“Hey, Darlin’,” Kegger called with a grin. He said the rim rider’s name as if he were speaking to a tavern wench or a trollop.
When the man answered with clenched jaws and narrowed brows, Vanx only half understood what the big gargan ordered him to do.
Vanx was listening more closely when Chelda and Kegger extended their perpetual competition to rock throwing, hunting boasts, and displaying scars right there in the cave. Vanx was picking up on the accent better but still only caught about four out of every five words spoken between them when they were like this. He learned that Kegger had ordered Darl to break out the climbing gear so he could inspect it, and that Darl had asked if he could stay at this stopover until their return. Kegger had told him no, but that he could hole up in the shelter on the other side of the ice falls with the pack animals. The edge of the Lurr was just a short walk from there, and if any of them returned, they’d certainly need help.
“Will some of you tend to the food and fire?” Kegger asked in caravan common. “I have a bit of work to do before the sunlight is gone.”
And work he did. During the last hour of light the big man tested every cord, loop and rope they had. He uncoiled them, one after another, and went through their entire length looking for abrasions. Later, by the fire, he carefully handled and inspected every one of the spiked iron soles that they would strap to their boots. It was during this inspection that Vanx suddenly realized that Poops not only couldn’t wear this stuff, he also didn’t have hooves or the agility to go across the narrow ledge.
“What about Sir Poopsalot?” he asked the big gargan.
“I’ve thought about that.” Kegger nodded reassuringly. “If you go fetch one of those carcass rolls over there, the ones with the iron rods… Yes, those.”
“What is it?” Vanx returned with the thing, but when he unrolled it between the two of them, he understood immediately.
“It’s a carcass hauler,” Kegger told him. “To haul elk and bear kills up out of a gulch, but we’ve modified them to haul men on a few occasions. I suppose it won’t be a stretch to adapt it to your friend here.” He leaned over and gave Poops a scratch behind his ears.
The canvas had four reinforced holes in it from which legs and arms could dangle, depending on the species being hauled. Two iron rods ran along each side, and they had iron rings set in either end of them. The rods could be pulled together at each end and tied off, causing the sides of the canvas to cinch around the body of the animal or torso of the man in the rig securely.
“Sad to say we’ve used them here enough.” Kegger forced a smile, but it was a grim one. “Let’s hope Poops can stay still for a little while.”
“I can spell him to sleep for as long as it takes, if I need to,” Xavian offered.
Poops looked at Vanx and let out a strange yawn. He looked like he understood that he was the topic of the conversation and didn’t like it very much.
“You know whey they’re so meeny of them weeth us?” Darl asked cryptically from the cave mouth. He didn’t wait for an answer. “When the riggateen suspects someone meet get keeled, he seends one of these corpse regs out weeth us. If he sends two or three, it’s because he knows someone is going to die.” He chuckled, squeezed a sip from his wineskin, and then wiped the red dribble from his stubbled chin. “Manix sent five this treep and gave us orders to wait it out why ye fools go feed yon spooks.”
After another sip, he added, “The fifth rig is so that me and Keeg can haul the dog beck too, so we might as weel go ahead and cut heles in it thet fit him good.”
After that, no one talked for a very long while.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Cold words cut like a knife
sharp and hard, they’ll steal a life.
They’ll tear a heart open wide
and leave nothing left but pain inside.
--Broken, a Zythian ballad.
They only had to travel half the next morning to reach the daunting upthrust of icy dread they were about to traverse. The ledge they had heard so much about would take them under the frozen ice falls, and these, Vanx observed from a very thin margin of visibility, were amazing to behold. He’d been told that there was a lake high above them, that the frozen falls were just the accumulation of windblown water and overflow. Only in the summer, during the heaviest of storms, did water actually fall here. But even then, it flowed over the ever frozen falls, adding to them, or taking away, as it would.
What little of the falls he saw were hidden the rest of the way. Not until the next afternoon, from the other side, Kegger informed them, would they be able to take in the full majesty of the phenomenon.
The day was bright and clear and the wind only a soft breeze. The land behind them was a rough white canvas, touched only here and there with the brown and gray tones of rocks, and the darker greens of the mostly snow-laden trees. The sky was blue, and it reflected off of all the frozen surfaces down into the depths of the great chasm, tinting everything below the color of dull, frosted steel.
Here, the ledge faced an open expanse of nothing until it curved away out of sight to the left. From there, it faced the other side of the gorge and grew closer to it, until eventually they came together in a rounded crook.
“It doesn’t look so bad,” Gallarael said, pointing at the two-foot-wide path that led down and out along the ledge at a slight angle from where they now stood. “Sure, it’s a sheer drop on the right, but it’s as wide—”
“No, it gets narrower,” Chelda said. “Especially where you go under the falls. You can’t see it from here, but for a time you’ll be kissing ice with your arms spread wide and your butthole puckering in the breeze. You’ll have nothing but your toe-tips to stand on, either.”
“I’m going first,” Kegger said, laughing at Chelda’s choice of words. “I’ll rig a handline through the ring spikes that are secure and reset the ones that are loose.” He began untangling one of the wide belts he’d been inspecting the night before. It was big enough to go around both Xavian and Vanx at the same time but looked like it would be snug on the big gargan.
“If the rings hold him, then we’ll have nothing to worry about.” Vanx slapped Xavian backhanded across the chest, like the Skmoes used to do.
Xavian forced a smile. It was a thin, pink line on his otherwise bloodless face.
“I’ll be learning the levitation spells for my next journey,” the mage mumbled aloud.
“That’s ef ye have the next journey,” Darl said and slapped the rump of a lightly packed ramma.
The animal took off down the narrow ledge at a brisk trot. Then, to everyone’s surprise, it leapt off of the trail upward and paused a moment on a minuscule footing. The ramma leapt again, an impossible distance. Poops began barking, urging it on, and a few heartbeats later, the ramma was out of sight around the gentle curving of the cliff face, traveling high above the narrow human path.
“Here.” Darl tossed Kegger a burlap sack with an iron clip on it. “Jest heng it frem the hook inside the sheelter. It weel draw the ramma back close. I’ll rend theem up leter.”
Kegger nodded and attached the heavily scented pouch to the back of his belt. “Secure the trolly line and feed me the coil,” he said back. “I’ll string both lines at the same time. Chelda will bring the pull-line with her. She’s made this passage before.”
Darl acknowledged his orders and went back to sorting and repacking gear. Every few moments, he would send another ramma jumping crazily up along the ledge. At first, Vanx thought the animal handler was ignoring Kegger’s orders, but it became clear that Kegger still had a lot of gear to strap to himself before he was ready to take the ropes. His weapons, he stowed in a pack. He replaced the axe at his hip with a heavy claw hammer that was the size of a man’s fist, at the head. On his other hip dangled a leather pouch full of barbed spikes with circular rings on one end of them. He had threaded connecting rings made of cast iron that would hold it all together. A short length of braided silk rope with similar i
ron “S”-shaped hooks was dangling like a limp member from his belt.
“This is a lanyard.” He took the short silk rope in his right hand. It was plain that he was tempted to make a jest about it resembling his manhood, but he stopped himself. “There’ll be a line snug to the cliff about shoulder height from the footing. That is the hand line. You’ll keep this clip in your left hand and slide it along as you go.” He demonstrated the instruction and looked like a mime feeling his way along an imaginary wall. “When you come to a ring spike, you’ll hold onto the hand line good and tight with your right hand and move your lanyard over and reattach it on the other side of the ring with your left. Don’t forget to reattach it. If you slip, don’t panic. The lanyard will keep you from falling. It’s short enough that, if you go, you can take a breath or two, gather your wits, and use your arms and the cleats I showed you last night to regain your footing.”
“Has anyone ever really forgotten to reattach the lanyard?” Xavian asked incredulously.
“The lanyard is a new bit of equipment to us.” Kegger grinned. “I don’t know if anyone’s forgotten to use one yet, but there was a far greater number of people splattered across the bottom of the gulch before we started using them.”
“They see that if ye fell, ye freeze on the tumble and sheetter when ye heet the bottom,” said Darl.
“Did he just say you freeze on the way down and shatter when you hit the bottom?” Xavian asked as he began to tremble.
“Only if you fall, Xavian.” Chelda slapped him on the back. “There wasn’t even a hand line the last time I went across. We had to use iron hooks that we lashed to our wrists.” She pointed at Kegger’s right hand. “Like that one.”
Just then, Poops decided to help Darl chase one of the ramma down the ledge. The ramma leapt and raced away with graceful dexterity and sure-hoofed speed, but Poops skidded sideways and slid halfway over into oblivion. He fought mightily with his scrabbling hind legs to keep from going all the way over, but couldn’t get purchase. Everyone stood shock-faced still. Vanx wanted to act but was overcome with a primal surge of the dog’s witless terror.
Darl dove into a belly slide and somehow managed to get hold of Poops’s forelegs before he went all the way over. Then Kegger’s quick action kept Darl from sliding too far himself.
It was a sobering moment, and even though the thoroughly aggravated animal handler spent the rest of the preparation time cursing them all as irresponsible fools, Vanx decided he liked the fellow as well as any man he had ever met.
Poops found a place to calm himself and for once stayed out from under foot. Vanx decided that he would have Xavian put Poops to sleep for the crossing. Anything else seemed cruel, especially after what he’d just gone through. Vanx knew absolutely the confused terror his four-legged friend had just experienced, for he’d felt it himself. Not only did he want to keep Poops from being traumatized by being trapped in the corpse rig while he was hauled like a sack of meal, he wanted to avoid one of the sudden jolts of wild canine emotion the dog was more frequently sending up and down his spine. He was nervous enough about making the transition on his own. He had no desire to carry Poops’s worry and fear with him on his trip across the narrow ledge.
Everything started happening quickly after that. Kegger took the two lines, and Darl stood patiently feeding rope from the coils as the bigger gargan eased his way out along the edge. After only a few moments, he was curving out of sight. Chelda was next, using wrist spikes and toting another line that they would use to pull the trolley across. Xavian stroked Poops and apologized to the dog before gently sending him into a deep, magically-induced slumber. His spell was so effective that Vanx found himself yawning and incredibly tired for a short while, but the feeling quickly passed when Gallarael excitedly clipped her lanyard to the hand line and waited for the signal that Kegger had secured it.
While they listened, Xavian put Poops gently in one of the corpse rigs. It was then that Xavian confessed his fears to Vanx in an anxious whisper.
“I can’t do it, Vanx,” he said. Stark terror showed plainly on the wizard’s face.
“Are you sure you can’t manage it?” Vanx asked. “The girls are handling it just fine.”
“I don’t care if you make fun of me.” Xavian was trembling so hard that he couldn’t even tie the leather thongs together that would keep Poops snug and tight. “I’m sorry, Vanx. I’ll freeze up or fall. I-I-I don’t want to cause a problem here, but—”
“Drenk these,” Darl said almost jovially. He started digging in one of the packs while keeping his eyes on his duty. He tossed Xavian a silver flask and went back to minding the coils of rope. “Just a few deep seeps, no more.”
“It won’t help to get me drunk,” Xavian said, but he took a deep swig anyway. Liking the sweet taste, he took another and swallowed it down. He was about to take a third when Darl leapt over and snatched the flask back.
“Wha-What is this?” Xavian looked around wide-eyed and suddenly giggling. “Is it dopor, man?” Xavian reached forward and a long strand of thick slobber dripped out of his mouth.
“Why did you give him that shit?” Vanx was suddenly angry. “He won’t be able to pull himself across now.”
Darl pointed to another of the canvas corpse rigs. After tying off the ends of the rope he was watching, he took Xavian’s place securing Poops. “Put him en a reeg. I’ll help ye get them festened. We’ll pell them both across in the trelley-line weeth the gear.”
Vanx was about to protest, but a distant horn sounded.
“It is secure. I’m going,” Gallarael called out to them. “He sounded the horn.”
“Be careful. I don’t want to have to explain any of this to your brother or father.”
“I’ll be careful, Mom,” she jested, and eased her way slowly out onto the ledge. Then she was off, sliding her lanyard’s ring carefully along, just as Kegger had instructed them to.
There was a long silence until Vanx watched her disappear around the curve of the cliff face. A pair of short, bright blasts from Kegger’s horn came to them, then.
“Sheet,” Darl cursed. He rummaged around and came up blasting quick triplets from the horn he’d found.
There was a single blast in response, and Darl began hustling to fasten the end of the trolley-line to a larger iron ring that had been buried in the snow. Deftly, the knot was tied and tested. Only then did Darl stand up and respond with two solid blasts.
A few moments later, the slack disappeared in that particular line. Vanx could hear the hum of it tightening like a string on his xuitar. Darl rigged another line, this one to the end of the line Chelda had taken with her. He fastened it to a heavy jumble of well-oiled chain that was in turn connected to a long iron “A”-frame. He carried this contraption down the path a short way and hung it from the tightened trolley-line. After a moment, Vanx realized that it was the trolley.
“The trolley is a problem for the ferst tweenty yards or sew,” Darl said. “It’s too close to the cliff face, see.” He pointed where the trolley-line ran tight against the cliff just a few feet above the hand line. “We have to welk the loads until the trolley-line is clear of the eedge.”
Vanx could see what he meant. As soon as the cliff started curving away, the trolley would hang freely, but until it did, it had to be dragged along the cliff face.
Darl took the pack that held Kegger’s weapons and some of the other personal gear and carefully hung it from the trolley. He then fastened another length of rope to this end of the the device. Vanx knew that he and Darl would use that line to pull the empty trolley back, so that they could send over Poops, Xavian, and the rest of their gear.
“We seend the packs first, to meke sure the line is safe for theem.”
Vanx watched the first time but eased the second load of gear out himself. Poops was next, so he waited for it to return. He saw the line dip down into the gorge from the trolley’s weight and then rise up again across the span. There was Kegger standing atop the far ed
ge, steadily pulling the load across.
Vanx hadn’t ventured far enough out around the edge to see the ice falls yet. He waited until Poops was safely across and Xavian was well on his way before he started his own trek along the ledge. It was just as he began to see the first great crystalline icicles that formed the majestic sight that the familiar feeling of warning assaulted his guts and caused him to lose his footing. This feeling wasn’t from Poops, though, and as he fell in an awkward tangle, his lanyard pulled tight and his head cracked hard against the wall. A blinding flash of pain collided with his hammering heartbeats, and the knowledge that there was terrible danger about came flooding through him.
Gallarael’s shrill scream cut over it all, and then there was the hissing roar of some gargantuan beast.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Anytime I’m fishing
and my line is in the water,
nothing really matters,
but the bobble of my bobber.
--A fisherman’s song
Scrabbling like a four-legged spider, Vanx managed to get one of his spiked cleats to catch hold of the cliff. From there, he kicked himself upright. Following a primal surge of instinct, he used every bit of his dexterity and his training to hurry himself toward where he’d last heard Gallarael. His razor-sharp eyes spied his footholds for him, and he didn’t even pause in stride when he unhooked his lanyard, passed it over the ring, and then reattached it.
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