The Realms Thereunder

5

Daniel and Ecgbryt walked down the tunnel, along with the flow of the sewer water. The walkway they were on took several sharp turns and sometimes the stream they followed moved fast, other times it moved slowly. A few times they passed a couple of deep, square pools of water, but the walkway never branched. They didn’t go up, and didn’t go down, just kept snaking through the darkness.

They had been walking for quite a long time when the section of the walkway they were on collapsed beneath their feet. It felt as if a rug had been pulled from beneath them-there was only the slightest sound of crumbling stone, and then they were falling. Daniel spent a frantic few moments clawing for handholds and kicking his feet against the shifting stone helplessly before they came to a stop.

“Are you hurt, ??eling?” Ecgbryt asked.

“I don’t think so,” Daniel replied. He had lost grip of his lantern, but it was lying quite near him. He checked himself for damages, but beyond the buzz of adrenaline, there was nothing.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

He rolled over to pick himself up. Ecgbryt had already made it to his feet and was looking over the collapsed section of the bank.

Coming to stand next to him, Daniel gazed up at a large scoopedout area where the path they were walking had been, and beneath it, a pile of rubble. It looked pretty impossible to get back up.

“It would seem,” stated Ecgbryt, “that our best course would be to follow the burn with an eye to the path. If it wanders from us, then we will find a way to pursue it. But for now we must ensure our way is fast. I fancy that path fell by design, not by accident, and that our steps are not going unnoticed.”

They gathered themselves quickly and moved on without a word more. They were walking along in the sludge now, so their progress was unsteady at first in the slippery canal but then more sure-the sewage water pulled at their feet, urging them faster and faster onwards.