by Inmon, Shawn
Senta-eh sprinted toward the river to try and catch him as well, but she miscalculated. By the time she got to the water to pull the boy out, he was already past her. The boy tumbled awkwardly in the rushing water, gasping and thrashing.
Alex’s first instinct was to look for a fallen branch or anything else long enough to stick out into the rushing water for Werda-ak to catch onto. The clock in his head told him there was no time for that. Instead, he sprinted along the bank, jumping over small logs and rocks, trying to get ever-so-slightly ahead of the helpless boy.
Werda-ak recovered himself and turned, trying to swim. The current was too much, though, and he bobbed helplessly.
As he ran, Alex cupped his hands and shouted, “Try to angle toward this shore. This way!”
He didn’t want to give up any more speed for words, so Alex just put his head down and focused on running.
He glanced ahead and saw that the river widened, which was both good and bad. Good, because it lessened the current somewhat. Bad, in that the mostly-level bank he was running on was about to disappear.
Monda-ak loped alongside him, easily keeping up, but not helping in any way.
His lungs burning with exertion, Alex reached for the last of his speed. He leaped over one last log and splashed out into the river. Nearest the shore, it wasn’t deep, coming only to his waist. The current still moved, though, forcing him to stumble to keep his balance. He fell against a log that protruded out into the water and waded quickly out, using it to stay upright.
Instantly, Werda-ak was upon him, and appeared to be just out of his reach.
Alex knew that if he missed him, that would be it. There would be no way he could catch up to him again.
Holding onto the end of the log, Alex leapt out toward the boy. Water washed over him, momentarily blinding him and his heart sank, thinking he had missed him.
Then he felt a scrabbling, grasping hold against his bicep. Alex curled his right arm up, giving Werda-ak a better hold. The boy’s grip slipped, then finally held.
Gasping and spitting, Werda-ak’s fingers dug into Alex’s arm as he fought against being carried away.
Alex tightened his grip on the limb of the fallen tree and attempted to pull them toward the shore, but found that all he could do was hold them where they were—he couldn’t move them.
How long until my grip loosens? Then, we’re both goners.
Alex felt a strong, lithe body against his back and a long arm slipped around his chest.
Senta-eh. She didn’t speak, but just braced her feet against the slippery rocks and pulled with all her considerable strength.
That was enough. She pulled Alex toward the shore, and he was able to release his death grip on the branch and hold tighter to Werda-ak. With one final heave, Senta-eh lifted both Alex and the boy out of the water and onto the shore. They collapsed at the very edge of the water, chests heaving.
Werda-ak struggled out of Alex’s grasp and climbed to his feet, walking unsteadily back in the direction they had come.
Alex relaxed and fell back against Senta-eh. They laid like that, recovering, for a full minute before Alex realized the intimacy of their pose and pulled away, slightly embarrassed. He stood, reached out a hand to her and pulled her to her feet.
Alex, Senta-eh and Monda-ak walked back to where they had left their packs, taking their time.
When they got back to the flat spot near the rope bridge, Alex felt completely exhausted. Days of constant hiking and sleeping in trees were taking their toll. It wasn’t near dark yet, but he said, “We’re done for the day. We’ll figure out how to get across in the morning.”
Alex surveyed the area. Above the bank was the spot where the two rock faces came together. Not as protective as a cave, but it would give them some cover. One person on watch would be enough.
“We’ll sleep up there. I can use a night not wrapped around a tree trunk. I’ll start a fire, then we can eat the lizard. I’ll take first watch.”
“Good. We can all use a little rest. I’ll take second watch,” Senta-eh said.
Werda-ak kept his back turned to them.
Half an hour later, Alex had a fire going. Senta-eh had the lizard roasting on a spit. There was so much meat that she knew they wouldn’t be able to eat it all and that it would spoil quickly. She solved that problem by giving it to the Kragdon-ah version of a garbage disposal—Monda-ak.
Just when the skin of the lizard was crispy and steam was issuing forth, Werda-ak sullenly approached and sat cross-legged on the ground. No one said anything, but using thick leaves like potholders, Senta-eh broke off big chunks of lizard meat and ran a sharp stick through them. She handed one skewer to Alex, another to Werda-ak, and kept the last for herself. Monda-ak had long since devoured his, of course.
Silence was heavy while they waited for the meat to cool.
Finally, Werda-ak said, “I really thought I could do it. I’ve never fallen like that before.”
Alex blew on his meat, peeled a bit of skin away and nibbled on it. “Delicious,” he said to Senta-eh. He turned to the boy. “I know you thought you could make it. And of the three of us, you had the best chance. But, we can’t take the chance of exposing ourselves to that much risk. Each of us is critical to our mission. If we lose any one of us, we’ll fail.”
Monda-ak woofed his agreement and desire to be included in that count.
Werda-ak hesitantly put two fingers to his forehead. “Then how are we going to get across?”
Alex smiled. “I’m honestly not sure yet. I thought about trying to do a monkey-crawl across—hanging on with my legs and arms, but I don’t think I can do that, either.”
The boy brightened.
“And neither can you. It’s just too far, and too much of a risk. We’ll all think on it through the night and one of us will have an idea in the morning.”
“I’d like to take first watch,” Werda-ak said.
“Okay, that’s fine,” Alex agreed, trying to find ways to give this young colt his head without unnecessary risk.
“Wake me in a few hours,” Senta-eh said. “I’ll take the middle watch.”
Alex and Senta-eh gathered one last armload of firewood each, then laid down with their heads on their packs. Both were asleep within moments.
Alex awoke as Senta-eh leaned close to him. “Thanks,” he said quietly. He looked at Werda-ak, who was fast asleep by the fire. In quiet repose, he looked even younger than he was.
“You’re doing fine with him,” Senta-eh whispered. “Young men are challenging. Too bad he’s not a girl.”
From the way she said it—as a warrior herself, no doubt having had to prove herself again and again—Alex recognized the voice of experience.
Still, he couldn’t resist. “At what point did you stop being less challenging?”
She swatted at him, but he easily avoided her.
“I’ll take it from here. Get some sleep.”
Senta-eh laid down and again was asleep almost instantly. The rest of an untroubled mind.
Alex poked at the fire with a stick, not because it needed tending, but because he needed something to occupy himself.
Sparks rose up into the inky darkness of the night sky and in those floating embers, Alex saw a solution to their problem.
A solution if it doesn’t kill us.
ALEX LET THE TWO OF them sleep in. It was almost dawn by the time he shook them awake.
As soon as they sat up, he said, “I have a plan.”
The sun was peeking above the mountain to the east.
Alex turned to Werda-ak. “The first part of the plan is critical. I was planning on doing it myself, but I think you are better suited. Are you up for it?”
Werda-ak was impetuous, but not stupid. He immediately recognized what Alex was doing—allowing him to save face for his actions of the day before.
“Det,” the boy said—Winten-ah for “yes.”
Monda-ak ventured out into the bushes to look for breakfast for
himself—perhaps the opportunity to find the rest of the skink whose tail he had taken the day before. The three humans dropped down to the bank of the river and walked to the tree that anchored the rope. It was what any Pacific Northwest logger of the twentieth century would have called a spar tree. It had been selected because it was tall and strong. Some brave soul had climbed to the peak, topped it, and taken branches off all the way down. Now it looked like a giant pencil jammed into the ground.
Alex laid a hand on Werda-ak’s shoulder, then handed him his sharpest knife.
“Skip the first hanger, then cut the second one, top and bottom. Don’t drop it, though, or we’ll have to start over again.”
Werda-ak gave Alex a look that said, I’m not stupid, then tucked the knife securely into his leather belt and shimmied up the tree to the same rope he had attempted to tightrope walk on the day before. Today, instead of walking on top of the rope, he wrapped his arms and legs around it and scooted along. Progress was slower, but he was in less risk of falling.
Alex and Senta-eh stood helplessly on the bank, watching the boy crawl along the rope. Monda-ak returned from his morning hunt and woofed at the boy.
Werda-ak crawled slowly out to the second hanger, which was fifty feet out over the river. He used that hanger rope to pull himself up, then used the knife to saw at the point where the hanger tied on to the lower rope. When he cut through, he held tight onto the rope to balance himself.
He turned and grinned at Alex and Senta-eh, any embarrassment from the previous day’s failure a long-distant memory. Holding on to that hanger rope, he used it to stand and balance on the lower rope. He rolled his shoulders, loosening his muscles, then began to climb hand over hand up the hanger.
Alex held his breath, knowing Werda-ak was more than capable of climbing a rope, but still worried about the consequences if he fell.
The boy never slowed or hesitated. He climbed all the way to the top rope without using his legs.
“This is where it gets a little trickier,” Alex muttered, not realizing he had slipped back into English.
Werda-ak threw his leg over the rope and pulled himself up. The boy settled his butt onto the much-wider rope and leaned forward on his hands. He reached one leg down and snaked the hanger rope around his ankle several times.
When that felt secure enough to him—secure being a relative term when trying to balance a hundred feet off the ground on a rope that was swaying slightly in the wind—he slowly reached for the knife. He once again sawed the blade back and forth against the hanger rope. It was slow going. He didn’t dare shift his weight or put too much emphasis on any motion for fear of losing his balance and falling. Likewise, if he cut the rope through and it fell, it would drop into the river and be lost downstream.
It was slow, tedious work that from Alex’s perspective stretched on forever.
Alex paced back and forth like a nervous, expectant father. He didn’t want to look, but he couldn’t take his eyes off him.
I don’t know which is stupider—the idea to do this, or the idea to let him do it just to make him feel better. If he falls off, I won’t be able to live with myself.
High above, Alex heard Werda-ak say, “Uhhnn,” and sway precariously to his left. Alex leapt toward him, as if there was something he could do if the boy fell.
Werda-ak managed to catch himself and reestablish his balance.
He had finished sawing through the hanger rope and it was now dangling off his wrapped left leg. When the rope had let go, all the weight shifted and nearly plunged him into the river.
Carefully, with agonizing deliberateness, the boy reached down and unwrapped the rope from his leg, then pulled it up to him with one hand while he balanced himself with the other. With his free hand, he looped it around his neck and torso until he had enough secured that he was certain it wouldn’t slip away into the river.
With the rope finally cut on both ends and wrapped around his body, Werda-ak let himself drop under the top rope, leaving his legs wrapped around and gripping it tight with his hands.
He turned his head slightly and shouted, “This rope is so thick, it’s harder to hold on!”
Alex cupped his hands around his mouth and said, “If the rope is too heavy and you feel like you’re going to fall, let go of it.”
“No way. I’m not doing this again. Once is enough!”
In that moment, Alex had a flash of insight. He had once said something almost identical to his father at the end of a long day of putting a new roof on their shop. He had been balanced precariously over the edge of the roof hammering one last nail.
I see it now. He’s me.
The boy started his long, painful, hand-over-hand climb toward the spar tree.
Alex stood under the rope, waiting until Werda-ak was directly overhead. As soon as he was, Alex shouted, “You’re good! You’re over land now. Drop the rope.”
“Kel!” the boy shouted down. No! “That will just throw me off! I can make it.”
It took several more minutes, but he was right—he made it. He leaned his head against the tree and even from the ground, Alex could see the boy’s muscles were shaking from exertion.
Alex wanted to send up a cheer, but he didn’t want to unnerve the boy, so he settled for letting out the huge breath he had been holding.
Werda-ak stayed in that position for what felt like a long time, but eventually unwrapped the rope from around him and let it drop to the ground, where it landed at Alex’s feet.
“Are you going to be able to climb down?” Alex shouted up.
“Are you going to come get me if I can’t?” Werda-ak replied, but there was a smile in his voice. He knew he had done something that he would be able to tell around campfires for the rest of his life. As difficult as it had been, the story would only grow larger and more impressive with each retelling. Eventually, the story might include a shark jumping out of the river and nipping at his heels as he climbed.
Werda-ak quickly made his way to the ground.
At the bottom, Alex already had the rope coiled up and around his own neck. When Werda-ak hopped onto solid ground, Alex laid his hand on his shoulder. “You did good, kid.”
The boy was almost too tired for a sarcastic comeback. Almost.
“I got the hard part done for you. Now you do the easy part.”
Chapter Five
The Jump
Alex grabbed his knife and scrambled a few feet back up the tree. Holding on to the trunk with one hand, he sawed at the lower rope. When he cut through, the rope didn’t tear out of his hand because it was still tied to the first hanger rope—the reason he had asked Werda-ak to skip that one.
He had the pieces of the puzzle he needed to complete his crazy-risky strategy.
He stared up at the top of the spar tree, where the top rope still swayed slightly in the breeze.
He looked at his traveling companions. Neither of them said, ‘Are you sure about this?’ or ‘Maybe we should scrap the whole damn plan.’ They trusted him. That made the responsibility weigh that much heavier on his shoulders.
Alex took the rope that had been the bottom of the primitive suspension bridge. Now, it was detached at this end, but still held fast to the rest of the bridge by the rope hangers. He looked at Senta-eh.
“I want you first in line. You’re freshest and probably strongest right now.”
He silenced Werda-ak’s automatic rejection with a glance. He wrapped the rope around her mid-section, then did the same to the boy. Finally, he took the rest of the rope and wrapped it through the legs and around the chest of Monda-ak, making sure the rope wouldn’t choke him when it pulled him along. As big and strong as he was, he still needed to breathe.
When they were all tied together in a single daisy chain, Alex realized he still had rope left. He passed it around Werda-ak and Senta-eh several more times before tying it off with a constrictor knot, once again saying a silent word of thanks to his father who had made him learn dozens of knots as a child.<
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Alex kneeled in front of Monda-ak, stroking his head before burying his face against his colossal neck. “I’m sorry. I know this is going to be scary, but it’s our only way forward. I won’t be right here with you, but I won’t be far. Understand?”
Monda-ak turned his head toward the river, looking stoically away, brave, and ready for whatever came.
Alex stood and said, “Stand in a few feet of water. That way, when it jerks you, you won’t have so far to go. Don’t fight it, just go with it.”
Senta-eh cocked her head at him. “We know the plan. Talking about it won’t help now. Go.”
Alex nodded to himself. He took a deep breath, slipped his pack on his back, strode to the tree, and began to climb.
When he reached the rope near the top of the spar, he hooked one leg over it for balance and took his first reconnoiter of the area from his vantage point.
From there, he could see the Kranda-ah stretching out for miles to both his left and right. On the far side of the river, there was a series of small hills that had blocked his view from the ground. From higher up, though, he could see curls of smoke coming from the valley beyond. He strained to see if there were buildings of some sort too, but if they were there, he couldn’t see them.
He looked down at his companions, who were patiently waiting for him to execute the final step of his crazy plan. He lifted a hand to them, then uncoiled the rope from his shoulder and wrapped it around him, hoping it would act as both a tie-down and some protection from the impact when he fell.
Next, he wrapped the two ends around the thicker rope and tied them off in a strangle knot, leaving plenty of rope free at the end. He checked the rope around himself and the knot, satisfied that he had done everything he could. He moved dropped underneath the thick rope, holding most of his weight with his legs.
He unsheathed his knife and sawed at the thick rope. It was hot, sweaty work and he was tempted to stop to get a drink from his water bag, but more than anything, he just wanted to know if this crazy scheme was going to work. He kept sawing. After ten minutes more of applied effort, he had sawed his way through more than half of the thick rope. The weight of the rope itself began to pull and tug and do some of the work for him. Small twists of the rope began to creak, pop, and let go at an alarming rate.