The sun above the mountains shone on the cave entrance, but its light only reached a few metres inside. After that the cave was dark. Very dark. But not quiet.

There had been a sound, Camille was sure of that. And the sound was the reason Camille  was still up here at the cave, when the rest of the class were on their way down to the village.

They had been in the mountains and narrow valleys of the Alpes north of Nice for three days now, staying at a local school and visiting museums and monasteries. Today, the class had walked up with their teacher Mrs Chollet along a steep gravel road to the mountain, and found the cave. They had eaten their lunch in front of the entrance, and Camille had sat next to it.

Had no one else heard the sounds from the cave? It didn’t seem so, but the rest of the class sat further away, talking and laughing. And when the lunch was finished and everybody rose to go back down, the others just looked blank when Camille asked them. ”Sounds? What sounds?” Then they were off running, and only Camille still stood by the cave, looking at its darkness.

Camillel took one step towards it and listened again. Yes, when Mrs Chollet and the class were gone there definitely was a steady sound from the darkness. And when Camille took two steps more and listened harder it was clear what the sound was: A whisper. Someone was whispering deep inside the dark cave.

”Ohé?”Camille shouted into the darkness.

The whispering stopped. But there was another sound: A scraping sound. Someone or something was slowly making its way out of the cave, moving towards the light. And moving towards Camille.

What happens now? Continue the story yourself!

Notes de l’auteur :

“The main character is called Camille because I have heard that name can be either masculine or feminine, so that the students can decide themselves if they want to write about a boy or a girl. They also have to decide who is making the sounds of course, human or nonhuman, friendly or unfriendly.”

A cave = une caverne / une grotte

A whisper = un chuchotement