Chapter 364: Room to Pass

Chapter 364: Room to Pass

The trunk shifted, then caught against the cliff again.

Glitch stopped before Jin had to ask. A broken root had lodged in a crack, holding the rest of the pine in place. Behind them, the bear roared a second time, closer and angrier.

Jin crouched to see beneath Glitch’s shoulder. He wanted to pull the root free with his hands, but if the trunk rolled, there would be nowhere to move them.

"A little higher," he told Glitch. "Just the end."

The drake adjusted his feet and lifted. The root snapped with a dry crack. Jin stepped back as the trunk came loose, then sent a firm push through the bond.

Glitch drove forward one heavy pace. The pine rolled across the boulder’s rounded top, its crown dragging the rest toward the drop. Branches tore loose. Jin called a halt before Glitch reached the outside edge, and the tree tipped away in a rush of gravel.

It crashed down the slope below them.

The opening was clear.

Pim checked the exposed edge with his pole rather than immediately leading Clover across. He scraped away loose debris and waved Sefa through to guide the ox from the far side.

Flicker returned as Clover started forward. Jin felt her alertness without alarm. She flew back toward the opening, paused on a branch in sight, and looked farther along the ledge.

"Go to her perch, then around the bend Holt pointed out," Jin told Pim. "I’ll follow."

Clover’s crate frame brushed the cliff, but her feet stayed on firm ground. Sefa took her forward, with Nib tucked securely inside her coat, while Pim checked the trailing crate had cleared. Jin counted them through, sent Glitch after them, and finally looked back.

Holt stood beneath the overhang, one hand raised. A pale barrier spanned the constriction from cliff to drop. The bear slammed against it, and light shivered across its surface.

Tuck darted near the cliff side, snapping at the foreleg the bear tried to force around the barrier. Each time it turned toward him, Holt moved the shield forward enough to make it give ground. Together they were keeping it at the narrow point, but her boots had scraped two furrows in the gravel.

"Everyone’s through!" Jin shouted.

Holt acknowledged him without looking away. "Keep moving!"

He obeyed. Flicker followed him around the bend, and he reached the others on a wider shelf screened from the overhang by a jutting spur. Glitch stood facing back toward the trees.

Jin wanted to stay behind him. Instead, he moved Clover and the others farther along the shelf, leaving the narrow entrance clear for Holt and Tuck.

A sharp pulse of pale light flashed through the branches.

Tuck appeared first. Astral light spread from his shoulders as he sprang across the broken outside edge of the bend. He landed beyond the spur and turned, growling toward the way he had come.

Above him, Holt rose along the cliff on two narrow fans of light. She caught a high ledge, well above the overhang, and drew herself behind its projecting lip. Jin could see only one boot before she disappeared.

The bear struck something beneath her with a crash. The spur hid it from Jin, but fragments burst out below the high ledge, followed by the scrape of claws on stone. He could see Holt’s fingers gripping the lip above it.

Tuck stayed close to the rock, out of sight of the overhang. Holt kept herself low. Jin pressed his back against the cliff and waited, trying not to breathe loudly enough for anyone to hear him.

Jin waited for it to come around the bend anyway.

There was another scrape, a heavy snort, then retreating footfalls. He did not move until Tuck lowered his ruff.

Holt came around the spur a few minutes later, having descended behind it. Her face was gray with exertion. She braced a hand against the rock and took several breaths before speaking.

"It’s gone back toward the gully. We’re moving north."

They walked until the trees were behind them. Only then did Holt call a rest where she could watch the approach.

"Everybody all right?" she asked.

"Pim, Sefa, Clover, Nib," Jin said. "Both mine. All the equipment."

"Good." Holt accepted the water Pim handed her. "You got them through quickly. And you left us room to follow."

Jin sat down before his legs could embarrass him. He was still holding Flicker’s feet gently against his sleeve, although she had settled there without any help.

"I didn’t think it would come up after us," he admitted.

"Neither did I expect it that soon," Holt said. "That’s why Tuck was watching the rear."

"Could you have killed it?"

Holt drank before answering. "Possibly. I’d rather come back with enough strength to cover the rest of the trip. It stopped pursuing once we broke contact. We were fortunate, and we used it."

Jin looked at the wolf lying beside her. He’d known Rank 3 meant flight, but seeing Tuck cross that broken edge so easily had made the difference feel unpleasantly large.

Glitch nudged his knee. Jin rubbed the plates above his nose.

"You were good," he said quietly. "That tree wasn’t going anywhere without you."

He checked the shoulder Glitch had used. Pine sap streaked the Harden-darkened plates, and a splinter had wedged between two of them. Jin eased it out while the drake held still. Flicker hopped down his sleeve to examine the wood, then lost interest when he dropped it.

His hands were steadier by the time he finished. He wished he’d noticed when that happened.

The drake leaned harder against him. Jin had to brace both feet to stay on the rock, which helped more than another explanation would have.

They reached the Ember Shelf later that afternoon.

Silver-gray sage bushes covered the terrace, their seed heads glowing dull orange in the sunlight. When the wind stirred them, Jin caught a dry, sharp smell like a struck match.

Flicker leaned toward the nearest bush.

"No," he said, moving his shoulder away.

"Good call," Sefa said. "The raw seeds irritate a bird’s crop. They’ll need drying, processing, and a measured dose."

Jin stroked Flicker’s neck until she stopped trying to reach. Her interest made him want to hurry the processing along, though he suspected Sefa would have something to say about that too.

The botanist knelt among the bushes with Nib and began checking the stand. Pim photographed the approach while Holt inspected a sheltered camping hollow above the terrace.

They worked until the light began to fade. Jin helped label sample tins, then carried water to the beasts and checked Glitch for damage beneath the broken twigs caught against his armor. He found scratches on the outer plates, but no injury.

Afterward, he sat beside their bedrolls and ate his ration with both hands. He had been hungry for an hour without noticing.

Holt arranged the watch with the other two adults. Jin was to sleep unless called; tomorrow they would finish the plant assessment and inspect the route again together.

He was grateful enough not to argue.

Flicker settled against Glitch’s neck while Tuck took the first watch beside Holt. Jin watched the little bird tuck away her head, then pulled his blanket closer. The camp felt warmer with them there.