Nobody dared to move or breathe, the threat of the shadow creature more terrifying and daunting than anything we had ever seen. Even our encounter with the other beast couldn't compare to the unnerving way it prowled towards us. Last time we had an escape, this time we weren't so lucky.

The ears of the beast twitched as it came closer, the small things laid flat against its head. Its sharpened claws dug into the crack between the stone tiles as it walked, making my heart pound in my chest. There was nothing we could do but watch and wait.

Haera silently stepped closer to a crate and gave it a strong shove towards the hole we had fallen through. The sound of its movement felt so much louder now that silence was our saviour. She wasn't just going to stand and wait to die to the clutches of the darkness. My sister was going to fight for her life.

As soon as the wood scraped along the stone, the creature increased its pace. It growled in the direction of the noise it had heard and sniffed the ground. We all took long yet quiet steps away from it, praying it wouldn't catch our scent. Though, if it had gotten this close and hadn't discovered us, its sense of smell must have been poor too.

We weren't going to be able to get out. A nauseating feeling twisted in my stomach at the thought. There was no way we could escape unless it was distracted somehow. What could cause a great enough distraction that would allow us to stack the crates and limb out? They were heavy too, we would need a long distraction to be able to even make any progress.

Larc snuck closer to the creature and crouched down, collecting pieces of broken stone and other debris that had fallen down with us into his arms. I furrowed my brows at him, an unspoken question as to what he was doing, but I received no indication of what he was up to. Did he have the same realisation that I did?

When the Draogn-born stood again, making sure to do so slowly, I noticed that besides the stone, he had also collected what appeared to be shards of glass. What was he going to do with them?

He crept backwards into another passageway — one we had yet to explore — and kept his eyes trained on the shadow beast. A sensation of dread coiled deep within me and I hoped there wasn't another creature behind him. All it would take was one misstep to alert it.

Haera and I circled around the beast, giving us a better view of what Larc was doing. Once he had no further to go and he tucked himself into the corner of a tunnel before it turned into another, he threw a shard of glass as far as he could down the passageway to lure the creature away

The nostrils of the creature flared and the shadows surrounding it stood up tall, as if they were hairs along an arm, before it darted down the tunnel towards Larc. I had to clasp my hand over my mouth to stop the cry of horror that attempted to escape.

One moment, the creature ran towards him, jaws open wide with drool spraying out. The next, it turned around the corner to investigate where the glass had shattered. Larc stood as still as he could, his throat bobbing each time he glanced between us and the beast. He was creating time for us to escape — a distraction from the death that loomed around us.

After a nod in the Dragon-born's direction, Haera wasted no time and began moving the crates. She pushed another beside the one she had already put in place and began to move over to the next. This one she would need to lift to stack on top of the others.

I sprung into action too, quickly rushing to her side to help lift the crate. It was much heavier than I had anticipated, causing us to nearly drop it, but we managed to place it correctly to form the beginnings of a staircase.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the shadow creature slowly returning to us, stalking past Larc who held his breath. Pulling my sister away from the crates and further into one of the other passageways, I waited for him to throw another shard.

As soon as the shatter sounded again, my heart leaping into my throat, the realisation dawned on me. We didn't have any crates left to stack. We needed to get more from the storage room all the way at the end of the tunnel we had ventured down.

My eyes met Haera's determined ones. She wasn't going to let this problem stop her. I turned back to the Dragon-born and he nodded, realising what needed to be done too.

Without looking back, we made our way back down to the room full of supplies and found two lighter crates that we could each carry by ourselves. It still wouldn't be enough to make it to the top, but it was the best we could do.

Before continuing to stack them high, we returned to the storage room to collect another crate. This one was much heavier and required both of us to handle its weight. Instead of one of us having to brave the backward walk, we shuffled sideways down the tunnel. When we reached our makeshift staircase again, we had to freeze in place as the shadow beast was making its way back down the passageway.

My arms shook, threatening to buckle under the weight of the crate, but Larc threw another piece of debris to draw the creature's attention back. I didn't know how this plan was working so well, how the beast hadn't realised yet that it was being played around. All I could do was thank the Goddess for watching over us and keep creating our escape route.

We continued our dance of death. A loop of constant fear and panic. The grip of death loomed above us, reaching out to grab us when the music halted and we stopped spinning to its tune — its hound ready in the shadows to kill us when we failed.

Haera and I secured another three crates to the makeshift staircase, meaning there were only a few more that needed to be added before we could climb out. It wouldn't be a stable climb up, but it was better than nothing.

As the creature turned around once more, lured by our noise — its growls growing more and more aggravated by the minute — we waited for another piece of debris to be thrown. Except, nothing happened. The beast continued to get closer without anything to drag its attention away again.

Larc had run out of stone and glass to throw. The one thing that was keeping us alive as we made our escape route had one flaw that we had overlooked in our panic — it wouldn't last forever.

All we needed was one more crate, one which sat beside us waiting to be added to the stairs. We just needed another opportunity to add it and make our escape.

Picking up a piece of shattered stone by my feet, I threw it down the passageway we had gotten the crate from. It wasn't as far as the Dragon-born had been throwing them, but a small tendril of pride weaved through my chest at the fact that it was much further than I thought I was able to throw it.

The beast sprinted past me and down into the tunnel to investigate the sound. The waft of something putrid filled my nose as it ran, making me resist the urge to gag.

I motioned my head for Larc to join us as Haera and I worked on moving the last crate into position. With a push and a quick check to make sure it wouldn't fall as soon as someone stepped on it, our escape route was finally complete.

Larc rushed over and I extended my hand to help him up the crates. There would only be one chance at this. If one of us fell or we were too slow, there wasn't any glass to throw from up here.

My sister scrambled to the top, dirt falling into the passages as she successfully made it up and turned back around to help me up too. I prayed to the Goddess, asking her to not let more of the ground collapse while we were trying to escape.

Once I had made it up, the setting sun blinding me from where it peered over the trees, and Larc had too, Haera knocked the top crate off of the staircase we had made to make sure the creature couldn't follow us for certain. We ran as far away as we could from the hole, making it to the edge of the clearing, a string of curses leaving my sister's mouth.

"That was close, too fucking close."

I sat down on the grass, taking a moment to calm my heart. "Larc, that was amazing." My eyes watched his movements, the way his eyes flicked between the hole and the grass we stood on. "Your bravery... you're the reason we made it to the surface again."

When he was certain no more of the ground would cave in, he crouched down and rested his face in his hands. "I can't believe we survived that." His words came out breathless as he still processed what had happened.

"It was very brave of you." Haera's voice was a murmur. "We wouldn't have made it without your quick thinking." She refused to look at the Dragon-born, keeping her gaze fixed on the hole.

Out of the corner of my vision, I saw blood trickling down Larc's back. The remains of his wings were bleeding again and they looked much worse than they had before we had fallen. "Your wings..."

He winced as he straightened his back. "Pushing myself into that corner wasn't the best plan of action for them."

I reached out my hands to heal them, to at least stop the bleeding and soothe the pain I knew he was experiencing, but Haera pulled them away.

"Let's make sure we're safe first. It doesn't seem like the shadow beast is able to follow us up, but we don't know if there are any more around here."

"We should find somewhere to sleep for the night too. It's getting late," Larc added with a nod of agreement. "This clearing would be good as it will be easy to see anything approaching."

"What if we fall again?" I questioned, swallowing the nervousness that rose in my throat.

"Judging by how big the passageways were, that underground section probably won't reach the edge of the clearing." Haera chewed a nail as she thought. "Alright, I'll check the perimeter quickly and we can set up here."

"I'll heal your wings as soon as we're set up then." I smiled at Larc who placed the satchel he had been carrying on the ground.

All we could hope for now was that our night would be uneventful.