As Rowanne grew more accustomed to the smothering darkness around her, she planned her route back to the surface. Usually even in the quietest workings there was always some sound; the silence down here was unsettling. Remembering what her dad had taught her, she reached down into the freezing water. Getting a feeling for the way it flowed would help her make her way back to safety. But she had to tread carefully, too. Walking too quickly in water made noise, and with Cutty about, the last thing she needed was to make a noise. The bogle was not known for being the forgiving sort, and he definitely was not welcoming to any visitors in his domain.

She slowly slipped into the icy, waist-deep water, suppressing a gasp at the sudden cold. Then, taking the shank of her pick, she started testing the ground ahead of her. Down disused workings, things were not always how they seemed. The minerals formed thin crusts over holes leading to collapsed areas. Like thin ice, it would sometimes bear your weight for a time. Then when you least expected it it would give, and once you started to sink into the silty water down here, a few feet deep may as well be a mile. If that didn’t claim you, the cold would have you just as fast.

Feeling out the old wooden rails with her feet, holding one hand firm to the clammy wall, while gently prodding the silt with the wooden shank to make sure the ground ahead was firm, she started what was bound to be a long journey back to the surface. More than once the water shifted just a bit too loudly. Each time she clung to the wall like a rabbit before a gun, her heart hammering, hoping, praying to whatever was out there that the thing lurking down here had not heard her.

Then suddenly she stumbled, her heart sinking as her probe sank deeper and deeper. There was nothing ahead. The path must have collapsed. Desperately she prodded deeper, then poked about fervently, until at last there it was, resistance. She stepped forward, exploring with her foot until she figured it out. The stone was gone but by some miracle the timber rail had survived, while the stone beneath it had sunk into a deeper seam.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Cursing under her breath she wondered what devil she had crossed to meet with such a thing. But what options did she have? Turn back and risk going deeper? No, that wasn’t an option. So she stepped forward, wishing she had been better on the balance beam at school. Placing both feet on one rail, she walked out over the pit of cold murky death beneath her, one hand on each wall for support. She felt like she was crossing a minefield.

Fumbling blindly heel-to-toe into the void she went. She tried her best to hold back the dizzy feeling from lack of input. She took to listening hard to her heartbeat, and the echoes, even the gradual drip drip drip that if it came on the surface she would be cursing became a comfort to her. It felt like she’d been fumbling in the dark for months when all at once the wall to her left vanished. She scrambled desperately, while clinging to the other side for support, before she realised reaching out any further would tip her over the edge.

She wanted to cry, but didn't dare. That much noise would attract everything she sought to avoid. There was no choice but to press on. So she did, doing all she could to hold her balance on the rotting wood beneath.

Then she slipped, scrabbling desperately; it felt like her heart sank into the void that would soon claim her body, mind and soul. Then her foot STOPPED.............. as it touched solid stone beneath the rails.

Reaching forward once again with hands and feet, step by step, each one hit ground… then an old tub, resting where it had been abandoned all those years ago. From the depths behind her came a snickering laugh that made her heart freeze in her chest.