Warm sun pressed onto her back like a comforting hand.

Slowly, every limb shaking, she rolled onto her side. She was near the base of a steep part of the slope. Behind her, the tunnel gaped open, taking advantage of the earth’s natural slant to create an exit that didn’t require stairs or ladders to get out.

Margot waited. She didn’t know what she expected: to see movement deep in the tunnel maybe, or to hear the scrape of slow steps fading away. There was nothing. No movement. Not even the whisper of a sighing breath.

I was hearing my own echoing footsteps after all. She collapsed back and felt the prickly grass dig into her back. Part of her wanted to laugh. More of her wanted to cry. Her emotions had her now drained, empty, and instead of doing either, she lay there, letting the sun heat her shaking limbs and waiting for the ache in her chest to abate as oxygen flowed through her once more.

She’d let paranoia snatch her up, letting her imagine the echoes were something more. And the faster she’d run, the louder they’d sounded, until she truly believed they were right on her heels.

And all the while, it had just been her, frightening herself in an old, disused tunnel.

She felt embarrassed. Like a child afraid of the dark, panicking the moment they entered a dim room.

The hole stretched ahead of her, as though silently asking her if she would like to take another round through the passages. Even with natural sunlight reaching into it, she couldn’t see more than a dozen feet in.

Her chest continued to ache as she moved to her knees and pulled the hinged doors closed. They were at an angle so gravity would hold them in place, and tendrils of reaching grass had begun to wrap over them. When she leaned back, she saw a post positioned nearby and slightly to the side. This entrance was more visible than the one she’d fallen into, but she supposed that wouldn’t always be the case. Eventually it would be swallowed up by nature, as so many of its cousins had been.

She stood. The area she’d found herself in was largely clear, but clumps of trees grew to her front, back, and sides. She couldn’t see her home, but she knew which direction to go find it.

At least that was one good thing about Gallows Hill: it was hard to get lost. As long as she kept climbing upward, she would eventually reach the house.

Margot sighed as she turned her phone’s flashlight off and tucked it into her pocket. Her fingertips were crusted with dirt from when she’d fallen. She could feel grit in her hair and sliding down between her clothes and her skin. She shook herself, trying to clear some of it, but it didn’t help.