There was only five of us left.

They had already taken a girl who tried to escape. Her decapitated head still remained in a darkened corner, the rest of her body in pieces strewn about us.

The stench rose to precarious levels, and thick blood began to seep into our clothes. We were all bloodied, bruised, and frightened, but none more so than the tiny girl I held in my arms.

“Where’s Mommy?” she cried, big blue eyes staring up at me.

I kissed her forehead, attempting to block the images of a woman screaming in terror as she was ripped apart, and said, “She’s in a very beautiful place right now. But she’ll come back for you soon, I promise.”

Then, the door flew open, slamming hard into the stone wall. Cast half in shadow, half in candle lit light, stood a man of average quality. But the overlarge canines protruding from his bloodied mouth suggested otherwise.

“Give me the girl,” he breathed, and without hesitance, snatched the little girl from my arms.

I heard her screaming all the way down the hall.