Chapter TRAPPED!
The bad news hit them without warning.
They had reached The Three Candles, rushing joyously up the three tunnels towards the promised light of day and the freedom beyond, a small troop of still limping and wounded satyrs and dwarves singing and playing their flutes behind. Yet, then, a black and dark doom descended over them, greater than any cloud.
In the first tunnel; young Joe and Amien scrambled over and around an enormous pile of rock that filled the tunnel to where not even one tiny beam of light shone through from above.
“The way is blocked,” said Ronthiel in disbelief. “It was open before!”
Leading the way in the second tunnel; Marroh and the boy soon studied a similar mass of fallen rock that nothing could get through.
“The way here is blocked too,” said Marroh in amazement.
And in the third tunnel, a desperate and panicked Ronthiel watched Leradien try to remove the fallen rock that blocked the way. Yet not even she could so much as dent the path and finally gave up, fell down, and collapsed, gasping for breath.
“It’s no use,” she breathed. “We can’t get out!”
“No!” cried Ronthiel in horror. “We can’t be trapped down here! Not when we are this close to getting out! Not now!”
The elf’s mind had been so looking forward to leaving, and it seemed so close at hand, that his mind now openly snapped at the bitter disappointment and realization that everything was for naught, the emotion somehow magnified beyond anything he’d felt before. As Ronthiel attempted to move the fallen rock blocking their path, it felt like trying to pluck a star from the night sky with one's bare hands—utterly impossible.
“There’s no way out!” he shouted.
His wild cry echoed over and over again in the cave—like a hideous laugh.
“NO WAY OUT… No Way Out… No way out…”
End part 2
For Part 3 look for: The Last Satyr: The Return of the Gang