CHAPTER FORTY EIGHT: SEVEN MINUTES

When the bronze armoured man and Xyri stepped into view, he sucked in his breath.

Both men had hoods hiding their faces, but Calin wouldn’t soon forget the voice of the man that threw the simple life he had had into utter chaos.

A simple wish boiled up, that he had a sword then, even if he was half useless with the thing.

Each step the men gave took almost an hour to him, before they finally opened the door and stepped through it.

The danger of being seen faded slowly behind the closing door.

He breathed in for the first time through the last ordeal. But knowing what came next didn’t make the breaths come in any easier. The look he shared with Eli was not comforting, but it did give him some courage, even if it was a hopelessly small amount. This was their only chance of escape. With a weak nod to Eli, they began crawling to the window.

It was unspoken between them, but he could see it on Eli’s face as he was thinking it himself. Mishael and Xyri were on their way to find him in the prison, but he wasn’t there. They barely had minutes to get away before the alarm would go out.

They hastened their pace and reached the window. He stared out over the valley far below. He swallowed hard. This is insane, I can’t do this.

As much as he wished there was another way out, there wasn’t. The leather grip of the handles pressed into his palms as he took hold of them. He stood up.

As luck would have it, Kirri was still busy writing something in the book. The room was empty besides the Warden. It didn’t take away the fear of sudden discovery.

But Calin moved slowly, his joints complained with creaks and groans he could only cringe at each noise. Straightening upright without incident, he motioned for Eli to stand up too. The bearded man stood up behind him and placed his arms over Calin’s shoulders in a tight grip.

He couldn’t help but wish he was more equipped for the life he was so suddenly thrown into.

Not risking the chance of discovery, he inched forward with Eli behind him. This doesn’t feel right.

The sweat dripped from his brow as the immense drop came into view beyond the edge of the window. Every part of his instincts told him if he was going to jump he was going to die. No, this is mad. Jerry and Mictoria this is not a plan!

But just as he wanted to back up, the crystals were outside the windows.

Without warning his hands came together. The crystals struck together.

It was as if his own hands had betrayed him, even with him knowing that Eli had helped for a moment. There was a flash of light above them.

It was as sudden as the wink of an eye before he was falling.

Wind gushed past his face.

The pathway that had been a hundred and seventy metres away only seconds ago, was suddenly rushing towards him.

He wanted to scream, but the force of the wind coming past him was hindering the effort to take a lung full of air to scream his terror.

Then the pathway was no more than twenty metres away.

I’m going to die!

Then a voice behind him shouted.

“Pull up!”

Calin didn’t know if it was his consciousness screaming at him, but when it came again.

“Pull your legs up!”

He did it.

Barely five metres left to the ground.

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Next thing, there was this force that was halting the suicidal decent. But Calin realized it wasn’t enough time to stop before they hit the ground.

All of a sudden he realized the absolute need to pull up his legs further.

He pulled with all his might sending the momentum forward.

Behind, other legs pressed into his knees as they careened over the edge of the pathway into another fall.

There was a very slight slope now, but he was still picking up speed.

Calin had forgotten that Eli was clinging to his back. Somehow he was glad he wasn’t going to die alone as some of the smaller Morning trees came into view with their colossal siblings towering out of sight into the night’s sky. A lot of them weren’t glowing as there were thick patches of clouds blocking their star light.

Then Calin realized the trees were rushing up to meet him.

With the little part that went slower he had taken in a mighty breath and now he screamed as he was about to hit the trees.

With a great pull, there was that force again that defied gravity as it wanted to slow down. Calin held on for dear life. His brain was a muddled mess at that moment, but he held on to the thing that was slowing him down.

From behind came a shout again.

“Pull down on the right one lad!”

This time, he didn’t hesitate. He pulled down hard on the right crystal in the rushing air.

He lifted his legs as their bodies swung to the right. He missed the first of the larger trees on the left and went on to the next, all the while gliding over the canopy of the smaller trees below.

It wasn’t long before he slowed down much more considerably. His thoughts cleared. He needed to plot a course. The crystals were giving upward lift, but they didn’t stop anything coming from the side. But Eli’s advice had opened up a little loophole in that one-way lift. For now they were floating over the tree tops.

Just in time as a rock pillar came hauntingly from the mist, right in front of them.

“Agh!” Calin shouted and instinctively dragged with as much strength as he could muster at one of the crystal’s handles to veer right.

They missed the pillar, if only barely.

His hip scraped against the stone as he navigated around it; all the while, they caught lift from the smaller trees below them.

They silently floated around the large natural pillar. A bridge between it and another one appeared from the mist. On it, there were two burgundy-armoured guards passing each other on their patrol.

Calin’s eyes widened.

They drifted to the bridge, tension strung taught, but they slipped between the men. Luck was with them as the guards kept on walking with their backs to them.

On the walkway they lifted higher over the medium sized bridge that connected the rock pillars, Calin looked back, but they were still unnoticed. It was amazing that they hadn’t been seen.He sighed with the sight of the men disappearing back into the thick mist.

After they were clear, he blew out his breath.

“That was clos—”

“LOOK OUT!!” Eli franticly shouted from behind. But it was too late. Another rock pillar came from nowhere and they crashed hard into. Pain lanced into Calin’s side as they went spiralling around the pillar and then there was another bridge.

Frenzied, Calin tried to drag at his legs to get himself over it.

His cloak scraped against the railing of the bridge. A few centimetres more and he would have struck it.

But then just before the crystals could lift up they jerked backwards, stopping most of the momentum and he went spinning again.

As Calin was spun around, he spotted Eli hanging precariously from the bridge. Worry washed over him as he risked a shout. “Eli! Are you alright?”

He was slowly drifting over another tree.

The bearded man climbed back onto the bridge. Eli grunted and held onto his hip.

“Yes, a bit sore. But don’t worry about me lad, this is far enough. I’ll find my own way back. I still have some friends in the right places. Now go find your friend-lady young Calin and be free! And know that I’ll never forget what you’ve done for me!”

Glad for the slow drift now, Calin said, “It is my greatest pleasure; and thank you for your company Elizriél. You are a good man. I hope we meet again.”

The mist was already starting to obscure the bridge Eli was standing on, but the next words were clear. “I hope so too, lad. I hope so too.”

With that, Eli disappeared from view in the mist and Calin drifted off over the next tree.

He was a bit unsure what to do next, but he kind of had an idea. He was still high enough in the canopy to go back and try and land on the path that snaked up into Yera’s Crossing. Okay here goes nothing.

Calin drew on the crystal’s handle and veered to the right, hoping he could find a route over the normal trees and some of the small Morning trees to the path.

It was a slow process to go back and more than once he didn’t know where to go as areas of Morning trees kept going dark under the shadows of the big clouds drifting overhead.

But as he got close to another pillar, guards were patrolling all over the web work of bridges. He cringed as he drifted silently under their recesses. If the Morning trees would light up, he’d be in trouble. He was suddenly thankful for the clouds as he swept pass the danger areas.

Calin’s arms started shaking, holding onto the crystals. Even with all the heavy loads he had carried in his life, it wasn’t enough to hold on to the handles much longer. With his arms above him, the blood was not getting properly to them.

He grunted and groaned. The tree that was giving the crystals lift below would hardly break his fall at all.

Just as he was about to lose grip, the road that wound up the rock face to Yera’s Crossing, came into view.

With a force of effort, he summoned the last strength in his arms. The road was twenty metres away. He held on. Then ten, his arms were done, they had no strength left. The muscles started cramping up. Come on Calin, just a bit more... He barely drifted over the relatively broad mountain pass in time. He used the little grip he had left to hit the stones together.

Immediately, they stopped resisting the gravity and he plummeted the three metres down to the rock.