by Dyer Wilk
Gordon steadily ascended, walking at first and then using his hands to brace himself against the incline, almost crawling. He pulled himself up onto a ledge, hugging it closely to maintain his balance as he got to his feet and ran his fingers over the sandstone in search of handholds.
The climb was almost unrelenting. From the ground, it had looked as if a man could move over the rocks like a ladder, the ledges evenly spaced like rungs. But standing on it, he saw that it was mostly a trick of the eye. The rock was crisscrossed with bands of light and dark, but neither signified a protrusion.
There were stretches where he held on with nothing more than his fingertips and the toes of his boots, fighting the burning in his muscles as he moved sideways in search of a better purchase. He had never known pain like this, the agony of pulling his weight another foot or another inch.
When he was fifty feet above the treetops, he looked down at the fire across the river. It had spread a long way beyond the kerosene, but it was starting to die out. It had served its purpose though. High above him, a pair of eyes would be watching, and if they watched the flames, they wouldn’t be looking straight down.
He allowed himself a few minutes of rest, and then continued upward. The moon was out now, casting its pale light onto the cliff and revealing the handholds he’d have otherwise missed. It was a small bit of luck, but he refused to feel hopeful. He would need cold austerity to get through this.
He was aware of the open air behind him, its coolness seeping through his clothes, just as he was aware of what one wrong step would mean. He was aware that he was losing all sense of time again. Every inch was an eternity in a forever night, a torture that proved to be the one thing that could distract his mind from regret.
The feeling of loss should have overwhelmed him. It should have crippled him, or driven him insane. But it didn’t. He kept climbing, pulling his weight higher and higher until his fingers were numb, his legs like lead. He looked up along the wall of the canyon and saw the tree. So close now. Forty feet. Thirty. Twenty. He willed himself to reach it, to see the face of the man who had held them here.
As he neared it, he forced himself to breathe slower, to become a whisper in the night air. He spidered his way over the rocks directly beneath it, looking up and seeing thick, gnarled roots clinging to the cracks. He saw a leg dangling, snakeskin boots, and blue jeans. Slowly now. Slowly. He moved sideways, his breath becoming ice in his throat, and pulled himself up along the other side of the tree. He saw both legs now, the edge of a shoulder illuminated in the moonlight.
Gordon reached high above him and gripped a narrow ledge, pulling himself up as he reached for his pistol with the other hand.
The man in the tree came fully into view.
For a moment, Gordon felt triumph. The man didn’t move. He was unaware, vulnerable. Gordon drew his pistol and aimed, his heart thudding as he pulled back the hammer. He started to squeeze the trigger.
His finger froze.
The man wasn’t sitting, although Gordon could see know how it had appeared that way from the bottom of the canyon. The gap of open space above the branch between his legs was no more than a few inches, and the sharp, broken sticks that dug into his shirt and suspended him there were all hidden behind his back, giving the illusion that he had been sitting. But up close, there was no mistaking the posture, the limp arms and legs and the head hanging forward, the long straight branch about the size of a rifle resting in his arms. There was no mistaking now that the man had fallen from a horse at the edge of the cliff above, and by some cruel twist of happenstance landed in the tree the way he had. There was no mistaking the gold pocket watch that hung from the man’s vest on a long chain, slowly turning, the open cover flashing dimly in the moonlight just as it had flashed brightly in the sun. And, even though Gordon couldn’t see it, there would be no mistaking the small portrait of the woman inside, waiting at home in Chicago for a dead husband.
Gordon lowered the gun and stood there on the ledge, gripping the rock with one hand, his body becoming heavy. He began to laugh, his voice dry and haggard, echoing in the emptiness. He laughed until his eyes filled with tears and he couldn’t tell if it was laughter or crying.
He felt his fingers slipping on the rock and his toes loosely perched on the foothold, his body being pulled. He kept laughing, crying, throwing his head back and letting it pour out of him. He let it fill the night. Letting everyone and no one hear it. He felt his fingers slip free of the rock and his weight teetering, his toes taking all of it for a moment, and then his body swaying back, moving freely into empty space.
Falling back into the darkness of the canyon.
Dyer Wilk was born and raised in California, where he spent his formative years consuming a steady diet of movies, television, and paperback books. Eventually, his interests turned to writing and graphic design (for which he is most known). His horror and science fiction stories have appeared in several anthologies, and his illustrations and designs have graced dozens of book covers, including this one.