“Oh God, architect of the skies above and the depths below, please grant us safety and prosperity as we toil beneath the ground. May our bodies have the strength to take the bounties you have buried for us. May our minds have the wisdom to remain vigilant in the dark places where your light does not shine. May our hearts have the courage needed to keep all of our brothers from joining you in your kingdom before their time. Amen.” Jean-Phillipe recited with a quiet voice. He had said these exact words at least a couple dozen times since Alexandra and her party had entered the cave. It took a few repetitions for Alexandra to fully understand what exactly Jean-Phillipe was reciting as he spoke in Metrovingian.

  The cave floor was cumbersome to move through. The surface was rocky and uneven, requiring the party to move slowly and with great care. Every move required them to be wary, lest they slip on an uneven surface or cut themselves on a jagged rock.

  The cave had also narrowed to the point where the party could only travel in a single-file line. Ekkehardt had taken a position in the front, followed by Alexandra, then Jean-Phillipe, and then Fahim in the rear. Alexandra struggled to keep Ekkehardt in her field of vision and there were often times when Ekkehardt was all, but consumed by the darkness and Jean-Phillipe’s prayers sounded as though they were the whispers of a mouse.

  To make matters worse, the temperature began to drop. Alexandra had expected this, but not to the extent that it was occurring. She could just barely see her breath fog in front of her. Somehow, the heat of her torch felt weak and distant.

  Despite all of this, Alexandra was still able to notice one more strange aspect of the cave: the absence of any fauna. Based on her reading and personal experience, she knew that there were many creatures that dwelled in caves; bats, snails, spiders, and salamanders. No such animal was present. Similarly, she hadn’t seen a single mushroom or any other type of fungus since entering the cave. It was as though the four of them had been taken out of reality and placed into their own dark, rocky world all alone.

  The group had traveled through the cave for some time and, other than Jean-Phillipe’s incantations, there was no way for them to measure the passage of time. Similarly, their sense of direction had become muddled. They had made so many turns that it was impossible to tell which direction they were facing relative to the cave mouth. The only thing that any of them were confident about was that they had definitely descended to a point far below the cave mouth.

  Other than that, their only tether back to the cave mouth was a series of simple chalk markings Fahim had made in the form of arrows.The mercenary had made one of these markings for every few imperial paces of travel, but he lost count of how many arrows he drew around the one-hundred and fifth. He felt a quiet panic creep into the corners of his mind every time he drew an arrow on the wall of the cave and found that his piece of chalk had become smaller and more difficult to use.

  As Fahim drew another arrow, something unexpected happened. As his hand moved the chalk across the cave wall, it appeared to expand and contract, almost like the stomach of a creature that was taking slow, deep breaths. Fahim blinked in confusion as his mind tried to process what he just saw, or thought it saw. He stood there frozen with his hand still up against the cave wall. The mercenary wanted to say something, but no words could escape his lips.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  ‘Did the cave walls just move?’ Fahim thought to himself. He didn’t want to believe it. There was no way for rocks or other such non-living material to move in that manner. Surely, it was a trick of the mind. Surely, he had made some sort of error in the dim torch light. He looked at the white line of chalk that he had just drawn. There was an abrupt and sharp curve right in the middle of it, a curve that no able-bodied and sober man could have drawn if they had intended to draw a straight line on a flat surface.

  ‘That was supposed to be straight…’ Fahim thought. His mind ran through a dozen possible explanations for this error that were rooted in rationality and his knowledge of natural philosophy. None of them convinced him.

  “Monsieur Fahim, are you alright?” Jean-Phillipe called. Although Fahim could not see it, the party had now stopped to await Fahim’s reply. Fahim felt like Jean-Phillipe’s words pulled him back into reality. He took a deep breath.

  “Yes. I’m fine. Sorry about that!” He called back before quickly adding a chevron to the line he had just drawn, making it an arrow. Jean-Phillipe resumed his prayer. Fahim then rejoined the group and tried to drown out his worries by focusing on fellow mercenary’s prayer.

  ‘That was surely just a mistake. It is dark and I am tired. There is nothing in this world that cannot be explained by either the word of God or natural philosophy. There is nothing in this world that cannot be explained by either the word of God or natural philosophy. There is nothing in this world that cannot…’ Fahim thought to himself before being interrupted by a hand tapping him on the shoulder. The mercenary’s blood turned to ice water.

  The others heard the scream, but Fahim had disappeared by the time they turned around. Jean-Phillipe was stopped mid-prayer.

  “Fahim?” Alexandra called into the darkness. She turned around as best she could to try to figure out what was going on. She saw no sign of either Fahim or Jean-Phillipe. How far back were they? She felt her stomach tighten as she realized that Jean-Phillipe, or at the very least the light of his torch, should be visible from where she was standing. She stared into the darkness, looking for the large mercenary.

  “Jean-Phillipe?” She called again. Nothing sound returned to her, save for her own echo. It was at this point Alexandra began to fear the worst. After what felt like an eternity of waiting in the darkness, she began to hear movement coming from the direction of Fahim and Jean-Phillipe. She wanted to call for Ekkehardt, but her vocal cords refused to act. She stood frozen in place as her eyes tried to cut into the darkness. The sound of footsteps became louder the longer Alexandra stood there. It was then when Alexandra saw it.

  A hand emerged from around a corner. Unlike Fahim and Jean-Phillipe, the flesh on the hand was pale; a sickly maggot-white. Long, boney fingers tipped with talon-like nails protruded from the palm and gripped the stone.

  Alexandra couldn’t remember exactly how or when she started moving, only that all reason had left her and that getting away was all that mattered. She scrambled over the uneven rocks in a desperate bid to get to Ekkehardt. Alexandra’s flesh scraped against the hard rock multiple times, but the pain didn’t even register. She moved quickly, used all four of her limbs, and acted on pure instinct. In that moment Alexandra resembled a prey animal fleeing from a predator more than a human being.

  She rounded a corner as a part of her begged God for a light to appear before her. Whether it was sunlight or Ekkehardt’s torch didn’t matter. All she wanted in that moment was to leave that dark, cold place.

  All Alexandra found before her was a solid wall of rock, a dead-end. Despair consumed her.