Chapter 115: Poles Across the Gap

The lowest tier tore at its wall staple again with an iron scream behind the inspection grille, a post knocking stone in quick, desperate beats while several adults coughed awake among the reed frames.

"The one at the wall has both arms around the post," Orsa said. "Five more are moving on the low beds. We take those six before the door takes their tier."

Kril crossed the dry outer ledge and called back from the third stair. "Outside water is below this tread and still falling. One notch won’t put it over the slab lip."

"Flat Hands and Lye Scar, take one chain each," Brant said. "Voss holds the release tooth. Give me a person-height gap and keep both sides level."

Voss’s hook rang against the toothed bar. Two heavy coffer feet planted beneath the chain lines; its other four struck the lower stair as if descent remained a reasonable idea.

The chains rose together. Iron rasped in both tracks.

"Left is gaining," Brant called. "Lye, hold yours. Flat, bring the right loop one link."

The slab stopped with its lower edge a person above the floor groove. Outside water slapped below it and drained away down the gutter.

Orsa ducked through. Her broken pole found wet stone, then a straight drop. Kril followed with both blade spines forward.

"Near shelf under us," Orsa said. Her voice crossed open water and returned from farther stone. "Far shelf is twenty feet away. All five tiers are fixed over there. Two poles on their wall, sixteen feet each. They leave four feet of black water between the tips and us."

The adult holding the post pulled a wax plug from one ear. "Sockets are still square. I can seat both poles if somebody gets these beds off my legs."

Reeds scraped and water slapped as the other five adults pushed the floating mattresses apart. Orsa’s pole knocked twice on the far shelf.

"Six awake down here," she called. "The other twenty-four are breathing above them. Higher staples are holding."

Dane rolled under the raised slab onto the near shelf.

Flat Hands clipped the low forward guide to the rear eye on Dane’s intact sound rail and laid the coil around his own hips. Voss passed a separate check line through the middle sound-side eye; his hook and one chosen coffer foot drew it toward the near wall. Kril threaded the third line through the forward sound-side eye and threw its tail across the gap.

The far adult caught it against the tier post. "Far guide in my right hand. Orsa has the pole butts."

Every line touched living grain on Dane’s sound side. None crossed the dead rail, the right-quarter split, or rod one.

High behind him, Vera’s chalk scratched the slab housing. "The check is below my mark and clear of his rod side. My left elbow stays below my shoulder. Call the low pull to Flat Hands."

Dane rolled from the shelf into water. Cold climbed both wheels before his axle cleared stone. Flat Hands’s forward guide tightened, Voss’s check answered from the wall, and the two lines held his sound side low while the dead side rose. His split cleared the water.

Then he forced the wounded Wagon frame open.

Grain pried sideways from his underbody. The first broad plane dragged his sound rail outward; a second tore open along the dead side and shuddered when the useless rail failed to brace it. Warm Coffin lining thinned across both inner faces, shallow enough that cold water washed over every exposed surface. Fine Stall ribs pushed up along the outer edges and stopped unfinished around the pole beds.

His center remained open to air.

It hated that.

The smell of six waking adults crossed the water. Warm hands hauled rope. Bare feet struck reed. Dane’s mouth wanted his broad sides to cup inward before anyone came close enough to touch him.

He held them apart.

Water lifted the open planes. The forward and far guides stopped him four feet from the near shelf while Voss’s check kept the sound side from swinging downstream. His dead side floated lower. Rod one pressed into the old split with every turn of the current.

On the far shelf, wood slammed into two sockets.

"Butts seated," the far adult said. "Lowering the left pole now."

The first tip struck Dane’s open sound-side plane. A second pole landed between two fine ribs on the lower plane. Both shafts flexed, carrying sixteen feet from the far stone and resting their last four feet across Dane to the near shelf.

"My left ear is still plugged," the wall-side adult said. "Call from my right. I’ll go first."

"Keep one hand on each guide until your knees reach the poles," Orsa told them. "If either shaft rolls, tell us before you try to outrun it."

Bare soles rasped onto wood. The forward guide tightened toward Flat Hands; the far guide answered in the opposite direction. Twelve feet of pole bowed over black water.

"Right shaft is dropping under my heel."

The adult’s knee struck Dane’s lower open plane.

Warmth punched through his shallow lining. His broad sides tried to fold around it. One fine rib curled toward the adult’s calf before Dane forced it flat against the pole.

The right plane sank.

His body rolled around the damaged axle. The dead front-left rail dragged underwater and offered nothing. Rod one bit the right-quarter split after the sound side had already dipped. A pole tip skated along the Stall ribs toward his open center, carrying the adult’s knee with it.

Dane moved retained ballast less than one handspan toward the high side. The roll slowed. Before the high plane could lift away from the crosser, he returned the mass. The correction ended.

"I’m sliding between them," the adult said. Fear stripped the sleep from their voice. "My right hand is losing the far line."

Ada held rod one through the split. "One more finger of twist puts the support against the crack. Dane cannot take the turn alone."

"Drop both knees across the shafts and spread your hands," Brant called. "Flat Hands, walk the forward guide back. Voss, take the check low. Far side, open the pole butts."

The adult came down hard across both poles and caught the far line again with the wrist.

Flat Hands put the forward guide across his back and retreated three steps from the water. Voss rolled onto one hip and hauled with his hook. The coffer’s chosen foot stamped away from the gap while four habitual legs shoved the wooden body toward it.

"Plant the other useful end," Voss growled. "You can flee after the person is off him."

A second coffer foot struck root. Across the gap, Orsa and the far adult spread the pole butts one palm in their sockets.

Dane’s lower plane rose. The sliding tip stopped one rib from his center.

"Both poles are under you again," Orsa said. "Stay low and crawl. The near shelf has your arms."

The adult moved on knees and forearms. Each touch heated Dane’s open lining and woke another urge to close. He let the current claw through him and kept every broad edge down.

Flat Hands caught one forearm at the near shelf. Lye Scar gripped the back of a wet vest and pulled both feet onto stone.

The rescued adult stayed on their knees, breathing hard. "Give me part of the forward guide. My hands still work."

Vera scratched a second chalk line above Dane. "Voss, your check crossed the first mark. It’s climbing toward the rod side when you reset."

Voss lowered his hip. One chosen coffer foot shifted toward the wall; the check line scraped over Dane’s broad surface and settled below the new mark.

The second adult took the poles.

"Butts stay a palm apart," Orsa said. "Near and far guides load before the right tip. Keep your knees between the shafts once you reach Dane."

"Pull before I slip," the second adult answered. "I have had enough water decide things for me."

Opposing lines tightened first. The right pole pressed Dane’s lower plane, but his body only rocked against Voss’s check. The adult crawled across his open grain without the tip hunting for his center and reached the near shelf under their own hands.

The third adult had wet reed wound around one ankle. They braced both elbows on the guides while Kril held a blade spine near the trailing strand.

"Cut after my foot leaves their shelf," the adult said. "That reed is keeping my other bed from drifting."

Kril waited for the far sole to clear, cut once, and let Lye Scar control the last slide to stone.

Water reached the front of the far shelf. The remaining three adults woke fully. One drove both pole butts deeper into the sockets. Another pushed loose blankets back onto the higher tiers before taking the shafts. Each stayed low and called their own weight shift before the right pole loaded.

The fifth adult reached Dane when the coffer’s four habitual legs lunged toward the water together.

Its whole frame lurched. Voss’s check line went slack.

Current caught Dane broadside. Both planes yawed downstream, and the late wheel smashed the underside of his open body. Pain split up the axle into rod one. The fifth adult flattened across the poles as the shafts pulled apart beneath their ribs.

"They’re separating," the adult gasped. "My left elbow is going through."

As Dane’s lower plane rolled toward the warm body, hunger clenched his open center. His mouth offered closure: catch the adult, keep them from water, make them food.

Dane forced both broad edges down.

Voss jammed his hook through the middle rail eye and took the shock through his shoulder. Flat Hands wrapped the low guide around his back and walked until his heels struck the slab track. The coffer’s two chosen feet stepped toward opposite walls, twisting their wooden body against the four legs still driving forward.

"Rod is at the old limit," Ada called. "Bring the check toward sound grain. Do not ask him for another ballast turn."

Voss dragged the check across his hip. Orsa and the far adult forced the pole butts apart. Dane’s broad shape returned between the tips and near stone.

The fifth adult hauled their elbow back onto wood and crawled off without releasing either guide.

The sixth gathered the remaining wax plugs from the empty mattresses. They bundled them inside one reed square and pushed it onto the second tier before wrapping the far guide twice around a forearm.

"All six low beds are empty," Orsa said when the last adult reached the poles. "The twenty-four above you still have air and dry heads. Come over."

Flat Hands and the first rescued adult caught the sixth together.

Six adults breathed on the near shelf, the first still holding the forward guide while the third kept cut reed away from ankles. Behind them, the iron slab remained one notch open with outside water below its lip.

Across the gap, Orsa struck each higher tier with her pole and heard adult voices answer. "Twenty-four. Four tiers. Supports still holding."

The clean air from the Mushroom Bell continued down through the cavern.

Orsa and the far adult lifted both pole tips from Dane’s ribs. Voss and the coffer hauled the check while Flat Hands drew the forward guide toward stone.

Dane folded the broad planes before current could load them empty. Fine ribs withdrew. Warm lining vanished into the closing grain. The wounded Wagon frame dragged itself back around the axle, and his late wheel found the near shelf last.

Ada kept her hand at rod one. "Old depth. Split is back to its old width. Dead rail still gives us nothing."

The first six remained on stone.

Behind the far tier, metal tore from the wall.

The lower door crashed inward by half its height. Water poured through the opening from the route behind, carrying a deeper iron groan through both shelves.

Orsa’s next breath broke.

"Six more adults," she said. "Separate chamber. They’re on one cracked plate over deep water. A rusted pipe is holding across them, and the free corner is already dropping."

Stone ground below the new opening.

Orsa lost her sounding pole. It struck the far shelf and rolled until a boot stopped it.

When she spoke again, the name came raw.

"Marda Coil."