Making its way ever onward toward the cliff, the trail passed between large fields, some planted with grain, others with vegetables. Once among the fields spreading out from the foot of the soaring cliff, the people with him finally felt safe enough to start whispering among themselves.
As they got closer to the rock wall, they came upon pens made of split rails. Some of the pens held sheep, others rather skinny hogs. A few milk cows stood together in a tight cluster in the corner of one pen. Long coops set among boulders fallen from the mountain towering over them looked like they were for chickens that were no doubt roosting for the night. Richard saw a few men tending to the animals.
One of the men was checking on the sheep, patting their backs to make them move aside as he wove his way back through the small but dense flock crowded together in a large pen.
“What is it, Henry?” Ester asked as she got closer. “What are you men doing down here at this time of night?”
The man couldn’t help staring for a brief moment at the strangers being carried in, one being helped on foot and a woman with a long fall of hair draped over a man’s shoulders. He lifted a hand out, gesturing to the neat grid of pens.
“The animals are restless.”
Richard looked back over a shoulder. The palm of his left hand rested on the familiar hilt of his sword as his gaze swept the fields between them and the dark mass of woods. He didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.
“I think you had better leave the animals and get inside,” Richard said as he scanned the dark tree line.
The man frowned as he lifted his knit cap to scratch his thinning white hair. “And who might you be to tell me what to do with our animals?”
Richard looked back at the man and shrugged, but then, feeling his legs about to give out, he put his left arm back around the shoulder of one of the two men standing beside him. “I’m just someone who doesn’t like it when animals are restless, and I’ve seen a lot of frightening things this night not all that far behind us.”
“He’s right,” Ester said as she started out again toward the rock wall. “You’d best get up inside with the rest of us.”
Henry replaced his cap on his head as he cast a worried frown toward the silent wall of the woods hard against the far edge of the fields. The tall spruce looked like sentinels keeping the moonlight from entering.
Henry conceded with a nod. “I’ll bring the others up right behind you.”
With the help of the men to either side, Richard followed behind Ester, who in turn followed behind the man carrying Kahlan. Out at the head of the small group making their way toward the cliff, a man with a lantern looked back from time to time, making sure everyone was still accounted for.
Kahlan, her long hair matted with blood, her arms dangling, hung limp and unconscious over the shoulder of the man carrying her. In the moonlight Richard could see the wounds from the thorny vines the Hedge Maid had used to bind and imprison her. From time to time blood from those and other wounds dripped from her fingertips.
Richard had the same kinds of cuts, but not as many as Kahlan. The thorn vines must have had a substance on them that kept wounds from closing up properly because his, too, still oozed blood. At least he had managed to kill the Hedge Maid before she could completely drain Kahlan of all her blood. Although seriously hurt, at least she was still alive.
As they had made their way through the forest on their way toward the village, he had ached to stop and heal her himself, but he knew that he was in no condition to be able to accomplish such a task. It took a variety of strengths on the part of the one doing the healing to be effective, strengths he didn’t have right then. It made more sense to get help for her.
Once he knew that Kahlan was safe, he needed to find out what had happened to the soldiers of the First File and the friends who had been with them. He refused to believe that those he cared so much about were already dead. He remembered all too vividly, though, the human bones he had seen. He was distressed that any of his people had died, but especially in such a horrific fashion.
As they approached the base of the cliff, the small group made their way through a sprawling boulder field of broken rock built up over time as rock cleaved from the cliff face to accumulate below. In some places those with Richard, making their way single-file among the boulders, had to duck under massive slabs of stone that had fallen from the face of the mountain and now rested atop the jumble of rock slabs.
Richard was surprised to see the people ahead of him start up a narrow path right up against the face of the rock wall. Set back in a tangle of scrub, it would have been easy to miss, had he not seen people ahead beginning to climb upward.
He had thought that maybe they had ladders going up to the inhabited caves, or even an interior passage, but it appeared that the only way up was along the path made up of natural crags and ledges of the rock face. Where there were no natural footholds, the rock looked to have been laboriously cut away to create a trail. In the weak yellow light of the lanterns carried by some of those ahead, he could see that the rock underfoot had been smoothed by people treading across it to ascend the cliff wall for what had to be thousands of years.
“What is this place?” Richard asked in a whisper.
Ester looked back over her shoulder. “Our village, Stroyza.”
Richard missed a step. He wondered if she knew what the name meant. Few people still alive understood High D’Haran. Richard was one of those who did.
“Why do you live up there? Why not build down among the fields and then you wouldn’t have to climb up and down this treacherous trail all the time?”
“It is where our people have always lived.” When that seemed not to be reason enough for him, she showed him a patient smile. “Don’t you think that it would also be treacherous for anyone who would come to attack us in the night?”
Richard glanced to the bobbing dots of lantern light out ahead as people carefully made their way ever upward. “I suppose you’re right. A single person up top could easily hold off an army trying to make their way up this trail.” His brow twitched. “Do you have a lot of trouble with people attacking your village?”
“This is the Dark Lands,” she said, as if that was explanation enough.
With the drizzle making the rock slick, Richard stepped carefully as they made their way up the narrow ledge of a path. The path wasn’t anywhere near wide enough for a man to walk on either side of him to help him walk, so one of the men instead followed close behind, ready to steady him if he faltered. Fortunately, there were iron handholds pinned into the face of the rock in particularly narrow spots.
Unfortunately, the handholds were on the left side, and his bandaged left arm was the one most severely injured. He was in so much pain that his fingers could barely grip the iron holds, so he sometimes had to cross his right hand over to grip the bars. It made it more difficult to climb, but kept him from falling. The man following close behind held on to the iron bars with one hand and from time to time used his other to help prop Richard up and to keep him from falling. Glancing downward in the faint moonlight revealed a dizzying drop.
When they finally reached the top, a small cluster of people waited to greet them. As Richard stepped onto the open area the crowd moved back to give the arriving party room. He could see that the naturally formed, broad cavity narrowed down in places into several cavelike, wide passageways going deeper back into the mountain. Concern masked the faces of the people watching the injured strangers being brought in.
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