The Witch Cave

by Sara Clancy

  Basheba resisted wiggling her shoulder out of her jacket but didn’t bother to question what he was giving her. Once he was done, she snatched up her backpack and, after a bit of rummaging, pulled open a hidden compartment. Barely giving him a heads up, she tossed a bag his way and cracked open a bottle of water.

  “Are you sure that’s not anything combustible?” he asked with a smirk.

  “No. Just water. Although I do keep snake venom in an identical bottle.”

  “You should probably label those.”

  “Why? I know what everything is.”

  Lifting the little bag to the light, he examined the contents, having to tip it back and forth to move all of the accumulated sugar out of the way. “Jelly?”

  Basheba gasped in horror. “Cactus candy.”

  “Sorry,” Cadwyn smiled.

  “That’s the good stuff. It’s handmade in a little shop in Arizona.”

  “Right.”

  Her lips pressed into a tight line. “Give it back.”

  “No, no. I’m grateful and going to eat the candy.”

  He hurriedly popped one of the overly sweet treats into his mouth before she could snatch them away. Dusting the sugar off of his fingertips, he heard Mina release a bitter moan.

  “I can’t feel my face.” The ravaged skin of her cheek slurred her words.

  Cadwyn shot Basheba a look before the blonde could respond. She rolled her eyes but let him answer.

  “It’s okay,” Cadwyn soothed. “You’re safe.”

  Mina struggled to get her eyes open. The boys reappeared beside them before Cadwyn had a chance to call them over. Jeremiah shouldered his way to his sister’s side and took her hand.

  “Mina, can you hear me?” Jeremiah asked softly. “Are you okay?”

  She blinked slowly and winced. “I’m okay. Are you all right?”

  “Don’t worry about me.” He sniffed and forced a grin.

  “I have to.” She squeezed his hand. “You’re my brother. It’s my job.”

  Unshed tears muffled his light chuckle.

  “Do you still have the box?” Mina asked.

  He swallowed thickly and forced a smile. “I gave it to Cadwyn. He’s keeping it in his med kit.”

  She smiled slightly, the motion little more than a twitch of the unnumbed side of her face. “That’s a good idea. Help me up?”

  It was a pleasant surprise when Jeremiah shrunk back to give Cadwyn enough room to handle the task himself. It wouldn’t have been the first time concerned loved ones had dismissed Cadwyn’s medical training. Under stress, certain people start to think that doctors can solve all problems and nurses are just glorified laymen. Since Mina had passed out, Cadwyn had prepared himself to use force to keep the twitchy boy at bay. Push too hard, move too fast, jerk at just the wrong angle and everything goes to hell.

  Carefully, Cadwyn drew Mina upright, his well-trained hands searching for any sign that something was wrong. Her fall had been a bad one and, given the array of bruises covering her ribs and hips, he suspected she had chipped a bone or two. It was something he was acutely aware of and conscious about, ever since his first day on the job. A little boy had been brought into the hospital. Barely more than five, he had simply fallen off of his scooter. No one knew his femur had chipped until his mother had tried to comfort him. Push too hard, move too fast, Cadwyn thought grimly.

  The sudden jerk had applied just enough pressure to the shard of bone. It had ruptured the boy’s femoral artery. He bled out internally before anyone knew what was happening. Cadwyn pushed aside the image that lurked on the edges of his mind and refocused himself on Mina. He didn’t know why that boy haunted him the way he did. It hadn’t been his first time seeing a dead body, even one of a child. It had never been an accident before, a voice whispered in the back of his head. No murder. No madness. Just bad luck and good intentions.

  Eventually, he was satisfied and allowed Mina to lean against him for support. She quickly set herself to the task of assessing their situation, unintendedly leaving Jeremiah to flutter about nervously a few feet away. The boy might have started screaming if Ozzie hadn’t given his shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

  She jerked. “The Mahaha?”

  “It hasn’t shown up,” Ozzie said. “We still hear it moving about now and then. I don’t think it can find a way in.”

  Mina nodded, the motion sending her eyes rolling back in her head. Carefully, she cupped the left side of her face. Delicate, trembling fingers traced the line of sutures that started just below her cheekbone and ended at the corner of her mouth.

  “It’s not that bad,” Jeremiah assured.

  “You’re still hot,” Ozzie added, pointedly avoiding the glare Jeremiah threw his way.

  Mina rolled her head to catch Cadwyn’s gaze. “It’ll scar?”

  She barely moved her jaw as she spoke.

  He smiled sadly, “I’m sorry, but at least it’ll be thin.”

  Taking his hand, she shook her head as much as she dared. “Thank you.”

  “It’ll be a cool scar,” Basheba noted, using Cadwyn’s distraction to snatch the candy back. “Makes you look tough. People might take you seriously when you’re planning your SWAT hits.”

  Mina pursed her lips to keep from smiling. “I want to be a profiler.”

  “Yeah, but profilers get to use SWAT teams.”

  “Not really.”

  Basheba made a noise in the back of her throat. “Yeah, okay. I’m sure the desk-jockeys that came up with the Unabomber profile were the same ones busting down his door.”

  “What?” Mina mumbled, struggling to keep ahold of the conversation. “SWAT are highly trained for infiltration. They wouldn’t need a profiler… Are you envisioning that I’d be sending them off to do my bidding like flying monkeys?”

  Basheba popped a piece of candy into her mouth and offered Mina the bag. “Well, not anymore. You ruined it.”

  Furrowing her brow, Mina reached for the bag, “Maybe we both shouldn’t be drugged at the same time anymore. It’s too confusing.”

  “Hey, I’m fine right now,” Basheba dismissed with a roll of her eyes. “Just eat your candy.”

  Mina hesitated.

  “They have the consistency of Turkish delight,” Cadwyn said. “Remember to suck rather than chew.”

  Selecting a piece, she ripped off tiny pieces that she could push between her lips.

  “It’s good,” Mina said tightly. “Thanks.”

  Basheba scooped out a handful of candy then placed the bag in the sand beside her. “You can have the rest.”

  Drinking from the offered water bottle was harder. After several failed attempts and a few pulled stitches, she got the hang of it. They gave her time to orient herself before gathering their belongings and addressing the question before them. Where do we go now?

  “Can we climb out?” Ozzie asked, eyeing the holes in the lofty cave ceiling.

  Jeremiah tilted his head up. “Does anyone have a grappling hook?”

  They all turned to Basheba.

  Looking somewhat offended, she wiggled her bandaged fingers. “Lift your hand if you think you can hold up your own bodyweight right now.”

  “Okay, not the best plan,” Ozzie said. “There are a few openings that the Mahaha hasn’t come through. So, I guess we can try those routes.”

  “And, yet, you offered rope climbing first,” Basheba said.

  “They’re a bit narrow.” Jeremiah tried to subtly sneak glances at his sister as he carefully chose his words. “We’ll have to crawl.”

  Being far more careful with her wound, and self-conscious of the saliva that kept seeping from her numbed mouth, it was getting progressively harder to understand her. The full-body shudder said enough, though.

  “What was that?” Ozzie asked.

  Mina drew a breath through her nose. “Now’s the time to go.”

  “But—” Jeremiah began.

  “I’m still a little loopy.” She tried to keep her smile to
the uninjured half of her face. “Might mellow me out.”

  Jeremiah took her hand. “Only if you’re sure.”

  At her nod, Basheba slapped a bunch of maps down before the brunette. Handing her the notebook and pencil, she grinned.

  “So, where do you suggest we go, Crane?”

  “A map of Black River and the surrounding area?” Jeremiah asked.

  “It’s all guesswork,” Basheba admitted. “But from where we started, and given what I can see of the stars, I’m guessing we’re in this general area.” She used the pencil to make a messy circle. “Does this help?”

  Mina nodded slowly and took the pencil. Seconds ticked by with little more than her staring at the map.

  “Educated guesses are acceptable,” Cadwyn encouraged, drawing one of the chafer tins closer to give her more light.

  “But correct answers are preferable,” Basheba added.

  Cadwyn knew giving her a withering glare wouldn’t do anything, so he snuck one of the candy pieces she had piled in her hand instead. Eventually, Mina leaned forward and scribbled just southeast of the Witch Woods.

  “I think we’re on this side. But I don’t know.”

  “It’s okay.” Cadwyn placed a warm hand on her shoulder. “You’re doing great.”

  “And it’s not like any of us can do much better,” Ozzie grinned.

  It coaxed another lopsided smile from her. Basheba half-sprawled back to snatch the map.

  “We have no idea where any of the tunnels go, anyway,” she mumbled. “This’ll probably be trial and error. At least we have a relatively safe place to retreat to.”

  “Are you talking about here?” Jeremiah asked.

  Ozzie smirked slightly and nudged the boy with his elbow. “You miss the ‘relatively’ part?”

  The boys used the dim light to cast playful glares at each other.

  “Hate to interrupt,” Basheba cut in. “But do there happen to be any tunnels in, we’ll say, that general area?”

  She waved her hand about, loosely gesturing to the far wall, and broke into a long string of profanity.

  “No need for that language,” Jeremiah bristled.

  “Screw you! That hurt.” She sat back on her knees to hug her arm to her chest. “I thought you drugged me.”

  Cadwyn carefully pried her hand away to get a better look at it. “I did. But you can’t go around flailing skinned limbs and expect nothing to happen.”

  “Isn’t that the whole point of drugs?” she hissed through her teeth, wincing when she clenched her injured jaw a little too tightly.

  “You wanted to keep your faculties.” A few specks of blood seeped out to stain the new bandage. “Just be careful and you’ll be fine.”

  Shoving another candy in her mouth, she pouted as she chewed. “Well? The wall? Tunnels?”

  “Oh, right,” Ozzie said before quickly pointing out a few of the shadows that were actually cuts in the stone.

  There were three options in the direction Basheba had indicated. Two of them were big enough for Cadwyn to fit through.

  “So?” Jeremiah asked gently. “Which one do you guys think?”

  Basheba pulled a long chain from around her neck. Over the years, it had fallen to her to collect the wedding rings from the corpses of her relatives, and she now kept the collection with her like a personal totem. One she was insanely protective of. In the entire month Cadwyn had traveled with her, he had only ever seen the collection in its entirety a handful of times. And he had only ever been allowed to touch them when she had been selecting which one to use as the wedding ring. Without taking them off of the chain, she hid two rings from view as she put one in each palm and then held her fists out into the middle of the group.

  “Ruby; we take the tunnel on the left. Diamond; we take the right.”

  Chapter 15

  Mina couldn’t breathe. She gulped for air, but it never seemed to reach her lungs and only left her body quaking. Pain radiated along her nerve endings, bursting anew each time she clutched and dragged herself over the dusty earth. It pulsated within her head in time with her rapid heartbeat. Whatever Cadwyn had given her, it was only enough to take the edge off. To muffle her thoughts rather than silence them. There was still enough of her left to know that she was essentially buried alive.

  They had been able to stand when they first entered the tunnel. The walls closed in quickly, allowing the tiny flame of the buffet chafer to paint the walls a light blue. Mina had found herself longing for light of a standard color. Ozzie didn’t seem too keen on it, either, but kept his protests to random bouts of squirming. Then the ground crept up toward the ceiling, and they were forced onto their hands and knees. Another squeeze and she was on her stomach, slithering forward, her terror sparking within her bones. All she could see was her backpack that she shoved before her. Her backpack, the dirt floor, and the walls closing in around her.

  Squeezing her eyes shut, she forced herself to take a sobering breath and tried to refocus. Plan for what’s coming. Plans soothed her. They also gave the most beautiful illusion of control. Jeremiah would be the first to see what’s coming. He had insisted on going first. As he had put it—he was the biggest coward, so he was sure to scream the loudest if anything happened and they needed to retreat. The idea didn’t sit well with Mina, but she wasn’t in a position to argue. Her brother needed to have confidence in himself. And this was how he chose to do it, how he was trying to earn his place amongst the group. She couldn’t deny him that.

  Ozzie had picked up on her anxiety and, with a smile, had offered to go next in line. It was comforting to know that someone knowledgeable and relatively uninjured would directly have Jeremiah’s back.

  Cadwyn brought up the end of the line. He had told Basheba that it was to protect them from the back but, in truth, Mina was sure he just wanted to make sure the injured girls didn’t fall behind.

  Jeremiah will see any danger first. Then Ozzie, she repeated in her head, shoving her bag over the sandy floor. Me, Buck, Basheba, and Cadwyn. All our physically dominant ones are at the back. Great. That’s just great. Coughing hard on the dust-filled air, she reminded herself that, while Ozzie wasn’t much of a fighter, he was fast on his feet. And he has proven to be resourceful. Both things not to dismiss out of hand. Her stomach churned with shame when she acknowledged that he had proven himself more useful than her on numerous occasions.

  Focus, she told herself sharply, refusing to let her anxiety fester and grow. It only made her feel the crush of the walls and the thickness of the air. Think. Plan. If these paths don’t lead to anywhere, what do we do next?

  Slowly, methodically, she began to sort through what she knew. Plucking the ideas from her sparking, irrational mind and shoving everything else away. The top of her head scraped across the roof. Instantly, everything within her shattered, leaving only one thought behind. I’m buried alive!

  “Mina?” Ozzie asked.

  Buck nipped at her foot, the pressure against her sneakers doing more to stir her than Ozzie’s voice. It chilled her to hear someone crying. It was even worse to realize that she was the one making the pitiful sound.

  “It’s okay, we’re okay,” Ozzie assured her.

  There’s no air. I can’t breathe! Trying to smother the sound turned it into something gut-wrenching and shrill.

  “Let’s play a game,” Ozzie suggested with a bit too much enthusiasm. “Something to distract ourselves. What do you like to play?”

  We’re going to get stuck. We’ll rot into each other, and no one will ever find us. Her whole body shuddered with broken, terrified sobs.

  “Mina,” Ozzie persisted, his voice encouraging and strong. “What game do you like to play? Mina!”

  “Periodic Chain,” she managed to blurt out, dragging herself forward a few feet.

  “I don’t know that one,” Ozzie said.

  “I do,” Cadwyn chimed in. “Someone says an element on the Periodic Table. The next person has to use the last letter as the first l
etter in the next element. I’ll go first. Manganese. Ozzie?”

  “Pass. How about you, Mina?”

  E. She latched onto the thought, trying to drown out the pain in her limbs and the internal mantra that she was suffocating.

  “Erbium,” she pushed out through her tears and teeth.

  “Mendelevium,” Basheba spouted. “What? I’m awesome at chemistry.”

  It’s dry earth. You might mummify rather than turn to sludge.

  Basheba prompted, “It’s your turn, Mina. You need another one starting with ‘M,’ or I get gloating rights.”

  The sandy earth streamed between her fingers as she pulled herself forward. It was too hot. The walls scraped against her trembling shoulders. A heavy thud shook the narrow passage. Dust fell like rain, stinging her eyes and coating her throat. She cupped a hand over her nose and mouth, trying to lessen the effect. Another thump and they all fell silent. Still. Her heart hammered against her ribs as the next thunderous boom fell upon them, and she realized that they weren’t strikes. Footsteps. Something heavy was walking just above their heads.

  The group stilled instantly, each one holding their breath as if the slightest noise would give away their position. The booming footsteps stalked across their concealed tunnel. Loose stones shook free with each impact, the resulting dust thickening the limited air and coating Mina’s throat. She stifled her urge to cough, turning it into a series of sporadic bone-wracking spasms. Each convulsion rattled her injured cheek. Pain coursed through her, bringing fresh tears to her watering eyes. All the while, the thunderous footsteps walked over their spines. Clawing at the last shreds of her self-restraint, certain she couldn’t take it all for a second more, silence descended.

  The blue chafer light elongated the shadows, twisting and distorting them into snarling faces. Mina squeezed her eyes shut, her trembling fingertips snagging against the tight sutures that protruded from her flesh. She cowered, certain she couldn’t take much more, when footsteps began again. Not where they had last left off. They were behind her again; starting where the last had and retracing the path above them. The process repeated, over and over, until her frazzled mind could make sense of it. There’s more than one.