Chapter 4 - The Breath of the Buried
Darkness had never felt so solid.
Elena could not expand her ribcage. The air was thick, musty, and smelled of decaying cedar and damp soil. When she tried to raise her hands, her knuckles instantly struck raw, splintering wood only inches above her face.
Panic ignited in her veins, burning away the lingering fog of concussion.
Where is Leo?
The memory struck her like physical blows: the stairwell, Marianne’s claw-like hands tearing at her hair, the flight through the air, the cold marble, and the agonizing sound of her baby's cry fading into the distance. She wasn't dead. They had put her in the ground alive.
She let out a muffled scream, but the sound was instantly absorbed by the suffocating enclosure of the crude pine box. Panic threatened to hyperventilate her, consuming the tiny reservoir of oxygen remaining in the coffin.
Calm down. Breathe slowly. Conserve everything.
Elena felt along the perimeter of the box. Her left wrist was sprained, throbbing with vicious pain, but her legs still moved. The fall hadn't paralyzed her. The wood above her head felt cheap, hastily nailed together—not an expensive casket, but a disposal crate.
She brought both knees up against her chest, flattening her bare feet against the lid directly above her pelvis where she could generate the most leverage. Bracing her shoulders against the bottom of the box, she pushed with every ounce of maternal fury surging through her veins.
The wood groaned. A shower of loose soil trickled through a seam, dusting her face.
She pushed again, a guttural scream tearing through her throat. Crack. The central board split down the grain. Heavy, suffocating wet earth poured into the opening, burying her face. Elena choked, spitting out dirt, fighting through the blindness. She clawed upward through the loose, rain-soaked mud, digging with broken fingernails, ignoring the tearing of her skin.
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Lungs burning, muscles tearing, she forced her arm straight up through the mud until her fingers breached the surface of the earth into the freezing night air.
Above ground, crouching by the freshly covered grave with a crowbar in hand, a shadowy figure reached down and gripped her muddy wrist.
