Chapter 415: The Hanging River

Ren hauled the cradle himself this time.

He backed it into the entry basin until Bolt and Riptide could swim over the rim, then drew it clear and took the drawbar. Anvil followed up the ramp with Balm’s tray level above its shell. The crab had hauled the same load before the fight. Now it shortened every step on the wounded side.

The grey light had dimmed by the time they reached the arch.

Ren pulled the cradle through and brought them down to the cove. Bolt and Riptide returned to the shallows while he helped Anvil onto its resting rock.

Balm’s turf went beside the damp home patch. After another treatment, Ren cleaned and dressed the leg, replenished the feed and dressings, and left Anvil to rest. He sent Lyra and Iris the same short message: everyone had returned; Anvil was hurt but recovering; they would go back once it could manage the route.

He kept the cracked chamber wrapped and tagged in his pack.

When Anvil could bear weight without disturbing the wound, Ren secured Balm’s tray to the carrier and they loaded the cradle again. He stayed beside it while the crab hauled Bolt and Riptide up the shore’s slope and lowered them back into the water. The injured leg held. Its step remained shorter than the others.

Ren took the long haul to the arch.

Inside, the light was brighter. He brought the cradle down the ramp, released the two into the basin and returned the trough to its notch. He refilled it, secured it above the wash and left the drawbar facing uphill.

The five bodies were gone.

Drag marks crossed the grit toward the upper shelf. A broken haft lay beside the slope, but nothing moved above it. Ren followed the marks as far as he could see from the bank, then returned to the group.

They passed the stepping stones and approached the pool beneath the aqueduct. He wanted a connected route inland, with water for Bolt and Riptide and a bank Anvil could use. The aqueduct gave him a direction to try.

Beyond the pool, its next span had fallen. A standing pier faced a broken stub across a drop filled with cloud.

Ren could pick out footholds along the near face. He could not examine the far bearing from here. A bridge for Anvil and a loaded cradle would need sound support at both ends, and his control had weakened when he spread his working across separated shelves.

He left the gap and followed the bank beneath the pier.

Bolt swam through the visible run and returned. Ren walked beside the same stretch until the ledge narrowed under an overhang. Water continued beneath it; there was no room above for Anvil’s shell.

"You fit," he told Bolt. "Anvil doesn’t."

Riptide held at the pier’s foot, where a side current passed beneath a stone lip. It followed the current out of sight, returned, and approached the opening again. Ren felt its attention through the bond and crouched beside it.

He raised his lamp beneath the lip.

The opening widened around the pier into a passage through the ridge. A dry margin ran beside the channel. Farther in, a projection narrowed it, with a high step just beyond.

Ren went ahead on foot. He cut the projection back with Earth and shaped the step into a short ramp, leaving rough purchase on its surface. Both held after he withdrew his working.

Anvil lowered its shell beneath the entrance. Ren lifted the lamp to check Balm’s clearance, then fastened it to his belt. The tray passed beneath the roof with room to spare.

At the ramp, he supported the rear of the shell while Anvil climbed. Once it stood on the level stretch, he let go. The crab tested the return slope with a foot before following him inward.

Bolt and Riptide kept alongside them in the channel.

— • —

A low hum came through the passage.

Pale fins grew from the cavern wall ahead, thin enough for their edges to tremble. The note deepened as air began moving toward Ren’s face. Above the water, a narrow vent blew harder.

At the same time, water welled from beneath the ridge and climbed a sloping stone throat.

Ren stopped on the entrance ledge. The flow rose past the dark bands on the throat’s sides and spilled over the upper lip. Spray caught the lamp’s light. Anvil settled behind him, leaving the channel clear.

The vent’s note weakened. Water near the lip slowed, then drew back into a groove along the throat’s lower side. The returning current struck the entrance channel and curled around the rocks beneath Ren.

Bolt turned into the deeper pool below the ledge.

Ren watched the vent strengthen as the water climbed again. The force came from farther inside the ridge; he could see where the water emerged, but not the chamber feeding it.

On this push, flat fish peeled from the stone and rode upward. They were clear enough for the lamplight to show through them. When the flow eased, they settled against the throat’s sides, bellies pressed to the wet rock.

A line of steps climbed the cavern wall above them.

Ren lifted the lamp. Shelves had been cut well above the flood marks, with shallow recesses opening behind them. Beside the nearest recess was a round niche at hand height. Its lower edge had been rubbed smooth.

He followed the steps upward with the light until they disappeared behind a projection. Grit lay undisturbed along the nearest treads.

The vent sounded again. Ren lowered the lamp to the route ahead.

A narrow ledge followed the left wall beside the throat and widened beyond its upper lip. Water remained in the deeper groove even when much of the sloping floor was exposed.

"On the fall," he said. "There’s more stone to stand on."

Riptide stayed below the return mouth.

It approached as the water receded, then drew back into the pool. Ren looked along the current it had avoided. A strand of pale weed had caught on a rock at the throat’s foot. The falling water pulled it straight toward the lower channel and held it there.

The exposed stone lay beside the strongest draw. Bolt would have to swim against that flow while Anvil climbed.

Ren watched Riptide instead of the bare floor.

The fins began to hum. The strand loosened as the downward pull eased. Riptide moved toward the throat, then held just below the slope while the water began to rise.

Ren could see the interval now.

"Wait there."

He followed the wall ledge far enough to examine its narrowest stretch. A slab rocked beneath his boot, opening a gap against its bed. He stepped back onto sound stone and worked the slab into the recess below it, closing the gap without disturbing the watercourse.

After withdrawing, he put his weight on it again. The slab stayed seated.

He returned to Anvil as the next fall drew through the channel. Riptide held in the pool, with Bolt turning beside it. Ren rested a hand on the shell until the hum began again.

The weed slackened.

Riptide entered the throat as the rising water reached the lower band. Bolt followed close behind, remaining in the deep groove. Ren watched them pass the upper lip before the push strengthened.

Anvil climbed the ledge.

Ren kept beside its rear, the lamp lighting the injured leg and the stone under it. At the seated slab, the crab paused and placed a foot along the outer edge. It took its weight, brought the shell forward and continued.

Water struck the throat’s wall below them. Spray reached Ren’s boots. He shortened his steps to Anvil’s pace as the crab climbed past the wet stone.

The ledge broadened above the lip.

A faint call came through an opening higher in the cavern: three beats, a pause, then two.

Ren looked toward the opening. He could see grey light beyond it, but no figure. The sound did not come again.

Anvil reached the resting shelf and turned toward the upper basin. Bolt and Riptide came alongside in the water. The crab lowered its body, taking weight off the dressed leg, and waited while Ren climbed the last step.

He checked the dressing. It had stayed in place.

Anvil rose when he stood beside it. They followed the basin’s edge together.

— • —

The upper watercourse ran through a chain of grown-stone basins.

Their pale lips stood at different heights, joined by channels worn smooth under the flow. A raised course followed the wall above them and curved back toward the first basin. Beyond it, another length of aqueduct ended against open grey light.

Water arrived through the throat and spread down the chain.

Ren stopped near the third basin. A dark line marked its inner wall. As the surface approached that line, less water entered through the open mouth, though the push from below continued.

More of the flow took a side passage at the junction. It climbed into the raised course and ran back toward the first basin.

Ren moved along the bank until he could touch the grown stone where the channels divided.

He recognized the response from Ebbmere. As the receiving basin filled, the change passed through the joined working and altered what entered it. Here he could follow that response into the side passage as well: the return took more while the third basin took less.

He followed the connection to the next junction. Beyond it, the working continued into stone he could no longer read.

Ren lifted his hand.

Water passed him along the raised course and fell into the earlier basin. The next push joined it. Through the gaps in the cavern wall, he could see broken spans that no longer carried anything, but the courses around him still received and returned the flow.

He traced the nearest junction in his notebook, marking where he had lost it.

Riptide entered the side passage. Its clear body followed the returning current up the slope and along the wall. When the push eased, it held in a deeper hollow beneath the course’s outer lip. As the water rose again, it moved on.

Ren watched it emerge into the first basin.

Bolt waited beneath the throat’s upper lip.

A group of flat fish arrived with the rising water. Bolt rushed them, and they scattered against the stone, settling so close to the lip that Ren lost sight of most of them.

Bolt circled beneath the basin’s overhang.

On the next push, it stayed low until the fish released their hold. It rose beneath them and caught one before the others flattened against the wall. The clear body vanished between its teeth.

Ren sat on a dry stretch of bank and ate from his pack. He put some of Bolt’s usual feed into the water beside him. Bolt took it, then returned to the deeper part of the basin.

Anvil rested within reach of the lamp. Ren loosened the care bag from its carrier and set out some shell grit. While the crab fed, he dampened the exposed edge of Balm’s turf. The moss had remained inside the tray throughout the crossing.

Farther along, the ledge widened beside the fourth basin. Level stone gave room for the whole group, with a view back along their approach. The watercourse continued past it, and the route to the throat remained open.

Ren carried the lamp over to examine the dry margin.

Worn places marked the floor. Stone benches stood along one wall, facing figures carved into the other. He raised the light and followed the row.

The figures had mineral ridges along their shoulders and forearms, like the warriors on the bank. Within their chests, the carver had cut the shapes of cavities. The first figures held one each. Farther along, lines joined several cavities inside a single body.

Ren bent closer to the first carving.

The curved outer edge resembled the cracked section wrapped in his pack. He remembered its ridged face and where the working had ended at the break. He left the bundle wrapped and opened his notebook.

Small marks ran beneath the figures. He could not read them.

He copied the single cavity, then the connected ones, leaving space beside them for the marks. Along the base of the wall, shallow cuts had been worn smooth by feet. Someone had stood close enough to use these carvings, over and over.

The final figure was taller.

A crown-shaped structure rose above its head. The surrounding stone had been cut into ridges, with channels and cavities inside them. Ren moved the lamp to see where the lines from the figure met those shapes.

He copied the crown last, then added the connections around it.

The lines from the crowned figure continued into the carved ridge.