Chapter 234: Jiang Let the Wakehound Bite His Trail

White light curled between Jiang’s toes.

Runoff slid across the cradle, passed beneath the family carrier, and vanished through a crack in the far rail. Wherever the water touched his feathers, it shone like a fresh knife edge.

Beside him, the injured male smelled it too. His beak shifted against the hide. No strength followed.

Hest leaned over the rail and watched the light spill into the shaft. "Please tell me Red Aeries does that for honored guests."

"Red Aeries ate its honored guests," Mottle called from above. "That is why the lift was available."

"I continue to regret asking questions."

Jiang lifted his sound foot from the water. The glow went out around his toes, but the stream below kept its pale rim. Something scraped wet stone above them.

Above them, the wakehound had reached the shaft.

Its blind face appeared through red mist, gills opening against the living wall. Following the runoff brought the creature to the north chain. Dry iron carried no scent. It circled the hanging links, mouth opening and closing around empty air, then found the next patch of wet tissue and drove downward.

Their cradle had barely cleared the upper gallery.

"Drop us," Jiang said.

Ilex’s hands remained on the west release. "The next stop is past the counter-run. If I let that link travel, I cannot pull it back from here."

"Then we will complain from somewhere lower."

His partner struck his shoulder with her beak.

Pain ran through the injury. Jiang turned and found her standing between him and the outer rail, breast low over the chick. Her mate lay beneath one wing. Every soft note had left the changing call in her throat.

She had watched him leave the family once already.

Jiang looked at the light under the carrier. Another barb in that stream would turn every wet hiding place below into a signal fire before the wakehound ever reached the cradle.

An empty saddle hide hung beneath the broken fourth chain. Years of mist had darkened it, but the inner fold was still dry. A counterweight cord passed through one corner and disappeared into a slit beside the shaft.

Old animal oil clung to it.

Jiang could give it newer oil.

"Valea," he said. "Can that hide survive one pull?"

She hooked two fingers under the cracked hem. "It can survive the first part of one."

"Good enough for one descent."

"That phrase has injured all of us today."

Wet flesh shuddered when the wakehound struck the wall. A white barb opened in another ribbon of runoff. Light raced along the scar and stopped where stone rose dry between the creature and the lift.

Above, Slate backed away from the north chain without waiting for Rill. Its flank trembled beneath the old scar. Rill saw the hunter climbing toward their end and unhooked his flight cord.

Eda pulled Cress clear of the southern tail. Cress released it only after the loose chain settled away from Mottle’s damaged wing.

Nobody stayed in reach merely because Jiang needed the lift.

Ilex looked down at him. "Choose."

Jiang twisted toward his tail.

Reaching the preen gland should have been the most ordinary movement his body knew. A healthy emperor could rub oil into its beak and work it through a coat while half asleep. Jiang’s straight leg folded badly beneath him, and twisting pulled the open flank until cold air found skin.

His beak missed the first time.

Hest made the mistake of noticing.

"Is this part private?"

"It was until you asked."

Jiang reached again. A small smear came from the gland at the base of his tail, carrying the warm, waxy scent of his completed coat. He worked it along the inner side of his beak.

His partner caught the smell and shoved between him and the empty hide.

She pressed her breast against his. Behind her, the chick’s head showed beneath the injured male’s wing. The male drew a rough breath and tried to lift that wing farther.

Jiang answered with the first note of the family’s changing call.

His partner gave him the second.

He looked toward the saddle hide.

She followed his gaze. For one hard beat, she held him against the inner rail. Then she stepped backward over her mate and spread herself across both male and chick.

Space between them opened.

She settled lower over her mate and chick. Trust did not soften her warning call. It made the sound sharper, because Jiang was taking her answer somewhere she could not follow.

Jiang hated how much trust could resemble permission to get hurt.

Valea dragged the empty hide within his beak’s reach. He rubbed oil into the dry fold, then along the counterweight cord. Its fibers drank the scent faster than the leather. By the time he finished, the feathers around his tail felt thin and wrong without their usual share.

Warm mist touched the unprotected patch.

His body tried to preen it again. He forced his beak away.

Now the hide smelled like him: salt, wax, wet feathers, and the warm hollow where he slept beside two other emperors. Months ago, recognizing his own animal scent would have ruined his week. Embarrassment could wait for a safer one.

Hest fed the cord around the broken chain. His burned palm failed to close on the first grip, so he trapped it between wrist and rail instead.

"Where do you want your deeply personal laundry?"

Jiang pointed his beak toward the slit in the shaft. "Through there. Keep it wet until the counter-run, then let the hide climb dry."

Valea studied the cord’s path. "If the weight catches, the line comes back across this cradle."

"Cut it before it catches."

She showed him the bent knife. "With the edge that defeated string at Cairnspire?"

"Bite through it, then."

"I have standards left."

Above the cradle, the hunter found another wet bridge.

Its pale body poured around the wall, longer than the cradle and narrow enough to bend through the scar. Six gill cuts opened. The circular mouth faced the white water beneath Jiang’s feet.

Bellwyrm emerged from a crack on the opposite wall. The long creature had descended faster than the lift by using its claws and unburned forelimb. It saw the wakehound, tasted the air through its ruined jaw, and flattened itself against stone.

Hest pulled the counterweight cord.

Oiled leather slid from the cradle and slapped into the stream.

Its blind head turned before the splash reached Jiang.

Its gills drank the fresh oil. The long body drove after the hide as Valea guided the cord toward the side slit. White flesh struck the opening, folded, and vanished into the counter-run.

Wet cord tore over the rail.

"Release the brake!" Jiang shouted.

Ilex opened the west brake.

Mottle kicked the north catch free with her good foreclaw and threw herself away from the chain. Above her, Rill pulled Ilex clear as the wheel spun. Eda braced Cress against the first recoil; Slate chose open gallery and limped for it.

Wood fell beneath their bodies.

Jiang’s belly left the boards. His partner closed over the chick. Valea caught Hest by the belt, and Hest kept the cord pinned beneath his burned wrist.

Beside Jiang, the injured male slid toward the outer rail.

His beak opened on a sound too weak to become a call.

Jiang landed beside the carrier, braced his straight leg on the snapped chain, and took the male’s neck across his breast. The old injury in his shoulder seemed to split. His partner planted both feet and shoved from the other side until the carrier settled.

One lift stage passed above them.

The cradle struck its lower stop. Every chain groaned, but the bed held.

The counterweight cord kept moving.

Inside the narrow run, the wakehound had closed its mouth around the hide. Its pull lifted the dry fold out of the runoff. The scent thinned. The creature worried the leather against stone, trying to force oil through gills that had only dust and old hair to taste.

Bellwyrm climbed beside the slit. A saddle hook snagged the cord above its burned forelimb. Bellwyrm struck the hook against the wall until rotten wood broke away, clearing its own path and the decoy with the same blow.

Empty leather shot upward into dry darkness.

Water stripped the final sheen from the cord below it.

The wakehound released its bite.

Jiang felt the slack arrive through Hest’s wrist.

"Cut it now," he said.

Valea pinned the cord to the rail and sawed with the bent edge. Fibers lifted. The blade skated away.

Hest bent to use his teeth.

The white stream at the cradle mouth flared.

Fresh oil had drawn the hunter back to the last wet place shared by decoy and penguin.

Its back struck one wet exit, then another. Trail barbs opened in the runoff channels around the lower stop. Each flare left less darkness beyond the cradle and fewer ways to carry the family unseen.

Valea bit into the cord beside Hest. The wet fibers held.

Jiang stepped onto the loose tail to keep it away from the chick.

The cradle swung. The cord rolled beneath his sound foot, crossed itself, and climbed around his ankle.

He kicked once. The loop tightened.

The other end slipped under the family carrier and out through the rail.

Hest grabbed for Jiang. His burned hand closed on feathers and lost them.

Above the lower stop, pale flesh filled the counter-run.

The wakehound bit down on the oil-soaked cord with its round mouth.

The loop around Jiang’s sound foot became a fist.