The Born Queen - J. Gregory Keyes [61]
“You shamed us at the waterfall, pathikh. If I had known your plan, one of us would have gone in first. We were determined not to let you risk yourself so foolishly again.”
“What good would it have done to go into the water before me? I wouldn’t have known if you made it or not.”
“Begging your pardon, pathikh, but you might have been able to hear us below. You’ve walked the faneway of Saint Decmanus.”
Stephen reluctantly acknowledged that with a tilt of his head. “So you sent them to jump before I could try it?”
“Yes.”
“But I wouldn’t have jumped.”
Adhrekh shrugged. “Very well. But someone had to, unless you know some other way down.”
“I don’t.”
A sharp ringing commenced, and Stephen realized that the Aitivar on the steps was working at the stone with a hammer and chisel, probably trying to create some purchase to tie a rope to. Another Sefry began the same work on their side. After perhaps half a bell, a rope was fixed across the gulf, and Adhrekh went across, hanging upside down, hooking his legs over the cord and using his hands to pull himself along.
Before Stephen went, they tied a second rope around his waist. An Aitivar held it at either end so that if he fell, they had a chance of stopping him. That safeguard made Stephen feel a bit condescended to but infinitely safer, and he insisted that Zemlé be brought across in the same fashion.
Finally, with the exception of a man Stephen hadn’t known the name of, they were all on the stairs.
The footing improved after ten or so kingsyards, the steps becoming more defined and the way wider. The witchlights occasionally showed the other side of the crevasse but not the bottom, or the roof, for that matter.
“It’s colder still,” Zemlé noticed.
“Yes,” Stephen agreed. “There is much debate about the nature of the world beneath. Some mountains spew fire and molten rock, so one would imagine there is great heat below. And yet caves tend to be cold.”
“Rather that than molten rock,” she replied.
“Yes. What was that?”
“I didn’t hear anything.”
“Up above, at the waterfall: a sort of scraping sound, like something big coming through.”
“Something big?”
“Archers,” Adhrekh said quietly.
Stephen tried to focus in the direction of the sound, but beyond their luminous companions there was only darkness.
“Is there any way to dampen the witchlights?” Stephen asked. “They make us easy to see.”
And then he smelled it, a hot, animal, resiny smell, just like the trace of scent in the aerie.
“He’s here,” Stephen said, trying to keep his voice from showing his building panic.
A warm breeze blew across them, and Stephen heard the sharp hum of a bowstring.
CHAPTER THREE
THE GEOS
THE BEAST saw Aspar coming and whipped its snake-necked head around, lifting its great batlike wings in challenge.
Aspar rushed to meet it, trying in the few instants he had to see where he should strike.
As on a bat, its wings were its forelimbs. It was crouched down on its hind legs, so he couldn’t see much of them. The head was vaguely canine, like some mixture of wolf and snake, and sat atop a kingsyard of sinuous neck.
That long throat seemed the safest bet. The feyknife ought to cut right through it.
But then it beat its wings and jumped, and as its long, sinewy rear legs unfolded, he realized that despite a few details, the thing was grown more like a fighting cock than a bat, as it was suddenly above him, kicking down with wicked claws and dirklong heel spurs. It was fast.
Aspar had too much momentum to stop, so he pivoted to his right, but not quickly enough. The spur of one foot struck his chest.
To Aspar’s surprise and relief, the thing wasn’t as heavy as it looked. Although the claw probably would have laid open his chest if he hadn’t been warded, it didn’t have the force to cut through the boiled leather cuirass he wore beneath his shirt.
It did stick there, though, and the thing shrieked and yanked, trying to get loose. Then it did the more logical thing and kicked its