Free Furnace 3 - Death Sentence by Alexander Gordon Smith Page A

kind of stress that might come from an immense weight of water.
    Before the third groan died out I had wrapped the chains around my hands and was pulling on them with all my might. There was now a veritable waterfall sluicing down the narrow shaft, making the floor slipperyand preventing me from getting a grip on the metal. Although the passageway next to me meant that the water wasn’t getting any deeper, I knew it was only a matter of time before the hatch gave out under pressure and I was crushed beneath a fist of white foam.
    Swearing at the top of my voice, I braced my leg on the rock and leant back, tensing my arms and shoulders until I thought the muscles would burst through my skin. I could feel the strength inside me, feel every fibre of my being put to work. It was power I had never dreamed of possessing, but it wasn’t enough.
    The hatch groaned again, then one corner popped loose from its casing. I looked up in time to see a jet of water cut down the cell, slapping me hard enough to make me lose my footing. I scrabbled up, screaming in rage as another hinge snapped above me and the jet became a blade.
    This time I wrapped the chains around my chest and turned away from the wall, pulling on them like I was hauling a cart. The adrenaline pulsed through my veins like acid, and I could feel the nectar in there too, giving me strength, urging me on.
    I wasn’t going to die like this. Not now that I finally had power at my fingertips. I wasn’t going to die.
    I gritted my teeth so hard I thought they might snap, pushing my foot back into the join between floor and wall and putting every muscle to work. There was another groan, and I almost dropped earthwards, thinking it was the hatch finally giving way. But then I felt the chains stretch and knew that this time they had made the sound.
    I stopped for a second to recover my breath, then threw myself forward again. The chains cut into my wrists, into my chest, but the pain was good, spurring me on. With the squeal of metal on rock one of the bolts in the wall flew loose. Facing my strength alone, the other bolt didn’t stand a chance, ripping out a head-sized chunk of stone as it surrendered.
    Momentum caused me to fly into the passageway, which probably saved my life. Above me the world seemed to collapse in on itself, a sound like the sky falling. The floor trembled as the water struck it, but by that time I was running along the passageway at full pelt, my chains dragging behind me.
    My legs were like jackhammers, the silver cracks in the walls and floor flashing by like catseyes on a midnight motorway. I could feel the wind on my face, the sheer exhilaration of being able to run this fast making me grin despite the fact that death was right behind me. I risked a look over my shoulder, the unleashed river like a swirling torrent of mercury, gaining quickly. Too quickly.
    I forced myself to run faster. There was nothing but rock ahead, no sign of a door or a junction or anything that might let me escape. I was stronger and faster than I had ever been, but my lungs were burning, my heart was threatening to burst its stitches, and I knew I couldn’t go on like this forever.
    I felt the first cold tendrils of water on the back of my neck, the roar like some vast creature that saw its prey was trapped. I knew why it sounded so triumphant. It had held me in its teeth before, this river, an age ago.I had escaped, and now it wanted to finish the job.
    And it would. Up ahead the passageway was sealed, a dead end of solid rock. I was strong, but there was no way I could pummel my way through it. Not before the seething mass of water ground me to a pulp against the stone. This wasn’t a test, it was an execution.
    I thought of the warden, his cold laughter as I died, and the anger clawed its way up from my stomach. Uttering an animal cry of pure rage, I charged at the wall, my fists raised. The water was almost upon me, its cold fingers the touch of death. So this is how