Chapter 10
Ten
She bolted upright, her ears picking out the beat of wings. Pulling on the first clothes to hand, she stumbled out of the tent, Phoebe behind her, although Lady Ophelia was only beginning to stir.
“You heard it too?” Aurelia asked Phoebe breathlessly as they both stared at the sky.
“Yes! My first pegasus voice!” Phoebe sounded excited, but the tenor of the voice—so different from Echo’s reassuring words the day before—had filled Aurelia with dread.
Danton was already outside, and most of the group joined them quickly, indicating how broadly the pegasus had sent his message. Something had to be terribly wrong.
Dawn had only just broken, so it took her a moment to pick out the dark shape of the black stallion as he appeared from between two hills. He reached them with incredible speed, but he didn’t land, hovering above them, his wings beating with awe-inspiring strength.
You must come quickly. We need your help. We need your hands.
“Our hands?” Aurelia looked toward Danton. “They must need help with something that can’t be achieved with only hooves.”
He looked totally blank, so he clearly had no idea what it could be.
But he reacted quickly and decisively, indicating three of the men and instructing them on what to bring in their packs.
Within minutes, the three men were mounted alongside Phoebe and Aurelia, Danton already hovering in the sky beside the black stallion.
This way! the stallion instructed, wheeling to fly back the way he had come.
But for all his agitation, he took care to lead them along a path that the ordinary horses could follow. And as the air around them lightened, Aurelia looked about her, searching for anything amiss. She could see no sign of anything, however.
Her vigilance lessened as the minutes passed, and by the time they had been riding for half an hour, she was almost nodding off against her horse’s neck. But when the unknown pegasus dove down and landed right in front of her, she came back to full alertness instantly.
Without the sound of either wings or hooves, the hillside grew quiet enough for her to catch a distant braying.
“Is one of your herd injured?” she asked the stallion.
A foal, he said. She is trapped, and we cannot reach her.
“I caught sight of her from the air. She’s this way.” Danton led the way on foot, striding across the rough ground with sure steps.
The others followed, leaving their mounts behind. As they approached a rocky outcropping, Danton began to pick his steps with care, and Aurelia followed behind with even more care. The last thing they needed was for her to slip and hurt herself.
When she finally reached Danton’s side, she peered down in dismay at the back of a young bay pegasus.
Her wings were folded awkwardly across her back, and she had somehow become wedged in a gap in the rock.
It widened above her, but below her it grew more and more narrow, and she had stopped at the tightest spot that was still wide enough to fit her body.
The sound of her distressed breathing reached them, and she tossed her head up, giving Aurelia a glimpse of one widened eye.
“Oh, poor thing,” she murmured.
If it was possible to just reach down and pull the filly directly upward, she would escape with only a few scratches. But how could such a rescue be achieved? She might have been a young pegasus, but she was still a large creature, and it would have taken a mythical giant to pluck her out.
Not that a giant’s fingers could have fit between her sides and the sides of the rocky ravine. She was well and truly wedged in place.
The men Danton had chosen huddled around him, glancing doubtfully down at the trapped young pegasus and talking quietly between themselves. Aurelia wandered away from their conversation, following the edge of the ravine, her eyes on the rocky bottom beneath the filly’s dangling legs.
It was narrow for a horse, but she thought a human could fit—as long as they were on the smaller side. But getting down would be the problem…
“Danton!” she called, forgetting in her sudden excitement to use his title.
He looked up, his eyes meeting hers and sending a thrill of realization through her. But he didn’t comment on her slip, merely hurrying to her side.
“What is it?” he asked. “Have you thought of something?”
“Look.” She pointed at a place where the ravine dropped downward at a less sheer angle, its roughness offering a series of potential footholds. “I think I could get down there if someone helped lower me down from up here.”
“What?” He shook his head. “It’s too dangerous. What if you fell? Or got wedged down there yourself?”
She stared him down. “You can’t fit and neither can any of your men. I’m the smallest of anyone here—even Phoebe—and it will be a tight fit even for me. If I don’t do this, what are you proposing instead?”
He looked away, and she knew he had no other ideas.
“But what will you do even if you make it down?” he asked, a stubborn light in his eyes. “I know there’s more to you than is initially apparent—that’s been obvious since the first day we met. But you can’t possibly be strong enough to push the filly up on your own.”
Aurelia snorted. “Of course I’m not going to single-handedly push the filly out of the crevice.
Even if I was strong enough, I’d be kicked in the face for my troubles.
But I heard you tell your men to bring rope and lengths of canvas.
If I’m down there, you could throw them down, and I could guide them around her belly and then carry them back up here.
Then you could work together with the pegasi to pull her directly upward.
I don’t see any other way to get her out. ”
Danton looked down at the crevice again, his eyes lingering on the trapped pegasus, and she could see him weakening. He had to let her try because it was the only way.
“Prepare the rope and the lengths of canvas,” he called. “And be ready to throw them down when Aurelia calls for them.” He turned to her. “I’ll lower you down myself.”
She beamed at him. “Thank you.”
He fetched a rope and helped her secure it around herself. When he wrapped the other end around his own waist, using himself as anchor, she wanted to protest. The last thing she wanted to do was accidentally drag him into the crevice after her.
But she didn’t bother to protest. She already knew it would be useless.
“I knew it was a good idea to bring you along,” he murmured as he checked her end of the rope an extra time. “It’s a good plan, Aurelia.”
“Thank you, Danton,” she whispered back, feeling daring.
He smiled, his eyes alight, and she turned quickly away to face the lip of the crevice. The descent had looked frightening enough from solid ground, but it took all her courage to trust in the rope and lower herself toward the first foothold.
She took a moment to pause there, allowing her body to feel the security of the rope around her waist and the stone beneath her feet. Then she reached down for the next possible step.
The process took an excruciatingly long time, her feet feeling blindly for each hold.
And there was one point when she couldn’t find one, and she had to trust Danton to lower her down about a foot with only the rope to keep her secure.
Even in that short distance, she spun enough to graze her arm against a sharp spike of rock, but she kept quiet, and her feet found a rocky ledge again.
Finally, when it seemed as if she had been descending forever, her feet found purchase on something far larger than a narrow rock ledge. She had reached the bottom.
“I’m down!” she called, and Danton’s face appeared above her.
“You’re all right?” he asked, his eyes somehow finding the red graze on her arm.
“I’m fine,” she called back. “Have them throw down the ropes and canvas. Throw them right on top of the pegasus’s back. They’re too light to hurt her.”
Two long narrow pieces of canvas dropped into the crevice, along with two more lengths of rope. The loose end pooled on the filly’s back, while the men above kept hold of their end. Aurelia picked her way carefully closer to the pegasus, crooning comforting words at the filly as she moved.
Now that she was down below the pegasus, she could see that the filly had become wedged only a short distance above the bottom of the crevice.
It had done nothing to help the pegasus so far, but it would help Aurelia.
If the filly had been higher up, she would have struggled to get the ropes and canvas around her.
As it was, it would still be a difficult task.
She examined the trapped pegasus from several angles, looking for ridges in the rock just large enough to squeeze her hand between the rock and the pegasus’s side.
“I’ll need you to help me,” she told the creature. “When I tell you, suck in your breath as much as you can manage.”
I will, the creature assured her in a higher, lighter voice than that of either Echo or the black stallion.
Aurelia smiled to hear her words. She had been afraid the young pegasus might be too exhausted and terrified to process her instructions.
“I have two lengths of rope here,” she explained, “and I’m going to pass both of them under your belly. But I’m worried about them hurting you once pressure is applied, so I have some lengths of canvas to place between your belly and each rope.”
Thank you. The pegasus tried to crane her head around to see the ropes but didn’t have enough range of movement to manage it.
“They’ve thrown down the end of each rope and canvas,” Aurelia continued, wanting to make sure the filly understood.
“You should be able to feel them resting on your back. I’ll have to pass them all downward between the rock and your side, and then I’ll thread them below your belly before passing them up between the rock and your belly again on the other side so that you can eventually hang beneath the two ends. Does that make sense?”