Doormaker: Devil's Harvest (A Short Story Prequel) by Jamie Thornton

Author:Jamie Thornton [Thornton, Jamie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: TWO HOURS. ONE INTERSTELLAR DRUG DEAL. If Esson doesn’t track down some magical drugs within the next two hours, the drug dealer he got involved with might just kill him anyway.
Publisher: Igneous Books
Published: 2017-12-19T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 2

Maella hit something cold, wet, and soft.

The cold of it shocked her into breathing again. She thought they would fall for ages but it had felt like only a few steps.

The darkness was so thick and complete, it was like she had been buried alive under the ground. Her heart raced. She didn’t want Barth to close the door and lock her down here to die in the darkness. Her hands dug into damp, gritty, squishiness, exploring, trying to find something to hold onto. It all smelled like a weird coldness. Part of her brain recognized she was touching mud, but another larger part of her brain didn’t recognize anything at all except that she had opened a door and that door had buried her alive.

“Maella?”

Claritsa’s voice stilled Maella’s hands, but more importantly, broke the panicked race of her thoughts.

She wasn’t alone.

“I’m here,” Maella said. Her voice echoed strangely in the darkness, like they were in a large, cavernous space.

“Why did you…” Maella started. “We could have made it to Grandmother, but you made me—”

“Maella—”

“We could have—”

“Maella.” Claritsa’s voice was scratchy, panicked.

Maella felt Claritsa paw at her arm and then grab her hand with a strength that made her wince.

Then Maella remembered.

Claritsa did not do well in the dark, not since Maella had found her locked in a small shed two years ago. Claritsa had been yelling—Maella didn’t know for how long before she found her but—long enough that Claritsa’s voice had turned scratchy and dull. Maella had feared she’d lost Claritsa through the door with Esson.

It’s how come Claritsa knew. It’s how come they could be friends. Two years ago Claritsa had seen Esson open a door and then gotten locked in a shed. Maella had broken the shed lock with a prybar rusting in the grass. It took five minutes of coaxing to get Claritsa to actually open the door since Maella could not. Claritsa fell into a stony, dangerous silence whenever Maella mentioned anything about the shed.

Maella squeezed Claritsa’s hand. “It’ll be okay.” She looked around for any hint of light that would show a way out. Her eyes constantly searched for anything to lock onto, making her dizzy. Finally she closed them and the spinning stilled.

“Where are we?” Claritsa’s voice floated away and bounced back.

“I don’t know.” A part of her didn’t even care. They were alive. The door hadn’t killed them.

She didn’t know what that meant.

The mud suctioned at her knees. A faint clash of metal echoed from somewhere far off. She opened her eyes, searching for the sound, but that just made her dizzy again.

“Did you hear that?” Maella whispered. Talking loudly didn’t feel right, not at all. She decided they must be inside something with walls and a ceiling because she couldn’t see any stars, if stars existed here, and the air felt so still, like it hadn’t moved in years.

Claritsa whispered, her voice shaky. “I heard it.”

“I think maybe we should follow it.”

“I can’t tell where it’s coming from.” Claritsa almost wailed these words.

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