The Edge of Darkness

                  Torben did not want to be included in the conversation. Their predicament weighed heavily on his mind. The choice to leave or stay did not disturb his mind as much as the experience from the night before. When the group retreated into the cave, Torben felt his way through the darkness, hoping to find shelter without discovering a lurking life form. But he didn’t stop because he found the end. He stopped because he couldn’t feel any more ground to walk on.

                  He spent the entire night nestled into a ledge of rocks, fearing if he rolled over, or lost his way in the dark, he could fall into an unseen darkness. As much as his mind tried to block it out the night before, he knew he lie exposed to the darkness of the unknown. Anything could have been in that nothingness. Watching. Waiting. Now, Torben wanted to know if the cave came to an ending, or if the wild imaginations of his mind were true.

                  With several sticks on fire and light in his hand, he wanted to know how far back the cave went. He entered the cave, crawled up to the nook where he spent the night, which at first glance looked like it ended. As he crawled over the rock, the cave opened to a dark hole of emptiness. He held his lit torches over the black hole, hoping to find a wall or path just out of sight in the darkness, wishing it would be a much safer place to stay.

                  The light exposed a slanted rock ceiling and a hole of darkness. His stomach lurched, realizing he stood a mere step away from falling into the narrow rock-walled abyss. He slept all night exposed to who knows what lived down there. Torben shuddered to think of staying another night, sleeping so close to the unknown. He took one of his sticks on fire and tossed it into the darkness to see how far the hole went.

                  The stick fell for a while, much longer than he expected, then it hit rocks, dousing the flame, smacking against several more rocks as it traveled downward. The cave descended far deeper than he ever imagined. Suddenly something growled! Or at least Torben thought he heard a growl. Did his ears deceive him? He took a defensive stance and listened. Then he thought he heard something move. It couldn’t be! Torben did not want to find out. He quickly crawled out of the cave, hoping to convince the others they should catch up to Hjalmar Geir.