The stone moved less than an inch.
That was enough.
A thread of cold air slipped through the opening and ran over Elspeth’s wrists.
She stopped pushing.
Behind her, Finn whispered, “Did you feel that?”
Elspeth nodded.
At the fence below, Marcus Thorne had stopped smiling.
For weeks, he had treated every one of Elspeth’s failures like entertainment.
When her tent sagged in a storm, he had laughed.
When he saw her hauling water from town, he had shaken his head as though witnessing a slow, ridiculous death.
But now he wasn’t laughing.
He was staring at the stone.
“Leave it,” he called.
Elspeth turned her head.
Marcus seemed to hear himself too late.
He cleared his throat.
“I’m saying you don’t know what’s underneath.
Could be unstable.”
Finn looked at Elspeth.
She looked back at Marcus.
Then she pushed the crowbar again.
The stone scraped sideways with a deep grinding sound.
The goats scattered three steps, then crowded back.
Beneath the slab was darkness.
Not a shallow hollow.
A round shaft lined with fitted stone descended into the hill.
Finn dropped to his knees but Elspeth caught the back of his shirt before he could lean over it.
“Careful.”
They waited for dust to settle.
The shaft was perhaps four feet across.
Old stones formed its walls, each one darkened by age.
Roots dangled through cracks near the top.
Finn picked up a pebble.
Elspeth understood before he asked.
“Small one.”
He dropped it.
They listened.
One second.
Two.
Then came a sound so soft Elspeth almost thought she had imagined it.
Plink.
Finn’s mouth opened.
Elspeth didn’t move.
For nearly two months she had carried water onto that land in buckets.
Every morning she measured what remained before deciding whether she could wash her face.
Every evening she calculated what the goats would need.
She had learned the weight of a gallon in her shoulders and spine.
Now something below her answered with the sound of water.
Marcus started up the hill.
“Could be runoff,” he said quickly.
Elspeth finally looked at him.
“You were just leaving.”
His jaw tightened.
“I’m trying to keep you from getting yourself hurt.”
“That’s new.”
Finn looked down to hide a grin.
