Halfway up the ravine I found a gravel trail lined with flowers in full bloom. Blossoms of purple spiraled open from blue-green bushes. Coiled amongst the stalks of those bushes were red vines sprung open in bursts of bright white blade-like petals.

There was no mistaking that I'd found the path to Methuzalan. I didn't know what kind of flowers these were, indeed, even in my dealings with numerous florists back home I'd never seen the like. But at the tail end of summer, when the grass of the plains was ready to fade from gold to brown, these had to be out of season.

My feet took to the path easily enough. The hem of my pants brushed against the flowers unleashing a shimmer of pollen, and the distinct aroma of cherry-glazed lamb shank. My mouth watered, and I became even more curious about the flowers. I so wanted to pluck some, but it was in bad taste, and I would need all of the healer's good will if she was going to expedite my order in time for me to leave with the rest of the caravan.

I pushed on.

The path shrank with every step, till the bushes pressed in on me and I was forced to put my feet directly in front of each other to avoid their lowest branches. The trail led into a gap in the wall of the rocky side of the ravine. I stepped past the last of the flowering bushes and into the narrow crevice.

I shivered.

Nearly all the light was blotted out in the narrow earthen hallway, save a sliver of blue sky directly above me. The rocks radiated a cold that penetrated my bones, and though it was the heat of summer outside the passageway, my breath billowed out in clouds of steam.

After several steps I got the feeling that the walls were moving. Slowly crushing in around me. I tried to turn around but it was too narrow.

A cloud covered the sky, and I was left only with gray light to press forward through the rocky passage.

I started to run. Sharp rocks pressed out from the walls cutting through my clothes and into my skin. Blood poured from the cuts only to freeze upon my flesh.

My chest was so tight I could barely breathe, but I kept running. I didn't dare look back again. I didn't dare stop.

There was a turn up ahead.

SWOOOOSH

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The wind hit me in the face, and I skidded to a halt. I'd stepped out onto a ledge on the side of the cliff, overlooking the ocean, the walls around me gone.

I threw myself against the wall of stone and hugged the face of the rock, panting. I must have been a thousand feet up. The waves roared below, crashing against rocks that rose from the base of the cliff like angry spears.

My head spun. I was going to fall.

I could feel my feet slipping out, my palms growing slick with sweat against the rocks to which I clung.

My legs trembled so badly, I wasn't sure if I was going to collapse before I even had time to slip.

This was not the kind of adventure I'd signed up for. Mine was one of new sights and people and trade. My path was not one that led along rocky ledges no wider than my shoe.

SWOOOOOOOOOOSH

Another gust crashed against the rocks, threatening to tear me off my perch and pitch me to the certain death that waited below.

The gust passed.

I moved one foot.

Then another.

Then a hand. Then the other.

One tiny movement. One inch closer to the relative safety I hoped waited for me at the other end of the ledge.

I continued like that for minutes or hours or days. Truthfully, my focus was so intense on making one tiny movement at a time, sensing the lulls in the wind that preceded the gusts, testing each hold for my hands and feet for any possibility of fragility or slippery moss, I would not have noticed the sun rising or setting. The pain of the rocks digging into my raw fingertips became the friendly reminder that I was alive.

"Welcome," said a voice from behind me, tickling my ear as though whispered from inches away.

"Aaaagh!" I screamed as surprise caused my body to jerk and my tenuous grasp of the wall of rock to slip.

I tipped back, my arms cartwheeling, trying to grab anything, even air. But nothing met my hands. And I fell.

Time slowed. I was going to die. All for some sunburn ointment. I should have just stayed home, swallowed my pride, and become Falmar's lapdog.

It's amazing how many thoughts ran through my head in the time it took me to fall onto a shelf of soft earth one foot below me. The spongy soil cushioned my back and head even as my mind spun, trying to catch up.

Yes. I'd made it to the Witch Doctor's lair and hadn't even noticed.

"Hahahahaha," She laughed, her voice–the ringing of wind chimes. "That was–ha ha–very enter–taining! I didn't think you'd be so funny."

I turned my head and saw a woman bent over, clutching her belly. Her hair was silver as moonlight; her eyes dark like the night sky; her skin, reddish like the clay of the earth, was smooth save the wisdom lines carved around her eyes and smiling lips as though by a sculptor; her garments flowing streams of interlaced sheer cloth–white, red, blue-green, and lavender.

"Yes," the woman said, "I am the one you seek. The one known as Methuzalan."

I stood, bolting upright and brushing the dirt from my clothes, only to find that where they had been torn there were no rips in the fabric. No stains of blood. No painful cuts in my skin.

"Wha-" I began to formulate a question, unsure what to say. What to do.

"Come in child," she said, gesturing to a wooden hut behind her. "Come in and have a cup of tea. It will calm your mind. Questions can wait."

Numb, I nodded and followed her into the hut.