Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 148397 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148397 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
“We’ll drown,” Mollie snapped. “Yes, I’m aware.”
“Well, what the hell are we going to do?!” Rachel shouted. “I can’t…we can’t just stand here and die!”
“Shut up and let me think!”
“We don’t have time to think! We have to run.”
“Run to where?”
“I don’t fucking know, but—”
“Quiet, Rach. Your screeching is not helping—”
“Screeching? We’re running out of time, and you’re telling me to calm down?!”
“Perhaps the caves won’t fill completely,” Mollie mused aloud. “We could swim—”
“Swim?” Rachel’s voice turned brittle with horror. “That’s your plan? You study the damn universe, and the best you can come up with is—”
I shut them out.
I couldn’t listen.
Their energy fed into mine, braiding our panic into a living, gnawing thing. My lungs threatened to stop working. Every fear, every terror, every horror, pain, despair, and loss strangled me like a monster.
My ears rang as they fought.
My arms ached as I held Peter.
I was so, so close to snapping.
So…I did the only thing I could.
I pressed my toes against cold stone.
I ignored the rapidly rising water level as it kissed my calves and travelled higher, higher, higher.
I begged that quiet, wiser part of my soul to take charge.
Images of us swimming and clawing at the ceiling as the ocean suffocated us played behind my closed eyes. Nightmares of us taking our last breath without ever seeing the sun again.
Focus.
I ordered every muscle to relax.
I went against every instinct and compelled my nervous system to choose calmness instead of adrenaline.
For a few moments, nothing happened.
The cave bounced Rachel and Mollie’s argument like a megaphone.
But slowly…thankfully…
My attention turned inward.
Light and sanctity, I found a pocket of peace.
I wasn’t this form.
This form could be cut, bled, raped, and drowned, but I was just the watcher within. Panic came from not accepting the situation. Suffering came from railing against certain fate.
But thanks to a lifetime of schooling my chaotic mind, I opened my eyes to a tranquil reality and smiled as the grounding cord of light that’d granted such salvation continued to glow up ahead.
Subtle.
Barely there.
But…
Wait.
I froze.
T-That’s not imaginary.
From this angle, I could see around the shadow of a stalagmite.
A shadow caused by the barest hint of deliverance.
“There’s another way out,” I whispered in shock, awe, disbelief.
Tugging Peter, I sloshed forward, sending water waking around our shins. The girls tripped with me.
“There’s light.” My arms shook with Peter’s weight. “The ground slopes up. It’s higher ground.”
Mollie and Rachel stopped fighting.
Rachel sniffed back tears. “W-What are you saying? I don’t see anything.”
A surge of energy filled me. I finally donned the mantel of leadership that Peter had always worn. “It’s faint. But trust me. It’s there. Come on.”
I expected Mollie to disagree. I tensed for Rachel to argue.
But…as I stepped into my role of guardian, they slipped into following.
Without a word, the two girls mirrored my steps.
We made a wet, slow procession through the small cave.
I bumped my toes multiple times, my heart pounded from carrying my share of a person.
Finally, we stopped outside the small chasm.
Peering inside, I willed the light to get brighter.
It didn’t.
It was just enough to see how hard this journey would be.
It veered up steeply, mimicking the longest tunnel I’d ever seen.
But…it was dry.
“It’s narrow to start with, but I think it widens.”
Rachel squished closer. “We can make it. We don’t have a choice.”
Mollie pressed her cheek to mine, looking at our unfortunate climb.
She sighed, but then…
…the faintest breeze.
A lick of cool.
A kiss of freshness.
I gasped on a sob.
Not dank and cave stagnant.
But alive.
Bracken and soil and trees.
We glanced at each other.
Without a word, we wriggled into the crack.
I went first and dragged Peter with me.
They went second and pushed.
Together, we inched our way into the light.
* * * * *
I’d endured some horrible things since Henri targeted me and brought me here.
I’d had to dig deep to stay sane and draw from strength I didn’t know I had.
But that journey…good God, it was hard.
Time lost all meaning as we climbed and crawled, tugged and dragged each other up and up and up. At one point, it felt as if we traversed a ladder made of rock and pebbles. The next we were in a chute made of stone.
Everything hurt.
Every muscle engaged to pull Peter behind me all while the two girls shoved him just a little each time.
The knife dug into my lower back, and cuts decorated every part of us.
Little slices as we travelled as if the cave demanded a cost in the currency of our blood.
Peter flickered in and out of consciousness.
At one point, he woke with a start and fought our hold.
The next, he woke up screaming.
Luckily or unluckily, he didn’t remain conscious for long.
And we had no choice but to keep going.
Climbing higher and higher.
Light growing brighter and brighter.
The air cleaner and cleaner.
Until eventually…freedom.
* * * * *
“I want to kiss you, Ily.” Rachel laughed with pure giddiness as we limped, shuffled, and practically fell out of the widening crack and into the largest cave so far.