Chapter Fourteen
Descent Into Darkness
In the raging bonfire that is Ferrol’s realm, faith, love, and hope are three delicate snowflakes looking for a safe place to land, but no such refuge exists. — The Book of Brin
The tiny path they took was filled with switchbacks and lined with sudden drops. Jagged rocks, bony roots, tangles of branches, and dim light required vigilance. Much of the trip was illuminated indirectly by the distant but ample fires of the war in the valley. Tesh had never seen such a sight before. Standing on the wall above the gate of Alon Rhist, he’d witnessed the Battle of Grandford when more than a thousand elves and giants clashed with the combined Rhulyn and Gula armies. In the collective memory, that battle had grown in size and significance until he, too, remembered it as if every living thing had engaged in a contest of wills to determine the fate of the world. But the Battle of Grandford was a tussle among village children compared with what was happening in that valley.
From the trail, he couldn’t see the war anymore because the trail—if the two-foot-wide ledge could be called such—wound back around crags and squeezed through niches along the face of a gargantuan stone cliff. Only the glow of the many fires bathing the rock proved the battle continued. This was a good thing. The sight of so many fiery plumes rising hundreds of feet, massive apparatuses of war, and a sky so filled with flying beasts that they could have been schools of fish could only serve to distract him. That battle was warfare on a scale impossible to imagine, absurd to believe even while being near it. Given the width of the trail and the length of the drop, it was best his view was blocked.
Fenelyus led them, strolling the treacherous path as if they walked along a beach around a tranquil lake. She often turned and answered questions while still walking—backward. Tesh kept a hand on the wall and shuffled rather than stepped. The whole process was difficult as he discovered the stone was exceedingly rough and pockmarked with holes. Touching the rock was not only unpleasant but painful.
For the first time, Brin and Rain were at the head of their march while he and Tressa lagged at the back. As in the Swamp of Ith, Tesh once more regretted letting Brin get so far ahead, but there was no fixing it, no way for him to catch up. He didn’t dare pass Tressa, who was having her own struggles to put one foot in front of the other. When he could spare a glance, Tesh was surprised to see Brin walking with arms swinging at her sides. Rain appeared equally at ease, and Tesh let out a gasp when both of them went so far as to leap a gap in the trail.
Tesh couldn’t understand his fear. He’d fought Sebek, hunted deadly Fhrey archers, and drowned himself in a pool of slime. He thought nothing could have been worse than that. Even so, this ledge terrified him.
How is this possible? I’m dead. What am I scared of?
For him, Phyre had turned out to be a place of confusion—nothing was as he had been led to believe. Great warriors were supposed to go to Alysin, a beautiful land of green fields. Instead, he had entered a dull, gray world where he’d seen the ghosts of his parents. After proudly telling them he’d avenged their death by waging a war against Nyphron’s Galantians, he had expected his father’s thanks. He hadn’t gotten that, and Tesh was confused by his father’s reply, “If I had one wish, it would have been that you had died with the rest of us that day. If that were the case, we’d still have you. Now, she will.”
Tesh had asked whom his father meant, who she was, but his mother had begun crying just then and ran off along the white brick road. With tears in his eyes, and without another word, his father had followed her.
None of that makes sense, but at least I found Brin.
Learning from multiple people that she had traveled deeper into Rel along the white brick road, he’d set out and arrived at the gate to Nifrel in the aftermath of a calamity. An incredible stone fortress had been destroyed by an attack of some kind. Rubble spilled out of the entrance. Fearing Brin was inside, he’d cautiously entered. He’d found no one except Moya, whose leg had been trapped by a giant slab of marble. She’d explained that Tekchin was buried beneath the other stones, and the rest of them had escaped through the portal into Nifrel. Years of battle had hardened Tesh to the necessity of severing limbs. Seeing no other option, he’d drawn his sword. When his stroke freed her, Moya hadn’t made a sound. Maybe she’d been in shock. But whatever the reason, Tesh had found the lack of a scream welcome since he didn’t want to alert anyone to their presence. He’d scooped her up and carried her out of the ruined castle and through the portal. It was only after they’d reached the other side that the screaming had begun.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Tressa said, stopping when she reached the missing section of the path.
“It’s not that far,” Gifford told her while looking back from the other side and putting an added emphasis on the last word as he continued to delight in his ability to pronounce the rrr sound properly.
Tressa got on her knees, then on her stomach to look over the edge. “There’s no bottom. There’s no culling bottom!”
“Don’t look down,” Roan offered. She, too, had stopped and peered over Gifford’s shoulder, offering support.
“Are you crazy? You want me to jump with my eyes closed? How in Mari’s name am I supposed to cross . . . to cross . . . I can’t do this.”
“Of course you can,” Gifford said dismissively, even bewildered. He had a smile on his face as if he found Tressa’s protests to be some sort of joke.
“No, she’s right. That’s insane,” Tesh agreed. “There has to be another way.”
“Thank you!” Tressa said.
Gifford glanced at Roan, shocked. “But . . . it’s just a tiny gap. You can practically step across. Here . . .”
To Tesh’s horror, Gifford hopped back. “See? And don’t forget, I’m a cripple.”
Pivoting in place, he hopped over again then turned around and beckoned them with his hands. “Now you.”
Tressa and Tesh gaped at each other. If there had ever been any doubt to the legend that Gifford was a man of bewildering bravery, it was erased at that moment. He also was clearly a bit crazed. Tesh’s stomach had crawled up into his throat at the mere anticipation. Tressa had backed into him, and he honestly wasn’t sure which of them he felt trembling.
“It’s easier than it looks,” Roan said. Her tone was far more serious, more sympathetic, but obviously she was as crazy as her husband.
“Nothing to lose. Nothing to lose. Nothing to lose,” Tressa recited, in a manner completely at odds with the sentiment. She continued to repeat the three words as she backed up on uncertain legs. Then she shifted to, “Malcolm give me strength.”
She ran forward and jumped.
Tesh held his breath as she flew through the air and landed safely on the far side, where Gifford wrapped his arms around her. The woman shook and cried. Gifford looked at him. “C’mon, Tesh, you don’t bat an eye when elves shoot arrows your way. What’s a little hop across a crack in a stone?”
A crack? Is he serious?
Gifford wasn’t brave—not in the least—the man was insane.
But Tressa jumped it. She’s not very athletic, but she made it across. So why is this hard for me?