The split in the rock face was just wide enough to see through. It did not look like a path. It looked like a mistake.

  Miu didn’t hesitate. The cat slipped into it, tail vanishing into the dark, and Peter was already moving after it. Layla swore under her breath and followed, shoulders tight, fire held back because there was no room for anything to go wrong. Peter brushed his shoulder against stone and didn’t even slow, trusting the cat in a way that would have been ridiculous anywhere else, but nothing about this situation left room for pride.

  Ilaria got Sarah through first.

  That was the hardest part.

  Sarah’s weight was dead on her back, arms looped around her shoulders without holding. Every step scraped Sarah’s boots against stone. Every time the rock narrowed, Ilaria had to turn sideways and force them through, teeth clenched, lungs working against the squeeze. The crack pressed in from both sides and made breathing shallow whether she wanted it or not.

  “Keep going,” Layla hissed behind her. It wasn’t a pep talk. It was a warning.

  Ilaria didn’t answer. She couldn’t spare the air. Her pack snagged, tore loose, then snagged again. Sarah made a soft sound that might have been pain or nothing at all, and Ilaria’s stomach twisted. She kept moving anyway because stopping meant dying.

  Peter’s voice came from ahead, strained but steady. “Miu says this goes down. It’s narrow, but it opens. We just have to get there.”

  Layla let out a bitter laugh that had no humour in it. “Brilliant. Down. Of course it’s down.”

  The crack opened into a tunnel. Water seeped from somewhere above and ran down the walls in cold streaks. Drops found necks and sleeves, and the chill settled in fast, the kind that didn’t hurt right away but made you pay for it later. The ground under their boots was slick and uneven, and every time Ilaria’s foot slipped her shoulders screamed at the extra strain of keeping Sarah upright.

  Layla’s fire stayed a tight, controlled glow. It didn’t flare, because flaring meant smoke and heat and the wrong kind of attention, and it meant burning the oxygen in a space that already felt thin. Ilaria kept her focus on the next step and the next handhold, because thinking too far ahead made her legs shake.

  Behind them, something scraped.

  It wasn’t close enough to see, but it was close enough to hear, and the sound didn’t belong to rock settling or water dripping. Layla heard it too. Ilaria could tell by the way Layla’s breathing changed.

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  “Don’t look back,” Layla muttered, almost to herself. “Just move.”

  Miu stopped at a fork that barely qualified as one, a dip that dropped left and a tighter squeeze that dropped right. The cat chirped sharply, then padded toward the tighter way.

  Peter didn’t waste time arguing. “Right. It’s right.”

  Layla stared at the gap as if it had personally offended her. “That’s not a tunnel. That’s a punishment.”

  “It’s also the only one our guide likes,” Peter shot back. He sounded too tired to be polite about it.

  Ilaria shifted Sarah higher, adjusted her grip, and forced herself into the tighter squeeze. Stone pressed into her shoulder. Sarah’s arm dragged along rock and knocked loose grit. Ilaria swallowed the urge to panic and kept her pace controlled because panic made you careless, and careless meant you fell in a place where nobody could catch you.

  The slope steepened.

  They had to half-walk, half-slide in places, boots skidding on wet stone. Ilaria’s thighs burned. Sarah’s weight became its own kind of cruelty. Peter stumbled once and caught himself on the wall, palm scraping, and Layla grabbed the back of his shirt and hauled him upright without a word.

  “You good?” Layla asked.

  Peter nodded too fast. “Yeah. Just… keep moving.”

  The scraping behind them came again, closer this time. Not constant. Measured. Patient.

  Miu led them down another turn and into a pocket that was barely a pocket, just a hollow where the tunnel widened enough to stand without being crushed. The air was stale in there. It smelt like wet stone and old dust and something faintly rotten that made Ilaria’s stomach roll. Their light hit the walls and died fast, swallowed by damp and shadow.

  Ilaria lowered Sarah as carefully as she could, easing her onto the ground with controlled movements so the drop wouldn’t jolt whatever was wrapped under the bandage. The moment Sarah’s weight left her shoulders, Ilaria’s arms shook from delayed strain and she had to flex her fingers to stop them cramping. She touched Sarah’s cheek with two fingertips. It was cold and clammy, and that scared her more than the scraping did.

  Peter dropped to his knees beside Sarah immediately, hands hovering, eyes fixed on her breathing. He wasn’t shaking from cold. He was shaking because he’d been holding himself together for too long.

  Layla crouched on the other side, fire ready in her palm without actually flaring. “How bad is it?”

  Peter swallowed hard. “She’s still breathing. She’s still here. That’s… that’s good.”

  “That’s not an answer,” Layla snapped, then forced her tone down. “Peter.”

  He looked up, face pale. “I don’t know. I can’t do much, not in here. I can try to stabilise her but—”

  Another scrape from behind them cut him off.

  Layla stood in one sharp motion and turned toward the tunnel mouth. “We don’t have time to sit.”

  Ilaria wiped sweat off her forehead with the back of her wrist and felt the grit smear across her skin. She looked at Sarah’s face, grey and slack, and something in her chest tightened.

  “We move,” she agreed, and hated herself for how quickly the words came.

  Peter’s jaw worked. He nodded once, then leaned in close to Sarah as if she could hear him. “Stay with us. Just… stay.”

  Miu chirped again, softer this time, and padded back toward the slope without waiting for an argument. The cat’s tail flicked once, impatient.

  Layla tightened her grip on her weapon and jerked her chin at Ilaria. “Get her up.”

  Ilaria didn’t respond with words. She just looped Sarah’s arms again, braced herself, and lifted, hauling that weight back onto her back with a grunt she couldn’t hide. The tunnel took them the moment they moved, squeezing them back into single file and swallowing their light.

  The scraping followed. Slow, steady and continuous scraping.