He checked the man first and found that he was merely unconscious. This hooded stranger would have a large lump on his head when he awoke. His nose was also bloody where Broneslav had punched him. Seeing that he was still alive, Broneslav hogtied the man and turned to the bundle the two men were burying. It contained the corpse of a young woman. Fresh. This boded ill.
A groan caught his attention. The man he had captured was coming to. Broneslav squatted next to the hogtied man.
"Who is this and what are you up to?"
The man spat blood and looked him in the eye, "You'd better let me go, or it will go the worse for you."
"Yeah, I don't think so."
"Seriously, kid, let me go or the Veiled Society will give you a good seeing to. Your pappa may have bought you the fancy kit, but you ain't nothing compared to us."
"Really, you think I'm afraid of a bunch of lurkers in the shadow who murder young women?"
"I'm warning you, kid!"
"Fine," Broneslav concluded, "Maybe if you won't talk to me, you'll talk to the authorities instead."
The man continued to threaten him, but Broneslav paid no heed. His only concern was whether he should finish checking out these tunnels or take the man to the authorities immediately.
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