Saint Elm's Deep (The Legend of Vanx Malic) (26 page)

A score of massive blue-and-white moths all wheeled away from the great palisade as another piece of ice came loose. It was a wondrous sight.

When Vanx turned to look, he saw something else, though. Deep inside a dark blue hole in the cliff face, a rather large shape quickly retreated from sight.

“We will camp soon,” Kegger said, distracting him. “Over there, if the ice bridge is still stable. If all goes well, we will spend the morrow sliding along the ice falls on a ledge no wider than a fence plank, and we’ll be at the edge of the Lurr by evening.”

“What if the ice bridge isn’t stable?” Xavian asked.

“I guess we’ll find out how well the river down there is frozen over.” Kegger chuckled and heeled his ramma mount on a course that ran parallel to the edge of the gorge.

The ice bridge was indeed stable. It was a place where the walls of the gorge were so close together that the years of accumulated windblown and ice had clogged the gap and formed a perfectly passable bridge. Even more amazing was that this span was more than a dozen paces wide. On the other side of it, Kegger led them to a cavern formed of ice and rock. It had obviously been used before. There was an iron fire-bowl and a stack of chopped, seasoned wood against one wall. There was no smoke flue, and the ceiling was stained a filthy, sooty black. A small pile of frozen deer bones graced a large, yellow-red stain in the snow at the back of the recess. It was a shelter made for maybe four adults, so it was crowded with six and an ever-frisky dog. No one responded at all when Darl snorted and stormed out to pitch his tent near where the ramma were hobbled.

“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 iron “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.