Night mode

The climb down started off easily enough. Eupheme had rigged up several clamps to the ropes, so she wasn’t reliant on her muscle power to take them down the side of the plateau, instead able to squeeze them for a slow descent. Tythel had grown up on a mountain and ridden Karjon’s back since she was a child. The heights didn’t bother her. The jerking, halting way they were descending was doing a number on her stomach, however, and she had to fight to keep herself from being sick. At one point it got to be too much, and bile rose up in her throat. The stomach acid hitting the sores on her throat was a whole new agony, and Tythel almost blacked up as she let out a pained rattle that passed for a scream.

Eupheme did glance over her shoulder when that happened. “What’s wrong?” she asked, a worried note in her voice.

Tythel shook her head.

“Right, you can’t speak. Is there anything that I can do?”

Tythel again shook her head.

“Okay. Is it injuries from the battle?”

Tythel nodded firmly at that.

Eupheme paused for a moment to consider. “Okay. If you need me to stop, reach over and pat me on the head. Don’t touch anything else, I don’t want to risk slipping. Can you reach?”

Tythel nodded again. I hate communicating like this, she thought bitterly. She’d already had enough time to figure out what she’d tell Eupheme – the truth. She wasn’t sure it was going to be enough, but it would at least be honest.

An ugly, nasty voice rose up in the back of her mind. Honest? Like you were with Nicandros? It sneered. She’s going to leave, you know. She’s going to abandon you. Same as he did. Or she’ll die, like Karjon. Maybe it’s better you keep her angry. At least she’ll leave now, before it hurts more.

Tellias drifted a bit further down beneath them. The arc emitters built into his boots were not strong enough to propel him into flight, but they were enough to slow his fall. He’d tested it by jumping off one of the few still standing buildings. The only question they had was if he had enough power to get all the way to the ground, but they’d decided to take the risk. He was definitely dead if they stayed up top and waited for the Alohym to show back up.

Tythel turned her head to the side and spit out a red globule. They were coming a bit less frequently now, which Tythel hoped meant she was starting to heal. And not that my stomach is filling up with…no, stop it Tythel, don’t think about it.

Eupheme grunted behind her, and some of the rocks began to clatter down the side of the cliff. Tythel sucked in an involuntary breath. Relax, she told herself, trying to unclench her fists from the sudden surge of panic. Eupheme was not supporting them with her arms and legs. The rope was doing most of the work. Thick, sturdy, rope, that wasn’t at all likely to snap and send them plummeting to their deaths hundreds of feet below.

Tythel took her mind off the valley below by focusing her eyes outward, down the canyon. While the land surrounding Hallith might be a desert, the flow of water in canyon had transformed the canyon into a forest. Tythel marveled at seeing how far away from the river proper the trees had grown, their roots stretching like fingers towards the water. A few birds flew among the trees, fat, ungainly creatures that could only fly a short distance. Tythel had read about them, but couldn’t recall their name. They only existed in the isolated ecosystem of the canyon, unable to fly up over the brim.

Tythel caught a shape crawling up one of the walls and focused on it. It was a lizard, easily the size of the man, another of the unique life forms to this valley. This one Tythel remembered. The drayko were six limbed reptiles, making them part of the ancient order of reptiles that had culminated in dragons. Unlike the majestic being that had raised Tythel, the drayko had no wings. Instead, where a dragon’s limbs would be were two claws folded tightly to their backs. As Tythel watched, one of the fat birds flew close to the Drayko. It’s claws shot out, easily fifteen feet long, and speared the bird mid flight.

The drayko brought the creature to its jaws, and Tythel swallowed hard, then risked a glance down. If their path took them past one sunning itself, looking for the birds, it could easily decide Tythel and Eupheme made acceptible pray instead.

No drayko awaited them on the climb down. What was waiting was another two hundred feet of falling and an intense sense of vertigo.

Tythel took her eyes off the drop. You’ve ridden your father’s back amongst the clouds, why does this bother you? Don’t you trust Eupheme? As soon as the thought was in her mind, she was able to answer it to herself. It wasn’t Eupheme she didn’t trust, it was the ropes. If they failed, Eupheme would never have the strength to hold them both to the wall. They would plummet, and all the truth in the would wouldn’t adhere them to the wall.

Flath, why am I letting her climb? I should have insisted on being the one to carry the burden! Guilt welled up in Tythel, and she tried to fight it down again, focusing on the canyon again.

Something was moving through the winding passages of the canyon, something moving with far more grace and agility than the flightless birds. Tythel had never seen these creatures in any of her books. They were flat and wide, shaped like crescent moon. They reminded Tythel of the manta’s she’d seen swimming outside their under sea base. Spots of flame emerged from under their wings, constant jets of fire that seemed to propel them as they used their wings to maneuver.

The drayko spotted them, and its claws lunged out at one of these new creatures. It swerved in the air to involve claws fast enough to catch birds in the air, and then swung its tail towards the lizard.

A beam of unlight went streaming into the confused drayko, cutting it in half.

Light and shadow, Tythel thought with growing horror. Eupheme had mentioned the Alohym were sending something. Skimmers, that had been the word. Apparently, these were them. They flew faster than anything Tythel had ever imagined, faster even that Karjon when he was flapping his wings with full force.

She reached up and frantically tapped Eupheme on the head. The other woman looked over her shoulder. “What is it, Tythel?”

Tythel pointed, and after a few seconds, Eupheme swore. “Get ready. Going to have to speed things up.”

The lead Skimmer banked upwards. The eyes were on the bottom of the creature’s stomach, and they peered at the wall on stalks. Tythel readied dragonflame as soon as the Skimmer came in range.

She spat forth flame, going for a wide gout that would incinerate the creature before it could aim that tail.

Instead, she only managed to spray forth flecks of dark blood. The pain was worse even than having her eye socket broken, and Tythel clutched her neck in sudden agony. Eupheme swore and dropped them a few feet right as the Skimmer shot a beam of unlight, searing the rock where they had been. It missed the two of them.

It didn’t miss the rope.

For a moment, Tythel felt weightless, like she had when Karjon started to dive.

Then gravity began to assert itself, and the ground came rushing towards them. Tythel didn’t hesitate. She swing her shoulders, getting a startled shout from Eupheme as the turned around. Tythel ignored it, instead popping her talons and shoving them into the rock and dirt that crusted the cliff face.

She felt a couple of her talons tear out of her fingers at the first impact. If her throat had not been so ruined, she would have screamed at the sudden agony. Instead she let out a raspy sound that burbled wetly in her throat. The remaining talons held fast, and after digging deep furrows in the rock, they brought Tythel and Eupheme to a halt. Tythel could feel Eupheme struggling to bring out her arclight rifle, could hear Tellias shouting something from the ground below.

The Skimmer crested its body over the canyon, and turned in a wide arc, coming around for another pass. The two below banked upwards towards them.

Tythel made herself begin to climb, ignoring the agony in her fingers, ignoring the way her throat burned like it held a trapped flame. If she didn’t get them to the ground, they were dead.

At least she didn’t have to worry about the rope breaking anymore.