Page 25 of Pippa of Lauramore (The Eldentimber #1)

“ M arigold. We leave now .” I grab her arm. I’m not gentle, but we don’t have time.

She fights me. “I can’t. I just can’t .”

Leonora has her other arm, and she’s helping me drag Marigold up. Marigold stops fighting but continues to cry. Great sobs wrack her tall, slender frame. It will be a miracle if we get out of here before the bandits find us.

Leonora is already breathless from Marigold’s weight. “They’re coming,”

“It will take a while to find the right tunnel. We took many turns.” I glance back, then crawl up the first ledge and hold my hands down for Marigold. She takes them, and Leonora boosts her up from behind.

“You have to try!” I yank Marigold up, so I have most of her weight.

Her sobs have calmed to hiccups, but tears still stream down her face. She finally gets a foot over the top, and I’m able to yank her the rest of the way. I reach down for Leonora. Thankfully, I don’t have to pull her up. She does the climbing on her own.

Marigold makes it over the stair-step ledges, and we’re nearing the jump. A rock clatters to the ground from behind me, and I glance back. Leonora is pressed against the rock wall, breathing hard.

“Don’t look down.”

Her eyes flicker to mine. “I already did.”

Not taking my own advice, I glance down at the cavern floor.

My vision spins, but I look back up and take slow breaths, trying to focus only on the ledge under my feet.

“You can make it,” I tell her. “Keep your eyes on me.”

We must crawl up and out the ceiling before the men find us. They’ll never guess we could make it out, and they’ll continue searching the tunnels. That will give us time to escape. It’s the only way.

“I’m going to jump.” My voice wavers, but there’s nothing I can do about it.

I back up, take a deep breath, and then leap across. I hop forward a few steps because I put too much energy into my jump. There’s a rock jutting out next to my shoulder, and I grasp it, regaining my balance.

“All right,” I say. “Marigold, you’re next.”

If Leonora goes first, there’s no way Marigold will make the jump. Leonora coaxes Marigold to go. The echoes resulting from the bandit’s search are becoming louder. We must hurry.

“Marigold, now!” I say.

To my surprise, the girl jumps. It’s a clumsy thing, like she’s never leaped before, but it’s enough. I grab her hands and pull her to safety.

They’ve found the last tunnel. I’m sure of it.

“I don’t think I…” Leonora says. “Pippa…I can’t…” She’s trembling, and her eyes are huge.

I can hear distinct voices. We have half a minute, maybe less, before they enter the cavern. We’re taking too long.

“Leonora, we don’t have time. They’re coming. I promise I will catch you. I swear it, but you must jump now.”

She nods, her movements choppy, and prepares herself. The voices enter the cavern.

“Down, both of you!” I fall flat on my stomach. “Make yourselves as flat as possible.”

There’s a chance they won’t see us up here. Why would they look? Who would assume three girls would scale the walls of a cavern?

I hear my heartbeat and feel its frantic rhythm in my neck.

Marigold is breathing so loud, I’m afraid they’ll hear it.

At least she’s stopped crying. Leonora is paralyzed on the ground, stretched as flat as she can get.

This can’t be good for the baby. Her heart must be close to going out from fear.

The bandits curse and argue with each other. Peg screams, and he still sounds drunk.

“Maybe they went out the hole in the ceiling?” one of the men, the one who must have drugged me, says.

My blood goes cold. I grit my teeth, not daring to even breathe.

“ Maybe they went out the hole in the ceiling, ” Peg mocks in a whiny, jeering voice. “Yes, perhaps they sprouted wings and flew out!”

“They might have climbed…” the brown-haired man offers.

We’re hidden in shadow, tucked as close to the cave wall as possible.

Please, don’t let them see us.

“You’re both morons! They went down a different tunnel! Find them!” Peg bellows. His voice fills the cavern and echoes down the tunnels.

Their footsteps fade, and their voices become distant.

I take a deep breath and push myself off the stone. My cheek is numb from the cold rock, and there are little bits of sand and tiny pebbles stuck to my skin. I brush the grit from my hands and hair.

Next to me, Marigold sits up. Like me, she brushes herself clean. Leonora is still on her stomach, but instead of clenching her eyes shut, like she was when the bandits were in the cavern, she’s staring at the empty space between her ledge and ours.

“You can do it.” I feel the need to be quiet even though the bandits have left.

She slowly sits up. “It looks so much higher from here than it did on the ground.”

“I know. Heights are tricky like that.”

Her hair is a mess. It’s come out of her braid and is all tangled. Her face and hands are smudged with cave dirt, and her sleeve is ripped and hanging off her shoulder. I’ve never seen her look so disheveled.

Percival is going to kill me.

“Will you catch me if I trip?” she asks .

I nod and hold out my hands. “Don’t think about it. Just jump.”

She braces herself, closes her eyes for a moment, takes two quick steps, and then leaps across. I grab her by the shoulders and don’t let go until I’m sure she’s stable.

We’re across.

I point to a part of the open ceiling closest to the wall. The first person will have to climb up the wall, hang from the ledge, and then pull herself up using only her arms. That person will have to be me.

“Here’s where we’re going to climb out.” My hands are sweaty. This is much more terrifying than the jump. For a few moments, I will be dangling over the empty cavern. There will be nothing to break my fall if I should slip—nothing but the tiny puddle of water on the stone floor.

“Pippa, please be careful,” Leonora says.

I find a foothold in the wall and pull myself up. I stretch my hand out and grab onto the rock ledge above me. I give it a good yank, checking to see if it’s stable enough to hold my weight.

So far so good.

I take in a few sharp breaths, grit my teeth, and quickly reach for the ledge with my other hand.

I’m hanging over the cavern.

Leonora gasps and Marigold squeaks. I swing my legs back to the wall, trying to reach a foothold. With one swift kick against the rock, I have enough momentum to pull myself up. My head and chest are out, but the ledge cuts into my stomach. I look for something, anything, to grab hold of.

My hands are starting to slip, and my legs dangle uselessly below me. There’s a sapling just within reach. I don’t want to trust it, not with its roots only growing in sand over rock, but I can’t hold on any longer.

I grab onto it and send up a silent prayer of thanks when it holds firm. I use the sapling to pull myself up and out and then collapse on the ground. Only now do my legs start trembling.

“Pippa?” Leonora calls, trying to be quiet. “Are you all right?”

“Mmmhmmm,” I answer.

I turn back to the opening, stretch out on my belly, and firmly tuck my toes against a sturdy boulder. I lower my arms and head into the opening. “All you have to do is clasp my hands. I will pull you, and you will use your feet against the wall to press yourself up.”

They stare at me like I’ve lost my mind.

“It’s the only way,” I say. “Hurry up, all my blood is rushing to my head.”

Marigold steps forward. Now that she’s this close, she seems eager to be free from the cave. I clasp her hands and pull as hard as I can. She stumbles against the wall but gives me enough to yank her up.

She’s out.

I turn back for Leonora. She looks up at me with tired eyes. “If something happens?—”

I give her a sharp look. “Leonora, stop.”

“Tell Percival I love him.”

“You will be fine.”

She grasps my hands, and I pull. It’s going well. She’s found her footing on the wall, and she’s walking herself up .

Then she slips.

Her feet slide down and away from the edge, and the only thing keeping her from falling to her death is our clasped hands. The momentum of her fall has loosened my grip, and I can feel her sliding away from me.

“No!” I shriek.

I can’t hold her. I grasp her as tight as I can, but our hands are slick, and I can’t hold firm. One hand slips away completely, and she’s dangling from my fingertips. I grit my teeth and close my eyes, doing everything in my power to just hold on.

Then she’s gone, and my hands hold nothing. I scream in anguish, not caring who hears.

“Help me!” Marigold breathes, her voice strained.

She is stretched out on her stomach like I am, holding Leonora by her wrists. I didn’t even feel her kneel, but somehow, she caught Leonora.

I grab Leonora’s hands, my grip now tight, and Marigold and I pull her to safety. We huddle together, crying because of what almost was.

“Thank you,” I say to Marigold, sobbing. “Thank you.”

Tears run down her dirt-stained cheeks, and she nods.

We are free.

The trail leading to the cave is the first place the bandits will look when they’re done with the tunnels. I don’t like it, but the only safe way to escape is through the thick woods.

I’m not sure where we’re at, although I think we’re going the right direction. Soon, we’ll hit a terrace wall and, if I’m correct, another trail.

It’s all so different in the deep night. I’m not sure what time it is, so I keep looking to what I think is the eastern horizon. Eventually, it will lighten.

I check again, but it’s still black.

We don’t say much as we walk. I can tell Leonora and Marigold are nearly as scared of the night as they were of the cave. I am too if I’m truthful with myself. It’s different on foot, especially when you’re following animal trails which disappear and reappear at random.

A distant, sharp shriek cuts through the night. We all freeze, listening.

It’s only a mountain cat.

Once again, I reach for my bow only to remember it isn’t on my back. “Keep moving.”

As I step forward, a branch swipes across my cheek.

I grumble under my breath, pushing the branch back and holding it out of the way as Marigold and Leonora pass by.

I make my way through the weeds and bushes, and I hope we don’t find a patch of waspnettle.

I have boots on, but Leonora and Marigold only have slippers.

They haven’t complained, but they must be in agony by now.

Leonora trips on a root but catches herself before she falls. “Pippa, I need to rest for a moment.”

I nod. As much as I don’t want to stop, we’re all exhausted. There’s another cry, closer this time.

“What is that?” Marigold asks.

“Mountain cat.”

Leonora rolls her shoulders, looking tense. “Are you sure? ”

“No.”

“What else could it be?” Marigold asks.

“We need to move on,” I say instead of answering her question.

We continue, and soon I notice my boots sinking into the ground as we walk. We’ve stumbled on a marsh. “We must be very quiet.”

Leonora creeps forward. “Why?”

“We’re in grim boar territory.”

We move along. I know we’re almost silent, but in the night, it sounds like we’re crashing through the brush. I just know we’re going to draw something in.

A dark cliff-like shape grows from the forest in front of us. We’ve left the marsh and are almost to our first terrace. At the base, I’m able to locate the trail I’d hoped for.

I feel more secure until another feline cry, this time much closer, rings through the night.

“I don’t think that’s a mountain cat,” Leonora says, her voice shaking.

It must be a mountain cat. A mountain cat is bad enough—the alternative is too terrifying to consider. We press on, faster now that we’re not tripping through brush and crawling over fallen logs. I’m almost running, but the girls keep up with me.

There’s another cry. It’s much closer and on the other side of us.

I stop, holding up my hand so the others will stop too. There’s another shriek behind us.

“How many of them are there?” Marigold gasps.

“Only one. ”

Leonora touches my shoulder, and true terror shines in her eyes. “Pippa. The cries—they aren’t coming from the ground. They’re coming from the sky.”

“I know.”

Marigold’s head jerks up, and she swivels, looking for the threat. “What is it?”

“It’s a glasseln, and it’s circling,” I answer.

“What do we do?”

I have no idea. I have no weapons, no fire…nothing.

Something dark sweeps above us and disappears into the trees. It shrieks again.

Marigold jerks and clings to Leonora. “What’s it doing?”

“Playing with us.” I look around, frantic to find something to use as a weapon. I pry a broken branch from a tree and stumble back as it breaks free.

In the distance, I hear horses. Somewhere nearby the bandits are searching for us. Perhaps the glasseln will be distracted and take after them instead.

It swoops again on silent wings, its shadowed form the only sign of its presence. I hold the branch like a club. Leonora and Marigold huddle together, back to back, as we crane our necks upward.

“There!” Marigold yells.

The dark form screeches as it swoops down. All three of us duck, and its claws only narrowly miss us.

It wouldn’t have missed if it hadn’t meant to.

It rises in front of us, turns in mid-flight, and then drops to the ground. Marigold gasps, and the beast lowers itself to a crouch. Massive feathered wings are tucked against its body, and it’s long, black tail swishes back and forth.

It’s as beautiful as it is terrifying. Long, lean, and covered with glossy black fur, it creeps forward, twitching as if it is about to pounce. Emerald green eyes shine in the darkness and appear to be lit by some unnatural light.

I scream a battle cry and wave my hands and club in the air.

“Pippa!” Leonora cries, trying to hold me back. “What are you doing?”

I break from her and run at the glasseln. It shrinks back, its ears twitching. Then it creeps forward and lets out a terrible hiss—like a perturbed stable cat but louder and much more frightening.

I hiss back, trying to make myself as large and threatening as possible. Its muscles twitch, and then it leaps into the air.

“Is it gone?” Marigold asks, her voice laced with disbelief.

“No,” I answer, frantically looking for it in the air. It’s circling again. “It’s toying with us.”

It attacks from overhead, and this time its claws rip across my shoulder. I howl in agony. Once again, it turns in mid-air. Its eyes are on mine like a challenge. It’s going for the kill, and it’s focused on me.

“Get down!” I scream, and I hold my branch up to defend myself.

It hisses and then sweeps toward me, its eyes locked on mine.