Run. Faster. Don’t stop.
The words pounded in my skull with every slam of my feet across stone. My lungs burned, legs screaming as I pushed along the knife-edge ridge. The beasts snarled behind me, claws ripping gouges into stone, their weight making the ground tremble under my boots. Every sound made the air vibrate through my bones.
Think, think, think! I shouted at myself, but thinking was near impossible with death breathing down my neck.
The ridge dipped then narrowed, forcing me to the right. I scrambled up a jagged slab, boots slipping on loose gravel. One beast lunged too wide, momentum carrying it into a wedge of boulders. It roared, thrashing, stuck between the rocks. My chest heaved, hope flashing bright. One down.
But the other was faster. Smarter.
Its shadow lunged across
