The Fickle Winds of Autumn

Kira stretched and flung a reckless right arm back out over the gaping chasm; her body lurched closer to the crumbling edge; it cracked and splintered beneath her weight; she arched and reached for Ellis with every sinew in her battered, winded body - with every desperate, resolute hope she possessed.

Ellis kicked and thrashed his limbs wildly; effort and terror strained across his despairing face. The terrible gravity of the ravine sucked him down into its deadly maul. The horrified blood pounded and sank through Kira’s frame; the bleak caustic acid tormented her innards; she urged her fingers to extend, to grab, to claw for him, the boy whose kindness had saved her from the slavers.

The trajectory of his forlorn body tumbled away from her, past the level of her eyes; down, down towards the fearful sombre distance below; a sudden rough jarring pain snatched at her skin; his hand ripped down her arm; she clenched her fingers, determined to hold on; his arm rasped through her grip; she seized at his writhing, plummeting wrist; her stubborn fingers stung and latched on; his fierce hand gripped hard.

The jolting shock of his falling weight tore through her shoulder and arm; her joints wrenched; her body dragged closer to the perilous edge; her head and shoulders lurched and dangled down; the blood thumped to her hair; Ellis slid deeper, hauling her further into the deadly chasm; but she would not let go - she could not.

A ravenous black wolf bounded close behind Ellis; it leapt across the gap after its prey; its jaws snapped angrily, its salivating incisors resolved to sink into the soft meat of Ellis’s legs. It kicked and twisted; its anguished paws thrashed for a ground that was no longer there; the sudden stark, brutal realisation of its fate shocked through its bulging eyes. A pitiful, despairing yelp reverberated across the valley as it thudded down the sickening side of the mountain, and the terrified creature was taken up into the Eternal arms of the Great Surrounder.

The frayed edge of the path bit deeper into Kira’s shoulders and ribs; her bruised frame scrambled and battled to support Ellis’s pendulous weight; she tried to remember to breathe as more stones crumbled and splintered away from the vulnerable, fractured boundary; they spun and skipped as they crashed down into the full, horrifying depth of the chasm below.

Ellis’s swaying weight yanked and heaved at her arm; she kicked and scrabbled; her feet searched for a solid hold as she slithered and slid further over the edge; her desperate knees tried to dig in; she pressed down, determined, onto the rough uncertain pathway; her thoughts reeled and shuddered, terrified at the prospect of sharing the fate of the predatory wolf.

Her head and arms and shoulders drooped precariously over the edge of the abyss; her panic-stricken eyes were forced to stare straight down at the dizzying vertical drop which fell away beneath her.

The cold rushing wind stood still, silenced by the adrenaline pumping through her; an awful halting of time stretched away into a dizzying eternity; a cold sweating sickness; the fear of losing Ellis, and her own life, swept across her suspended trembling frame.

She fought and focused; a solitary thought resonated through her body - she would not let go, she would never let him go.

Her legs slid further and scraped cruelly along the cold rocks; her swaying shoulders were dragged further down; Ellis’s weight swung and lurched; her body stretched and racked to its painful limits; his terrified grip crushed her wrist; but she saw nothing and felt nothing; she peered down at the face of the young man, the fresh, hopeful life, which dangled from her aching arm; the earnest, unconditional blue of his eyes burned back up, transfixed on hers, desperately needing her and trusting his life to her; the magnetic pull of his gaze drew her full focus and blocked out the giddy vertigo, the hungry, desperate battle with gravity.

She must repay that faith, that bond.

Her sprawling legs slid further; they slithered deeper towards a cruel and horrible fate; Aldwyn’s legs writhed and tangled and wrapped beneath hers; the lurching momentum jolted to a halt.

“Alright,” Aldwyn panted, “I’ve wedged my foot into a crevasse - don’t move - I think I can hold you.”

The surprising sound of another person’s voice shocked Kira back to the cold of the mountain, to the sudden, treacherous and vulnerable situation.

“Don’t let go!” Ellis gasped up to her.

“I won’t!” she yelled.

“Can you hold me?” he asked.

“Yes, I think so - Aldwyn has my legs - but I can’t pull you - you’ll have to climb up.”

Ellis stared intently at her; the pressure of his grip redoubled and stung into her wrist; he grimaced with effort and swung his other arm up and grasped her just above the elbow; her skin wrenched and bruised; Ellis heaved and levered himself up; he clawed and pinched and burned her flesh; her arm sagged and throbbed and numbed; she bit her lip, determined not to cry out.

He swung up and grabbed her belt; the grateful blood pulsed back into her hand as he released the strangling hold on her wrist; he kicked and wriggled his legs; his blunt, urgent knees caught her flush in the forehead; her thoughts reeled and dazed, but held firm.

His weight shifted further up her body; he clambered across her back; her dignity happily abandoned; a thankful relief flushed through her; he scrambled to grab Aldwyn’s outstretched hand to safety; her ungainly work as a human ladder had saved him.

The angry blood pounded through her inverted head; several pebbles cracked away from the brittle edge and rattled down into the void below; the dust and grit of the falling rocks mingled with the sour taste of her own fear at the back of her mouth.

But Ellis was safe.

It was all worth it.

Her numbed, cramped legs were grabbed from behind; she was pulled up and back away from the perilous gap; her trembling body collapsed its relief onto the cold hardness of the solid rocks; she spread her arms and hugged the bleak barren pathway; her cold, frightened breath caught up with her and gasped back into her lungs; a ridiculous urge to laugh dissolved through her.

Several wolves prowled angrily on the other side of the newly-formed chasm; they howled their frustration to the chilled mountain air. They sniffed the edge of the crumbling path and pawed at it tentatively; their tongues lolled, their stomachs sagged.

The foremost wolf stared across hungrily, then padded away, its head slung low. The others followed.

The stalking anxiety thinned and melted from Kira’s body.

“They’re going,” she said.

“Yes,” Aldwyn panted, “they now know where there’s an easy meal of fresh warm meat waiting - if they can find a way down to the bottom of the gorge to get it.”

“You mean, they’ll eat one of their own kind?” Kira asked.

“Nothing is wasted in Nature,” Aldwyn puffed. “The death of that she-wolf might save the lives of the rest of her pack - her sacrifice might not be in vain.”

“Well,” Ellis gasped, “perhaps now we know what happened to all those travellers who’ve gone missing here over the years.”

“Yes, we’ve been most fortunate,” said Aldwyn, “let’s hope we didn’t use up all our luck in one go - that was more than enough excitement for my old bones.”

“Yes,” said Ellis, “thanks for saving me Kira - and for your help too, Aldwyn.”

An uneasy heat prickled through Kira.

She could not remember if she had ever been thanked before; she could not be certain that she enjoyed this awkward sensation. She lay still and held onto the raw pathway.

“Well,” Aldwyn replied, “I haven’t spent all these years teaching you how best to wield the Magik that Heals just to lose you now - besides, who would fetch water and go to market for me if you were gone?”

“Hmmph! Typical Aldwyn!” Ellis said.

“However,” Aldwyn continued, “I fear that our problems are not quite at an end.”

“But we’re safe now,” said Ellis, “the wolves have gone - they can’t get to us anymore.”

“Yes, but we’re also cut off,” Aldwyn replied, “we can’t get back down the pathway to the valley. Perhaps that’s no bad thing knowing that the wolves are prowling around out there - but it means that we’ll have to take the Pass and cross these treacherous mountains - and that will not be an easy thing - especially at this time of the year with the weather closing in - in fact, it might prove to be every bit as perilous as the danger we’ve just escaped.”