The tree had broken his descent, but for a moment he still could not breathe at all. The pain was intense. Stars swam before his eyes, then slowly faded, and finally he saw his legs were dangling over the edge of the cliff.
And moving.
Moving downward.
The tree was a spindly pine, and his weight was slowly, slowly bending it over. He felt himself begin to slide along the trunk. He was helpless to stop it. He grabbed at the trunk and held tightly. And it worked: he wasn't sliding anymore. He pulled himself along the trunk, working his way back to the rock.
Then, to his horror, he saw the roots of the tree begin to break free of the rocky crevices, one by one snapping loose, pale in the sunlight. It was only a matter of time before the entire trunk broke free.
Then he felt a tug at his collar and saw the boy standing above him, hauling him back to his feet. The boy looked exasperated. "Come, now!"
"Jesus," Chris said. He flopped onto a flat rock, gasping for breath. "Just give me a minute - "
An arrow whined past his ear like a bullet. He felt the wind of its passage. He was stunned by the power of it. Energized by fear, he scrambled along the shelf, bent over, pulling himself from tree to tree. Another arrow snapped down through the trees.
On the cliff above, the horsemen were looking down on them. The black knight shouted, "Fool! Idiot!" and cuffed the archer angrily, knocking the bow from his hands. There were no more arrows.
The boy pulled Chris forward by the arm. Chris didn't know where the path along the cliff went, but the boy seemed to have a plan. Above him, the horsemen wheeled, turned away, heading back into the woods.
Now the shelf ended in a narrow ledge, no more than a foot wide, which curved around an angle in the cliff. Below the ledge was a sheer drop to the river. Chris stared at the river, but the boy grabbed his chin, jerked his head up. "Do not look down. Come." The boy pressed himself flat against the cliff face, hugging the rock, and moved gingerly along on the ledge. Chris followed his example, still gasping for breath. He knew if he hesitated at all, panic would overcome him. The wind tugged at his clothes, pulling him away from the cliff. He pressed his cheek to the warm rock, clutching at fingerholds, fighting panic.
He saw the boy disappear around the corner. Chris kept going. The corner was sharp, and the path beneath had fallen away, leaving a gap. He had to step across it carefully, but then he rounded the corner, and sighed in relief.
He saw the cliff now ended in a long green slope of forested land, which continued all the way down to the river. The boy was waving to him. Chris moved ahead, rejoining the boy.
"From here it is easier." The boy started down, Chris behind him. Almost at once, he realized the slope was not as gentle as it had appeared. It was dark beneath the trees, steep and muddy. The boy slipped, slid along the muddy track, and vanished into the forest below. Chris continued to pick his way downward, grabbing branches for support. Then he, too, lost his footing, slapped down in the mud on his backside, and slid. For some reason he thought, I am a graduate student at Yale. I am an historian specializing in the history of technology. It was as if he was trying to hold on to an identity that was rapidly fading from his awareness, like a dream from which he had awakened, and was now forgetting.
Sliding headlong in the mud, Chris banged into trees, felt branches scratch at his face, but could do nothing to slow his descent. He went down the hill, and down.
With a sigh, Marek got to his feet. There was no marker on Gomez's body. He was sure of it. Kate stood beside him, biting her lip. "I know she said there was a spare. I know it."
"I don't know where it is," Marek said.
Unconsciously, Kate started to scratch her head, then felt the wig, and the pain from the bump on her head. "This damn wig . . ."
She stopped. She stared at Marek.
And then she walked away into the woods along the edge of the path. "Where did it go?" she said.
"What?"
"Her head."
She found it a moment later, surprised at how small it seemed. A head without a body wasn't very big. She tried not to look at the stump of the neck.
Fighting revulsion, she crouched down and turned the head over, so that she was looking at the gray face, the sightless eyes. The tongue half-protruded from the slack jaw. Flies buzzed inside the mouth.
She lifted the wig away and immediately saw the ceramic marker. It was taped to the mesh inside the wig. She pulled it free.
"Got it," she said.
Kate turned it over in her hand. She saw the button in the side of the marker, where there was a small light. The button was so small and narrow, it could only be pushed with a thumbnail.
This was it. They had definitely found it.
Marek came over and stared at the ceramic.
"Looks like it to me," he said.
"So we can go back," Kate said. "Anytime we want."
"Do you want to go back?" Marek asked her.
She thought it over. "We came here to get the Professor," she said. "And I think that's what we ought to do."
Marek grinned.
And then they heard thundering hooves, and they dived into the bushes just moments before six dark horsemen galloped down the muddy path, heading toward the river below.
Chris staggered forward, knee-deep in boggy marsh at the edge of the river. Mud clung to his face, his hair, his clothes. He was covered in so much mud that he felt its weight. He saw the boy ahead of him, already splashing in the water, washing.
Pushing past the last of the tangles along the water's edge, Chris slid into the river. The water was icy cold, but he didn't care. He ducked his head under, ran his hand through his hair, rubbed his face, trying to get the mud off him.