Chapter 10 #2
I understand. A strange sighing sound echoed in Aurelia’s mind. Although I don’t know why I’m in any rush to get out. The elders are going to scold me for weeks.
Aurelia hid a smile. Apparently there were similarities between pegasus young and human children.
Starting on the opposite side of the crevice to the one she had climbed down, she scrambled up to a ledge that was just wide enough to hold her feet and put her on a level with the filly’s head.
“What’s your name?” she asked as she got herself into position.
Bramble, the pegasus answered promptly, and Aurelia hid a grin. How quickly had the new foal fallen into a bramble patch to earn herself that name?
She instructed Bramble to suck in her breath, and the pegasus obeyed. Working quickly, Aurelia threaded the ends of the pooled canvas down between the rock and Bramble’s belly. Once both lengths had made it through the tightest section, she did the same with the two lengths of rope.
“Success!” she called up when all four were dangling down to the ground below, having passed down Bramble’s far side. “Now to thread them up again.”
Passing the strips of canvas beneath the pegasus’s belly, she slid them along until one sat in front of Bramble’s back legs and the other just behind her front legs, avoiding her wings as much as possible.
The ropes she positioned on top of the canvas to give them extra strength, while the canvas would provide the softening.
Once she was satisfied with their position, she repeated the same exercise on Bramble’s other side, once again perching precariously on a rough spur of rock to lift herself high enough.
At a request from Aurelia, Bramble sucked in her belly at just the right moment as Aurelia threaded the canvas and rope upward again, leaving it to pool on Bramble’s back once she’d done so.
When she’d finished, she jumped back down to the ground, gazing upward at the result of her effort.
The canvas and rope snaked down into the crevice from where the men still gripped one end, passing under Bramble and then upward again.
All that was left was for Aurelia to climb back up again, carrying the loose ends of the ropes and canvas with her. Child’s play.
She laughed at herself. If coming down had been difficult, going up would be much more so.
Danton’s head appeared over the side. “I have help this time, so don’t worry.
We’re going to pull you up. You just need to keep hold of those ends and use your feet to push against the side of the crevice as you come to stabilize yourself.
Otherwise you’ll spin the whole way and scrape against the rock. ”
Aurelia bit her lip, remembering the sharp sting of the rock from earlier. But it would take her forever to climb out on her own—if she could even manage it.
“Very well,” she called up, climbing up to her ledge again and gathering the loose ends. She gripped them along with her own anchoring rope, which she would need to keep hold of to help steady herself.
“Ready!” she called, her arms braced, and the rope around her middle jerked uncomfortably.
It burned as it pulled her weight upward, but she gritted her teeth and ignored it, her full focus on keeping hold of the various items in her hands and tapping the balls of her feet lightly against the rock in front of her.
She rose higher and higher, her taps becoming more even and practiced. The burn was only getting worse, though. Surely the top of the crevice would appear soon.
She gasped in relief as her eyes finally found it, only just above her eye level. Within moments, her shoulders were above the lip of the ground and then her hands. She gripped a root protruding from the hard ground, and held herself in place, flopped halfway over the edge of the crevice.
With her other hand, she held out the ends of both the ropes and the lengths of canvas.
“Here!” she gasped out, “don’t let them fall.”
She wasn’t eager to repeat the process of getting into the crevice and back out again anytime soon. A man ran forward to retrieve the ends from her, calling for his fellows over his shoulder as he did so.
“No!” Danton called sharply. “Let one of the others do it!”
Aurelia realized the man approaching her had been the one helping the Earl pull her up. And he had just let go of the rope to retrieve her load.
Just as realization hit her, the root under her hand gave way, the unexpected loss of grip making her slide backward. She tipped off the edge of the crevice, the full force of her weight jerking unexpectedly against Danton and pulling the rope through his hands.
She fell. For a horrible second she was free falling downward, plummeting toward her death. Then the rope went taut, jerking against her in a burning ring.
She gasped, energy surging through every part of her as her breath came raggedly. She was still alive. Sore but alive.
Grabbing at the rope with her hands, her feet sought the rock, finding it and steadying herself so that the dizzying spin stopped. Danton called a command, his voice harsh and full of steel, and feet raced toward him.
Moments later, she was once again pulled upward. Her heart pounded with the aftereffects of her fall, and her hands trembled, although she seemed to fly upward from the speed of their pull.
The edge of the crevice reached her, but the pulling didn’t slow as she was dragged all the way over the edge, the tugging continuing until she lay full length on the ground. Her dress was going to be utterly ruined.
“Aurelia!” Danton finally dropped the rope and rushed to her side, falling to one knee beside her. “Can you move? Are you injured?”
She groaned and pushed herself up into a sitting position. “It’s my dress that has been injured. Mortally so, I fear.”
“Your dress.” He slumped back against his foot, his hand briefly rising to cover his eyes. “I thought you were dead.”
“So did I for a moment there. But you saved me.”
“It should never have happened.” He threw a furious glance at the man who had come forward to take the ropes from her, but Aurelia put a restraining hand on his arm.
“Don’t be angry with him,” she murmured. “I’m the one who called for someone to come. And besides, he managed to keep hold of the ropes amid the chaos, which I am excessively grateful for. I have no desire to go down there again to retrieve them.”
“You are not going near that crevice again,” Danton said fervently, gathering her into a hug, both of them still seated on the ground.