Chapter 8 · Frontier Lord - Chapter 8: The Road Under the Wall

The cry came from somewhere inside the wall.

Ava's hammer hit the dirt. Rain was already moving, hands scraping along the fresh timber like he could claw through it. His wife grabbed his arm. The other refugees backed up, staring at the logs they'd just lifted into place.

"Mira!" Rain's voice cracked. "Mira, where are you?"

The little girl's sob came again. Muffled. Not from the other side of the wall. From under it.

Ava dropped to her knees and pressed her ear to the base. Dirt. Then hollow space. She could hear the kid crying, maybe six feet down.

"There's a gap under the foundation," she said. "Old tunnel. Has to be."

Rain was already digging with his bare hands. Ava grabbed his wrist.

"Stop. You'll bring the whole thing down on her."

"Then what?" He looked at her like she'd just told him to wait for his daughter to suffocate.

Ava stood and scanned the wall line. Fifteen feet west, one of the foundation posts sat crooked. She walked over, crouched, and shoved her fingers into the gap between post and ground. The soil gave. Loose. Recent.

"Here," she said.