by Raven Bouray
A small snort and whinny from outside confirmed her thoughts, and she stretched her shoulders and arms upwards to get her blood flowing. With a sigh and huff, she stood up and looked behind her longingly at the bed, softly caressing the wood. It wasn’t the most comfortable thing she had slept on but it at least didn’t give her a backache or shoulder soreness like her usual accommodations. Her gaze turned downward at where she had left her shoes and she found a small pile of food on the table next to her bed. Emmaline knew that it had to have been her captor feeding her again and she sat back down on the bed to pull her boots up over her feet and leggings. When they were secured and snug, she picked up a pale purple vegetable and took a bite from it.
Bland would be the first she could say about it. Fibrous would be the best. Once again, she longed for the flavorful and tender foods that she was used to, but this food seemed sturdy, not nearly as perishable as her normal diet. It was most likely good for those who were taking long journeys that would have little to eat along the way.
The door opened, and her familiar cloaked figure entered the house. He barely looked in her direction as he gathered up supplies and packed them neatly into several bags. Emmaline noticed that his posture was stiff and his movements lacked their normal fluidity. It seemed like he was irritated or perhaps angry, but at what or whom, she wasn’t sure of. While he packed each item away with precision, he didn’t seem to react to her watching him so closely. She took another bite from her breakfast while her thoughts raced.
Maybe her dream had upset him or woke him, and he was grumpy this morning. Or he may have been irritated because he had to keep her calm and comfort her. But his mood was nothing new. They had been at odds from the beginning with him acting as if he resented her and her furious with him for kidnapping her.
Emmaline, at least, was ready to start anew and try again. This would not last forever and it would be good for her to learn about elves all she could. It was something that Master Telgrin would have loved. The chance to learn. So she would do what she could to preserve that aspect of her favorite teacher and absorb was she could. The last bite went down haltingly, and her captor placed the last piece of cloth into a bag and took the three full satchels in hand before turning to head back out the door.
She stood and followed him out the door into full sunlight. Lifting her hand to shield her eyes from the sudden glare, she looked around to realize that the it looked like it was nearly noon. They had never slept much past dawn. But today she had gotten more sleep even with her nightmare than the past week and a half.
Emmaline vaulted up onto Arya’s back and gave a surprised gasp as two bags were slung across Arya’s hindquarters. The mare threw her head up in response, and he murmured in his strange language to her apologetically.
Her captor hooked two bags across his own shoulders before he began walking through the village. As they made their way through this time, she spotted quite a few more people than on the way in. From the way they looked at her as she passed by, perhaps it was better for them to go back where they came from. Hard eyes and stiff postures greeted her, and gooseflesh erupted on her arms and back from the animosity and feeling of being watched.
Soon they left the village behind and approached the great crack in the earth filled with peaks, stacks, crags, and gorges that stretched further than she could see through the fog that filled the space. Even with the fog that surrounded them, her captor’s pace did not alter in the least bit, even though Emmaline couldn’t see much more than a few paces ahead. She felt their direction turn and looked up at the sky to figure out that they were heading toward the setting sun. West. What if they fell in, misstepped, or some creature leapt from the fog and devoured them?
Arya’s hoofbeats mirrored her heartbeat in the way of their speed and odd cadence. This place made her anxious and tingly in the way of pins and needles along her spine.
Emmaline spotted something in the distance. Something very large and wooden through the now thinner shroud of fog. As they approached the wooden thing, she could hardly believe what it looked like and how it had survived here for so long. They stopped just before they would have stepped onto it, and Emmaline got a better look at what she now knew was a platform suspended over the chasm of the Barren Wilds, complete with a fully functional rope and pulley system to lower and raise it in the foggy depths. She dismounted Arya and strode past her captor to examine the mechanical crank which operated the whole ensemble. Rust peppered the iron gears and along the handle, which looked as if it had not been operated in some time. How something like this had even come about was astounding to her. Normally her grandfather disliked anything that cut down on his taxes across the Wilds, from everything she had heard and knew about him. Patrols regularly moved up and down the chasm edge to dismantle rogue’s paths down and through.
The only way this could exist is if it was allowed to exist for some reason. The shopkeeper knew about this. Perhaps the village even sent a bribe to the capital city to keep it in usage. They probably paid for passage with everything else. Closer inspection of the platform brought to her attention the rickety boards and questionable looking fastenings. It did not look safe in the least bit. A gust of wind only brought more concern as she heard the creak of the top pulley and watched the platform move slightly away from the edge on the rope suspension. “Is this even safe?” She looked back at her captor with wide eyes.
“May it be.” He shrugged, seemingly unconcerned. Another creak and his voice came again, “No.” Regardless as to his answer, he stepped up onto the platform and urged a nervous looking Arya onto it as well.
“I don’t think we should.”
She heard a frustrated sigh. “Life is full o’ risk, yea?” Another gentle murmur and Arya stepped up onto it. She waited for the entire thing to crash down to the bottom, but when it did not, she still eyed it cynically.
“Are you sure?”
“Yea. Do ye really thin’ I wan’ ta die? An ‘sides tha’, I wouldna do any harm ta Arya. I am fond o’ her. She does no’ give me such head pain like ye do.” Emmaline’s expression at his answer must have been rather comical as he let out a chuckle. “If ye mouth is open ta long, a fly will set in it.”
He had made a joke. While he was standing on a death trap. She didn’t even know that he was capable of humor but he had joked about liking her horse more than her. Arse. She glared at him. “Is this really the time for jokes?”
“Get up ‘ere, will ye?” His tone bled exasperation, and he held out a gloved hand.
She soundly ignored his assistance and stepped up onto the platform. The sudden movement jarred it, and the platform drifted out and back to the edge with a soft thud. Her heart leapt into her throat, and she clung tightly to Arya’s neck while burying her face in her horses warm and soft hair. She heard his feet move and the creak and click of some sort of latch. Another gust of wind and the groan of the support system only made her anxiety worse.
“Hol’ on.” She heard his voice before the groan of metal on metal combined with a solid grunt of effort on his part sent the platform on its journey.
The initial drop of the old mechanism weakened her knees and tore a terrified squeak from her throat. But once it had started to move, it felt much smoother than her first examination assumed. With her face, and especially ears, so close to Arya’s chest, she could hear the rapid heartbeat of her trusted friend and responded by stroking any part of the pale mare she could reach. Tending to her took Emmaline’s mind off of her own fears for the most part.
The journey was slow, or perhaps the distance was long, but with time passing by them, she lifted her face from Arya’s neck and looked around. Fog and rock surrounded them. And her captor remained at the lever that continued to keep them from plummeting to a horrific death below. Despite feeling well enough to look around, Emmaline still did not wish to look directly down and instead continued to tend to Arya.
The platform had a significant sway the entire way down, and she could now h
ear the creak and rub of the rope that lowered them.
After what seemed like an eternity, they finally reached the bottom of the cliffside with a solid thump and jolt that unbalanced her. She stumbled away from Arya, and a strong hand wrapped around her arm to keep her from hitting the ground. Once she had regained her proper footing, the firm grip relaxed and he drew back his hand. When her gaze lifted from the wooden planks up to survey her surroundings, she wanted to go back up. Grey, brown, and black rock surrounded them on nearly all sides. And the dense but light fog was present down here as well. It drifted, rolled, and danced around them without touching, as if it were alive somehow. A shiver crawled up her spine and gooseflesh erupted on her arms from the cool air around them.
With no real scenery to speak of around the platform they stood upon, Emmaline lifted her head and looked upwards. Gaping up at the fairly clear area above, she could scarcely believe how far down they had gone. And she was glad that she hadn’t known how deep the gorge was when they began. It was a fall that none of them could have lived through had their rickety ride failed them.
“See? No’ dead,” he chided in what she perhaps thought was a self assured cocky manner. “Now, stay near me. Many thin’s ‘ere are no’ as they seem. More dangerous ‘ere than the trip down be.”
“So same as always then? My life has been filled with nothing but danger since you slashed your way into it.” Sarcasm dripped from her words and all she got in reply was a shrug.
This was going to be interesting, but then again that seemed to be her life now. She wanted adventure. Maybe she should be more careful what she wished for. Like a warm silken bed. And a bath.
Another look at the dismal place around her and with a sigh, she stepped off of the platform into yet another adventure.
Chapter 21
Emmaline had stepped off of the platform with little preamble, and after she had mounted up, her captor turned from side to side to look down each pathway. He must have better eyes than she did because he turned down the left path and started walking, despite no obvious distinction between the two.
The absence of sunlight disoriented her, as did the strange fog that encircled them. It was oppressive in a sort of abstract way because they could move easily through the wisps but for the fact that it never seemed to dissipate even when touched.
Emmaline pulled her cloak tighter around her body as she shivered in the oddly cold atmosphere. Everything was wrong here. Her sense of hearing, acute though it was, did nothing for her down here. Echoes bounced off of the solid rocks or were lost in the fog, noises that seemed malicious made her hyper vigilant. But each time she heard something odd from inside the rocks or behind them, she looked to her hooded guide and found him still at relative ease when she was ready to scramble back up the cliffside.
Arya’s hooves slid and clicked on the ground as she plodded along, also not bothered by the strange new sights and sounds. She seemed eager and happy to follow the male in front of them. That makes one of them at least.
At first, while they walked, the pathway was just a corridor in the rock, extending all the way up along her right and left to the lip of the gorge. Soon enough though she spotted overhangs and small offshoots of tunnels along the path that widened it and even some places that looked and felt deeper. They even passed by small dark tunnels in the rock walls that even more strange snarling, grumbling, and clicking sounds originated from. Whatever creature made them she did not wish to meet at all.
They continued their journey as if they were still on proper land, and as she watched her captor’s gait and posture, she determined that his agitated mood from the morning had improved. And when a particularly loud growl from the rock face echoed around them, he didn’t even miss a step, but Ayra’s ears flicked back and forth and she threw her head agitatedly. Perhaps he was trying to be comforting to her by staying passive or something of the like but if that was the case, he was doing a terrible job of it.
The gorge darkened as they journeyed, and even though the sun was a lost cause to pinpoint time, her belly seemed to keep a decent record of it and growled loudly, causing a blush to pinken her cheeks in embarrassment. And when he pulled up short and turned his head in her direction, it only served to make everything worse.
But they did stop a short while later in a clearing of sorts. There was more room, at least, and rocks to sit on but not much else. Emmaline dismounted and took out an oddly colored vegetable from one of the sacks that lay across her mare’s flank. The flask was still operating as it always had and fresh, cool, water flowed into her parched mouth and down her dry throat as she ate. Her captor had even taken the opportunity to sit down and was eating some dried food from his own stores.
“Do you know where we are going?” Emmaline’s voice echoed and bounced off of the rocks around them and she winced. The acoustics of this place may drive her mad.
“We be long the edge now. Will be stayin’ ‘ere for a bit. Took a month ta cross on me own. But the path I went on is block’d now. Mos’ likely.”
“Do you really think that? This place doesn’t seem so bad. I mean, it’s dark, dismal, foggy, and is causing a bit of panic, but I thought it would be worse.” She bit into her food again and chewed slowly.
He chewed slowly and swallowed, then took another bite and swallowed that. “Do ye feel anythin’?”
“What do you mean feel anything? Physically? Emotionally? I feel many things.” She paused a breath and a thought came to mind. “You know. I still have no idea what to call you. Guard? Elf? Scary hooded person? Do you have a name?”
“Feel a buzz? Like a fly or bee under ye skin or in yer ears? Chest poundin? Jumpy?” He was asking questions, but his tone spoke more of a statement, rather than inquiry. He was soundly ignoring her question about his identity, the exasperating and irritating male he was being.
“Yes?” How could he know how she was feeling? That specifically? Despite her surprise she still wanted him to answer her damned question.
“Tha’ be magic, deep deep down in the ground. Old. Fickle. Strong.” The last few words were spoken huskily and it caused the tiniest thrill to run across her skin, and she kept eating until a question came to mind.
“Can all elves do magic? Feel magic?”
It was an innocent enough question, but her captor stiffened and gave a snarl in reply before turning away from her and finishing his meal.
Emmaline sighed at his back. She should just stop asking him about elves, shouldn’t she? Even though she was immensely curious about the whole race. It kept ending the same way and it was obviously painful for him, but she never knew what would set him off. Shutting down was getting her nowhere with him, and there was something about him that called to her despite his rapidly changing moods and hot and cold attitude toward her.
After the small meal, he gestured for her to remount Arya, and they continued further into the canyon. And perhaps it was the fact that she was claustrophobic in the way that she disliked being confined in a large room, but she could swear that the walls were getting closer together as they walked. Her suspicion was most basically confirmed when a leg brushed the wall and she had no room on the other side to move over without brushing the other leg against rock. Oh. Wonderful. Now they were starting downward again, deeper into the earth where a quake could bury them alive or perhaps cripple them as they die an agonizing death where no one would even know where to look to give them a proper funeral. Now there was a hole directly in front of them, a deep, dark, black hole in the rock that could only continue downward. A cold sweat had started at her back and she shivered again.
The fog was preferable to the dark, and she swallowed past a tight throat as it swallowed them up. What little light there was dissipated behind them and she looked back at the gray fog in alarm then forward into the pitch black. Arya’s demeanor had changed as well and the mare grew skittish with her inability to see. However, the mare was quickly calmed by some soft words from her captor. “Can you see?” Her
voice was pitched too high, half strangled and had to be pried from her clenched throat.
“Inna way, yes. Eyes are no’ the only way ta see.” And his pace did not alter as they continued their descent, but they did not stumble, fall, or run into any rock even as they turned right and left in the tunnel. After a time, her posture on Arya changed and she was leaned back more, as if they were ascending instead of continuing downward.
But the darkness was suffocating her. She needed large fields, trees, and freedom. Sweat coated her skin, her stomach rolled and churned, threatening to bring up it’s contents and her heart wouldn’t stop pounding, “Elf. I need. I need-- I can’t do this. I need to go. Have to get out. Please. Please.” She was shaking now, tears running down her cheeks.
The ground and walls around them began to shake, and she gave a strangled cry of fear. Rocks clacked and bounced off of the walls on the floor, seeming to feed off of her heightened emotional state.
They stopped immediately after the walls began to shake and she felt a hand at her knee. “Be well. Not’ing ta fear. Hol’ it in. No’ long fer fresh air. Ye need ta be quiet, calm.”