Fallen (40 page)

“I have a story,” Ramin said at last, and Nomi could have hugged him.

Ramin told his tale of sea caves, smugglers and water serpents, and his voice was strong enough to take her far away for a while.

THEY HARDLY SLEPT,
and next morning as the clouds to the east lightened, they were keen to move.

They took the same formation as before, and Nomi was sure her fingers and toes were so stiff and bruised that they would fail her. But she quickly found a rhythm, working with Ramin ahead of her and Beko behind, and the climb proceeded well. Physically it was the hardest thing Nomi had ever done, and she discovered depths of determination she never knew she had. But mentally, though it was a challenge climbing so steadily and painfully toward the unknown, excitement won out. By midday of that second day, they had started to work as a true team, and by the time light began to fade again, Nomi realized she had actually enjoyed the climb.

Some of what they saw underlined that this was a unique place. There were spiders that lived on the cliffs, legs growing up from the top of their torso and down from their abdomen. They moved quickly across the rocky surface, and they seemed unconcerned with these human invaders, watching with what could only be curiosity as the clumsy climbers went by. There were also a few insects that had adapted to vertical living, building small homes from spit and dust that clung solidly to the rock.

That evening there was no wide ledge. Though they had passed a crevasse in the cliff earlier that afternoon, it had been too early to stop. So Rhiana passed down the spare rope she carried over one shoulder, and one by one they fixed extra pitons into the rock and tied themselves in. Nomi still held herself up to begin with, finding it difficult to trust the rope cradle. But as weariness stiffened her limbs she eased down, and by the time darkness fell she was sitting fully in the rigged harness.

She had been able to look down and behind her that day; they were so high that there were no real details visible on the ground below. The sense of vast space behind her and the solidity of the end of Noreela before her was still staggering, but the scale had changed.

Looking down now was like staring into nothing.

“How far do you think to the clouds?” Beko asked. He was tied in ten steps below and to the side of her, giving her room to do whatever she might need to during the night.

“We've done well today,” Nomi said. “Maybe we'll reach there tomorrow?”

“We won't be able to see so far then,” he said.

“No.”

“We won't know how high to go. Don't even know for sure whether there's a top at all. Maybe we'll find climbers tied in like we are, dead from old age.”

This defeatist voice did not sound like Beko. “
I'm
sure it ends,” she said. “And so was Ramus.”

Later that night Noon called out from above and directed their attention to the east. Clear in the night, far along the cliff and lower than them, Nomi saw the diffused glow of a fire.

Ramus,
she thought.
Brave Ramus. Mad Ramus.
She
was
scared of him, but as things became more remarkable—and Noreela felt farther and farther behind—she found herself hoping that they would meet again.

NEXT MORNING, RHIANA
woke them all from troubled, uncertain rest. She had woken early and climbed on alone, and now she was a hundred steps above Noon. “Eggs!” she called down. “Eggs for breakfast, and a ledge to cook them on!”

They climbed, and by the time they reached Rhiana she had started a small fire on the ledge and boiled three huge, blue eggs. Nomi was startled by their size and worried that the parents would return, but the Serians seemed unconcerned.

They shared an egg between two and it was the most filling, satisfying breakfst Nomi could remember. Up here in the fresh, cool air, much of Noreela laid out behind her as she ate, she felt the familiar thrill of exhilaration drive through her again.

I wonder if Ramus is breakfasting as well as this,
she thought, and she sent a good-natured thought his way.

“They were miles away, and much lower,” Rhiana said unprompted. She dropped the eggshell she had been licking and the strengthening breeze plucked it away. “We'll reach the clouds before them.” She looked up and the others followed her gaze. Sometimes the constant cloud cover seemed close enough to touch, other times it was too far away to discern anything but a uniform gray.

“Feel like I could just let go and fall into them,” Ramin said.

“A favor, Ramin,” Beko said. “Don't try.”

The bald Serian raised an eyebrow and looked past Nomi at Beko. “Captain, surely you'd catch me if I fell?”

“Depends on my mood,” Beko said. “I've had no meat for more than a day, and my stomach gets . . . cranky.”

“Beko's cranky stomach,” Rhiana said, quietly shaking her head as if it was something they'd all had to deal with before.

Another gust of wind whispered across the cliff face from the west. They leaned into it, and an instant of panic seized Nomi—cool, dark and deep, the fear of falling and the greater fear of climbing some more—but she squeezed her eyes shut and willed it away.

“We're doing well,” Rhiana said, and Nomi silently thanked her with a glance.

“So let's carry on!” Noon said. “Maybe if this thing does have a top, there are people there. And if there are people, there will be daughters, widows, wives.” He laughed out loud and released his harness.

We
are
doing well,
Nomi thought.
There's a breeze, but it's not yet a gale. The nights are cool, but not too cold. There's no meat, but we found eggs. And those clouds . . . we may even reach them by this afternoon.

They climbed on. The weather remained stable, interrupted by occasional gusts of wind that came and went without warning. They made the climb challenging but exciting. Nobody complained. The cliff offered numerous handholds and narrow ledges, and Nomi fell into an exhausted rhythm.

THEY HEARD IT
before they saw it.

They were climbing with quiet concentration. Nomi had already spotted the rent in the cliff face directly above Ramin—Rhiana had climbed past it, and Noon hung a dozen steps along the cliff—and when the low growl sounded, that was the first place she looked.

There was nothing to see. But the sound came again, like a rumbling stomach. She glanced around, wondering whether thunder was rolling in from the distance.

When she looked up again, Rhiana was gesturing to Noon and Ramin. She put her finger to her lips, leaned back and took a small crossbow from her belt.

“What is it?” Beko whispered below her.

“Hole in the cliff.”

“Cave?”

Nomi shrugged. “It's coming from there. I think Rhiana—”

The noise came again, this time a definite growl.

Nomi heard Beko climbing, pulling himself up the cliff face to reach her level. She looked up at Ramin where he hung suspended a few steps below the wound in the rock face. He was motionless and silent, head bent back so that he could look up, one hand grasping the long, curved knife he had taken from his belt.

Rhiana was above and to the right of the hole, trusting her ropes completely as she leaned back into space. She held the crossbow in her left hand, its aim sure and unwavering.

“Ramin!” Nomi whispered. “Move back down.”

Ramin shook his head slowly, gently, and Nomi wondered what he could see or sense up there.

Beko drew level with her. “Take this,” he said, offering her a knife similar to the one Ramin bore.

“I don't—”

Beko scowled at her and drew his own sword, careful not to scrape it against the stone.

They waited, Ramin just below the hole, Rhiana and Noon above and to the right, Nomi and Beko lower down and to the left, and listened to the growls growing in volume and frequency. Nomi splayed one hand against the rock, feeling for any sign of movement.

And then something came out of the hole on the cliff. A long snout, covered with scales and spiked with thick black hairs, sniffling and twitching at the air. It was at least as long as Ramin was tall, Nomi guessed, and the two clawed hands that appeared around the edges of the hole were the size of her head.

Nobody fired, nobody spoke; everyone became as still as stone.

The creature snorted as it came farther from the hole, displaying at least two more sets of clawed hands on long, muscled legs. The large head and mouth came next, and as it paused, Nomi was sure she saw the hint of wings to either side of its pale pink torso.

Its snout shifted again and the head moved slowly from side to side. Its mouth opened, and Nomi saw teeth.

Ramin moved. Perhaps his foot slipped, or maybe he pressed his legs and locked one knee against the cliff face, slipping him sideways. He hurriedly regained his balance, just in time for the animal to lash out and down with two long limbs and clasp him in its claws.

Ramin screamed. He swung his knife, missed, and the creature's limbs spasmed as it tore his arm off at the shoulder.

Nomi felt the Serian's blood splatter down on her upturned face, and as she went to scream, Beko's hand clapped across her mouth, splitting her lip.

Ramin's feet slipped and he hung face-first against the cliff, held in place by one vicious claw buried in his shoulder. The thing was eating his arm.

Something whistled and the creature jerked, screeching in pain. It emerged more fully from the hole, even more limbs uncurling to fix it across the entrance, and turned to face Rhiana.

She had already reloaded her crossbow, and she sent a bolt into the animal's head.

Noon was scampering across the cliff, sword swinging in one hand, but the thing lashed out. The frayed ends of a slashed rope whipped at the air.

Ramin, still shouting, blood pulsing from his tattered shoulder, drew back his right arm and threw a knife at the thing's pink underbelly. It bounced off and fell away, and the animal turned back to the bald Serian.

“Piss on you!” Ramin shouted, spittle and blood darkening the stone before him. He reached for another knife.

The thing's wings twitched. They were huge and leathery, laid back across its body like those of a massive beetle, and when they moved it sounded like metal on metal. It was preparing to take flight.

Rhiana fired a bolt into the thing's back, pinning one of its wings to its body. It screeched, drowning Ramin's cries with its own.

Beko threw a knife at its snout and it pierced, drawing blood but falling when the thing shook its head.

“Ramin!” Rhiana shouted. “Cut your rope!”

“Hold on!” Beko said to Nomi. He slammed a piton into a small crack before them and took some slack from the rope above Nomi, tying it tight.

Ramin strained on his ropes and cursed. Blood soaked his clothing now, and Nomi knew that he would bleed to death if they could not get to him soon.

“Noon!” Rhiana shouted. “Cut the rope!”

The line between Noon and Rhiana was slashed, and he had wrapped the frayed end around a small rocky spur to his right. But he had not yet tied a knot. He was holding his own weight against the cliff, sweat beaded on his face. Yet still he reached out again, hand going low, the knife tantalizingly close to the taut rope that held Ramin in place.

“Piss!” Rhiana shouted. She drew her sword and slashed the rope that tied her to the cliff.

“No!” Beko shouted.

Rhiana held herself in place, muscles taut in her right arm. Then her left foot turned out into space, her body slowly followed, and Nomi sensed her gathering her strength.

“Rhiana, don't—”But she did. She leapt along the cliff face, judging the arc of her plunge perfectly. Three beats after letting go she had fallen fifteen steps and landed across the creature's back.

Its one good wing slid open and Rhiana sliced it off. The wing flipped away, whooping at the air as though delighted at its freedom. The animal shook. Rhiana stuck her sword into its back and held on with both hands. It shivered and screeched, then turned back to Ramin. Its long limbs reached, claws opening, and Nomi shouted, “No!” But her word held no power. One set of claws sank into Ramin's good shoulder, the other crunched sickeningly into his neck and left cheek, and the animal roared as it ripped off the Serian's head.

It fell between Nomi and Beko, tongue lolling, tattered neck spewing blood.

Nomi closed her eyes and felt the whole world sway.

There was a moment of stunned silence, broken only by the sound of the creature suckling blood and flesh from Ramin's open neck.

Then Rhiana screamed, an exhalation of pure rage, and drew two short knives from her belt. She hacked at the animal's neck, holding on with her legs as she raised the weapons again and again, and as it went to roll over completely, she fell away into the hole from which it had emerged.

The animal was bleeding profusely now, dark red blood pouring down the cliff face just to Nomi's right. More sounds of fighting and fury came from the hole, and then the creature let out a hideous, fading wail before growing still.