Hrochka woke to the beginning of the night's exhalation from the looming cavern mouth and rolled over. The cool, slightly musky wave washed over him, displacing the muggy suffocation that passed for air in the jungle and making him almost chilly. Tide-driven breezes were his friends, often just enough to keep Scribe-damned insects at bay, at least until they turned and drew air back in.
As he moved, heard the clatter of a falling stone maybe two meters cave-ward. Doing the only sensible thing, he froze. Adrenaline-fueled awareness crept over him with the buzzing of blood in his ears and the wide-eyed stare straight out into the pitch beyond the meager light supplied by the camp's single glyph lamp. Without meaning to, he stopped breathing although the thudding of his heart certainly seemed to move his chest as much as a breath might.
No other sounds came from where the rock had tumbled which served only terrified Hrochka more. Whatever had dropped it was still there. He slowly exhaled as silently as possible and drew another breath. The thousands of jungle calls were a cacophony pouring in from the edges of the clearing, but he was confident that nothing had moved in the direction of the cave.
The children in the coastal village a few kilometers south had told stories. Hrochka and his fellow druggists dismissed them as the sorts of nonsense that children are given to, but every terrible detail flashed through his memory at this moment. The bone spines. The heavy skulls with smooth, notched plates instead of teeth. The cleverness to turn a trap against a hunter. Hands with razor-edged claws. Their amusement with the tales had wavered when the trail out from the village had ended abruptly with an orderly pile of rocks, supposedly marking the beginning of these monsters' territory.
And then the tiniest of rustles, like bone dragged against stone.
Hrochka was shaking now with increasing violence. He was absolutely sure that the sound of his blankets was going to draw attention. Screwing his eyes shut, he carefully tilted his head back to face the source of the sound.
Two days ago, they had awoken to find a meter-tall cairn assembled near the mouth of the cave. No one would admit to the prank, although Beridatl threatening to "rip the out the arm of whoever did it and beat him to death with it" had scarcely encouraged confession. Nervous jokes had been made, but the cairn had been disassembled before heading into the cave to gather exotic fungi.
The next morning found another cairn this time with a skinned animal, some sort of medium-sized mammal, draped over its top. It was actually the whimpering of the creature that had woken Hrochka; he ended up snapping its neck before any of his compatriots awoke and heard, keeping that horrible truth to himself. Hiding his terror in rage, Beridatl had stormed off back towards the village alone, willing to risk the predators of the jungle rather than stay where they were. The others muttered, but were ultimately convinced that the folk from the coast were trying to scare them off.
Another rasp, closer and clearer.
Hrochka could feel a bead of sweat working its way across his forehead. He had never been particularly brave, but neither was he a coward. And yet, this was more than he knew how to cope with. He reasoned that his eyes were shielded from the lamplight, there was no way for them to show up in the night; it would be safe to look and maybe there would be nothing. If he were lucky, the night would be just as empty as it ought.
He opened his eyes. Three pairs of luminous eyes, orange and burning like the last scraps of sunset before nightfall, hung in the darkness, reflecting back the light from the camp. One of them immediately flicked in his direction, peering directly into his. Hrochka clamped his eyelids shut and struggled not to vomit. He had begun breathing again, but it was so shallow and rapid that he was quickly becoming light-headed.
He heard rattling and scuffling retreating from where he had seen the eyes, the slight echo betraying their entrance into the cavern. His last conscious thought before blacking out was, I'd sooner thrice-damned be before I go back into that hell-pit of a cave.
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