26
As they proceeded down the narrow tunnel and away from the large river chamber, the heat slowly faded to a warming glow, no longer prickling Higgs’s skin and making his eyeballs feel dry and swollen. Once again, he had the uncomfortable sensation of the mountain being some living creature they moved within, ever deeper, down inside its heaving chest toward its heart.
‘Here. We are closer than I thought.’ Flame’s words shook him from his grim musings. She was standing a few feet ahead, eyes wide and eager, face sweat slick and gleaming in the orange light.
‘Closer to the Pit?’
‘Yes.’ She nodded, turning from him. ‘Come.’
Higgs followed behind her as she crept, slower and more carefully now. He tried to remember what he had seen when he had been in the Pit, but he could only glimpse
