The Forbidden Temple (18 page)

‘Come on mate,’ Luca continued, ‘With the herders gone, its not like we’ve got a whole load of other options at the moment.’

For a long while Bill didn’t speak. When he finally looked up from the fire, his eyes connected with Luca’s, but they seemed to be looking right through him.

‘I don’t know what to think,’ he said. ‘But right now, I guess you’re right. She’s all we’ve got.’

THE FOUR OF
them stood with their heads bent back, eyes following the old monk’s grubby forefinger as it traced a line down the sheer wall of rock.

In the misty morning light, the buttress of the mountain resembled the knuckles of a giant’s fist, scoured with cracks and fissures, seemingly impenetrable. But as the monk’s finger traced a line down the rock face, Luca’s vision blurred as it had done the day before and he suddenly realised what the old man was trying to show them.

‘Well, I’ll be damned,’ he muttered under his breath.

‘What is it?’ asked Bill, standing just behind him.

‘That crack he’s pointing to . . . look at it again.’ Luca cocked his head to one side as his eyes swept up along the contour of the rock-face. What had appeared to be a large crack running from the base to halfway up the rock-face was, in fact, a narrow ledge. Like staring at the inkblots of a Rorschach test, Luca’s eyes suddenly reversed their focus and what had simply been a fissure in the rock, now became something wide enough for a human to stand on.

Bill shook his head. ‘I can’t see it.’

‘You have to kind of unfocus your eyes,’ Luca answered distractedly.

After a few moments, Bill began to smile. ‘Jesus, yes. I see it now.’

Luca shook his head in disbelief, turning to where the old monk stood.

‘How the hell did you find that?’

The old man smiled then looked pointedly over at Shara who stood staring up at the cliff-face, her expression unreadable.

Luca turned back to the cliff. Even with the ledge, it was still going to be one hell of a climb. Not for the first time since last night, he wondered if they would be able to keep their side of the bargain. After they had decided to accept the monk’s condition, the four of them had talked more over breakfast that morning. They were to get Shara above the cliff and on to the flat of the glacier beyond. Once there, they would set up a base camp from which they could tackle some of the nearby peaks and she, in turn, would be able to collect her herbs. A week later, they would all descend together.

As Luca stood there, staring up at the route, he felt a tap on his shoulder. Bill motioned for him to step away from the others and the pair of them moved closer to the cliff. Opening their rucksacks, they began laying out ropes and hardware on the ground in neat piles.

‘I’m still not sure about this at all,’ said Bill in a low voice. ‘Are you buying this whole rare herb thing? We’ve been up in the mountains a thousand times and nothing grows at that altitude.’

Luca shrugged, squatting down to count the pile of climbing bolts.

‘Maybe it’s possible you get lichen or something up there. Who knows?’

‘It just doesn’t make any sense. I got the feeling last night that the whole charm offensive happened because the old fella had forced her into making a deal with us.’ Bill scratched the side of his face distractedly. ‘I wonder why that would be?’

Luca stopped counting and looked at him impatiently.

‘Bill, the bottom line is that I really don’t care what she is doing up there. All that matters is that we’ve been shown a route up and we’re one step closer to finding the pyramid mountain.’

‘Yeah, but I don’t see the connection between . . .’

Luca stood up, pulling two climbing harnesses from the rucksack. He looked at the deep frown lines running across his friend’s forehead.

‘Come on, mate. Give it a rest. We came here for the pyramid mountain. That’s all that matters. In a few days’ time, we’ll have found a route through these mountains and be standing at its base.’

He handed a harness across to Bill.

‘Piece of piss,’ he said, the beginnings of a smile on his face.

Bill stared down at the harness for a moment before reaching forward and taking it. He went to say something more, but Luca swivelled away from him, staring out towards the distant mountains. Low on the horizon, faint wisps of cloud were gathering on the peaks.

‘We should get moving,’ he said. Then raising his voice to include Shara and Gyaltso, ‘We need to be on top of this cliff before the wind picks up.’

Shara took in the crisp morning air and clear skies. She cast a doubtful look towards Bill.

‘Trust him on this,’ Bill confirmed. ‘The weather is the one thing Luca always gets right.’

‘The one thing?’ queried Shara, an eyebrow raised.

While Bill and Luca finished preparing the ropes, the old monk led Shara away and started talking to her. They kept their backs to the men as they looked out at the mountains. Luca was in the middle of uncoiling two of the eight-millimetre ropes when he glanced over and noticed the old monk reach into the small satchel slung across his shoulder. He pulled out something wrapped in a piece of cloth. Luca only saw it for a split second before Shara slid it quickly into her own bag.

She put a hand on the old monk’s arm, seeming to reassure him about something, before walking over to where Luca was standing.

‘Are we ready?’ she asked.

‘Yeah, we’re ready.’

He studied her for a moment, impressed by how calm she appeared before the climb. She stood with her hands on her hips, the strong bones of her face emphasised by the way her hair had been pulled back in a ponytail. Her green eyes were levelled at him in a look that was both confident and challenging. Instead of the dirty tunic of the previous evening, she wore a thick cream jumper with a high neck. It was pulled tight around her waist by a leather belt while the felt boots she was wearing were laced with twine, in similar fashion to the herders’ but of much better quality.

A green canvas bag with metal clasps and padded shoulder straps lay by her feet. Earlier that morning he had seen her pack a thick sheepskin jacket and several pairs of tightly knitted woollen gloves. Looking down at the bag, he wondered what it was that the old monk had given her.

‘It’s going to be a hard climb and you should travel the lightest,’ Luca said. ‘Why don’t you put some of your stuff in my pack and I’ll carry it for you?’

Shara gave him a quick smile. ‘I should be all right. It’s not too heavy,’ she said, raising the bag a little to test it.

‘Up to you,’ said Luca.

Bill walked up to them with a loose bundle of slings in his hand.

‘We didn’t have a spare harness,’ he said to Shara, ‘so I’ve rigged this up for you. It’s not pretty, but it’ll hold.’

Luca swung the ropes round, tying off two figure-of-eight knots into his own harness and then signalled to Bill to start belaying him. He was about to move on to the narrow ledge and begin climbing, when the old monk stepped up to the cliff-face and approached him. Luca stood in silence as he old man placed gnarled hands on his cheeks and began mumbling a long stream of rolling syllables. Resisting the urge to pull his head free, Luca waited until he had finished, feeling awkward with the sudden solemnity of the situation.

‘A blessing,’ Shara explained, as the old man turned and did the same to Bill. With Shara he bent forward so that their foreheads were
touching and with his eyes firmly closed, repeated a silent prayer, his lips moving slowly with unspoken words.

When the old monk had finally backed away, Luca nodded to him, smiling faintly.

‘Don’t worry. We’ll take good care of her.’

With that, he glanced across at Bill and moved forward on to the ledge, keeping his hips close to the rock and the top half of his body arched out, so he could see higher up. Shara watched the ropes slowly paying out to where Luca climbed in a steady rhythm, only pausing every five metres or so to clip in one of the bolts that hung in a great bunch of twisted metal from his harness. In what seemed like just a couple of minutes he was fifty feet above where they stood, his movements fluid and precise. There was an absolute confidence to the way he climbed, each grip of his hand deliberate, each foothold instinctive and self-assured.

Pausing again, he jammed down two bolts about a metre apart into an open crack in the rock. Offsetting the angle, he clipped a carabineer through each point and ran through a sling, twisting it back on itself with a flick of his wrist. Clipping the climbing ropes into a third carabineer, he screwed the locking gate closed and finally put his weight back into the seat of his harness, secure.

‘OK,’ he shouted down the face. Bill tied Shara into the same rope and then motioned her forward. He counted out ten more metres before tying himself in.

‘Just take the exact same route,’ he said. ‘And whatever happens, don’t look down.’

Shara moved methodically, keeping her focus on the wall ahead and trying to ignore the fact that her legs felt wooden and her heart was beating in her throat. Despite appearing confident in front of the others, as soon as she started climbing higher she realised that there was no more pretending. This was it. Along the actual ledge, the going was not too bad and although much slower than Luca, her feet moved
upwards in a near-constant flow. Every few metres, the ropes ahead of her would gently tug at her waist as Luca pulled in the slack from above.

As she reached fifty feet above the ground, the ledge naturally sheared off, leaving an exposed patch of perfectly smooth rock.

Shara stopped, feeling for a handhold higher up the cliff. There was nothing above or below – just smooth, unbroken rock. All she could think to do was to press her body flat against the cliff and edge her way higher, but without a decent grip her balance felt tenuous, as if the slightest breeze would send her toppling over the edge. She’d watched Luca climbing this part from the ground. He hadn’t even hesitated.

Looking across the gap, Shara could see where the ledge continued. It was only a metre or so away. All she had to do was lean out.

She felt her breath quicken and shallow as the sweat collected across her forehead. She tried to move, tried to force her heavy, unresponsive legs forward, but every instinct screamed out for her to stay where she was.

‘Come on,’ she murmured to herself. ‘Come on. Just one step . . .’

Slowly closing her eyes, Shara inhaled deeply. She could hear the ragged exhale of her own breath, but forced herself to breathe deeper and deeper, calming her nerves. Then her eyes flicked open and, with a sudden lurch, she pushed out across the drop. The side of the cliff yawned out below her and, for a second, she looked down, seeing the hazy outline of the ground. As her foot connected with the opposite side of the ledge, the toe of her right foot slid on a loose pebble lying near the edge. Suddenly, she was tumbling backwards, her knee banging sharply against the cliff and her hands clawing at the bare rock.

There was a split second of weightlessness and Shara just stared in horror as the cliff seemed to move away from her. Before she had time to even cry out, there was a huge jolt as the ropes snapped tight, forcing the air from her lungs. The straps from her sling harness dug viciously into her waist and kidneys, while the heavy bag on her
shoulders yanked her whole body backwards, pulling her off balance. Everything went still. There was silence, except for the slow creaking of the ropes.

‘You OK?’

Luca’s voice wafted down to her.

Shara tried to shout back but her mouth was completely dry. As she fought to steady her breathing, her body slowly spun round on the end of the ropes, facing her towards the distant mountains. Using her hips, she swung her weight round again, fighting to get her feet flat against the rock. After a few moments they finally connected.

Shara swallowed a few times more, trying to get some moisture into her mouth.

‘Fine,’ she shouted, feeling her lungs bursting from the effort.

A moment later the ropes tugged upwards and, inch by inch, Luca slowly hoisted her the couple of metres back towards the ledge. Shara reached forward, gripping on to the rock and taking her weight out of her harness, feeling disorientated by the lack of support from the ropes.

Edging her way along once more, she rounded a corner of the cliff to see Luca, hanging in the seat of his harness, coiling in the slack rope. As their eyes met, a smile flashed across his face before he reached out one hand. For a moment, Shara’s eyes flitted from the rock to his outstretched fingers, gauging the distance. Then, with a lunge forward, she grabbed on to his wrist. The movement was clumsy but he was able to switch his grip and hold her tight, drawing her towards him.

Shara clung to his shoulders, a wave of relief washing over her at the contact, at the sudden feeling of being secure. Before she had even looked down, he had clipped her into the same two anchor points as himself and was gently pushing her back into her harness.

‘You OK?’ he said softly. He’d seen the same wide-eyed look many times before.

Shara exhaled, pushing back strands of hair from her clammy face.

‘I had no idea it was going to be like this,’ she said. Then after a pause while she tried to steady her breathing, ‘This probably isn’t what you want to hear, but I really hate heights.’

Luca laughed out loud.

‘Fine time to tell me.’

Despite herself, Shara found herself smiling.

‘I know. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t worry, you’re doing great,’ he said.

Shara shook her head slowly, her voice barely more than a whisper. ‘I’ve always been dreading this part of the journey.’

‘Part of the journey?’ Luca asked, turning to look at her. ‘What do you mean?’

She shook her head again.

‘I’m just going to be a lot happier when we reach the top, that’s all.’

After a moment, he nodded thoughtfully. ‘Well, it looks like the ledge gets broader up there and the going gets easier. We’re going to have to move fast, though, if we want to stay ahead of the weather.’

He gave another tug on the rope and, moments later, Bill’s face appeared round the edge of the cliff.