image 2  image

INTO THE MOUNTAIN

Old leaves, moldy and partially decomposed, softened the ground beneath Kale. Her nose wrinkled against the musty smell. Her head felt like a cracked melon, and her eyes refused to open. Her stomach wanted to heave. The putrid smell of rotting garbage tormented her.

She shifted. A hard lump pressed against her rib cage. The egg! The rock-hard egg was still intact. Kale tried to sit. Bindings around her wrists and ankles stopped her. Grawligs!

She remembered the huge hairy grawligs and their rowdy game. She felt again the helplessness of being tossed from one rough ogre to another. Terror sickened her. They hadn’t killed her, but she felt that every muscle in her body had been stomped on.

She slitted her eyes open and peered at her surroundings. Grawligs lay sprawled around a campfire. Beyond the light cast by burning logs, night shadows hid the forest. Two females turned spits, roasting what looked like large deer. A group lounged almost in a pile under trees across the clearing. They made loud rhythmic noises Kale assumed must be a song.

No one seemed to be interested in the captive trussed up and lying under a bush. Two grawligs sat just a few feet away as if they’d been set to guard her. Even they ignored her. They picked over a knee-high pile of dirty mushrooms, popping them into their drooling mouths, smacking their lips as they chomped on the treats.

Kale closed her eyes against the sight, hoping to protect her stomach. The repulsive smell of the grawligs could not be shut out so easily. To distract herself, she searched her memory for tales of the mountain ogres.

What’s true and what’s fable?

In the stories, they eat anything they catch. Lucky for me, it looks like they prefer roasted venison to roasted o’rant.

Dumb and vicious. I think I can testify to that much.

Afraid of tight places? Maybe.

Clumsy with their fingers.

Moving her head just enough to look down, Kale examined the cloth binding her hands together. She wiggled her wrists, and the loose knot unraveled.

Well, they don’t tie knots very well.

She glanced up at her guards to see if they’d noticed her movements. They were still bent on stuffing the forest fungi past their flabby lips.

Carefully, she moved her ankles apart an inch, and then back and forth until she could slip her bare feet out of the binding.

Can I escape?

She watched the two grawligs push dirt-encrusted mushrooms into their mouths. Their pile dwindled with every minute. Soon they would have nothing to distract them. Could she crawl away? Would they turn and catch her? Should she wait until the females declared the roasting deer done and passed the meat around?

If I wait too long, I’ll probably be dessert.

Kale made her decision. Rolling onto her stomach, she crawled deeper into the bushes surrounding the camp. The grawligs’ caterwauling covered the crunch of leaves and twigs under her as she slithered away from the light. On the other side of low bushes she found herself against boulders, part of the mountain looming over the smaller hills.

She rose to her hands and knees and crept another ten yards. Then on her feet, but still nearly doubled over, she followed the jumble of rocks. Her muscles protested, but she pushed on.

Distance muffled the noisy voices of her captors. Kale breathed more deeply, begging her body to relax. Surely tension caused as much of her pain as the injuries inflicted by the grawligs.

A shout went up from the camp, followed by a clamor of voices and howls from the angry brutes.

Kale quickened her pace, looking over her shoulder, expecting to see dark, hairy shapes rising out of the forest to chase her. One misplaced foot slipped into a hole, and she found herself sliding, not away from the rocks and down the mountainside, but into a narrow opening under a huge boulder. She grabbed for roots to try and break her fall. Loose dirt rained down around her as she continued to scrabble, sliding ten feet farther before landing on a hard rock floor.

The impact jarred her aching body. She clenched her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut against the pain. Debris still showered on her head. Instinctively, she lifted her arms to cover her hair.

The last trickle of dirt slowed and then settled. Kale relaxed her jaw and opened her eyes. Pitch dark surrounded her. She listened and heard the plink of dripping water somewhere behind her. She shivered. Goosebumps rose on her arms.

Cold and frightened, she looked around for a means to escape. Peering upward, she could make out the opening and the starry sky beyond.

A cave. This may be good. Aren’t grawligs afraid of closed-in places? I sure hope so.

A scuffling warned her that the grawligs were tramping around in the forest above her.

Maybe they’ll just pass on by.

She heard branches snap, grunts and low voices, and an excited exclamation. She’d been found. The heads of three ugly grawligs blocked out the dim light from above.

They chanted, “Stupid o’rant. Stupid o’rant. We smelled you.”

Kale slumped in a heap, clutching her knees, and leaned against the cold rock wall. Too tired to think, too tired to fight despair, she allowed the tears to come.

“Stupid o’rant. Stupid o’rant. We smelled you.”

The chant grew louder as more tormenters joined the first three grawligs kneeling by the hole. A hairy arm reached down and groped along the sides of the rock. More dirt, leaves, and twigs fell on Kale’s head.

The young o’rant girl curled tighter, shrinking from the voices above. Her hand searched for her treasure, pulling it out by the leather cord. She grasped the smooth cloth of the drawstring pouch. At first the egg inside lay cold and unresponsive. Gradually, it grew warm. Kale concentrated on the soft thrum in her hand, blocking out the “stupid o’rant” chant of the grawligs.

Pain and fatigue, fear and panic drained away. She shifted around to find a fairly comfortable position on the stony floor. With the pouch gripped in her hand and pressed against her cheek, she fell asleep.

When she opened her eyes once more, streams of light shone into the cave at three spots. The first was directly above her. A head covered with matted brown hair lay partially inside the hole. Kale could see a large hairless ear and part of the loose lips of the beast. Rough snores rumbled above.

A beam no more than a hand’s width descended from a second hole in the ceiling. The third opening on the opposite side of the dismal cave showed more promise. Not only was the hole big enough for Kale to wiggle through, but also large boulders like uneven stairsteps made climbing possible.

She stood and stumbled across the uneven cave floor. She looked up and studied the hole she hoped to use for her escape. Since the ceiling of the cave sloped upward, it would be a long climb compared to the slide last night.

“I’m thankful that’s not the hole I fell through,” she whispered.

Tucking her treasure inside the neck of her blouse, she started climbing. She placed each foot carefully and tested each ledge before shifting her whole weight. She didn’t want to cause a landslide for two reasons: I don’t want to wake those grawligs, and I don’t want to be buried under a ton of boulders. I want out of here alive. I want to get to Vendela in one piece.

Warm air touched her hand as she placed it on the next rock. Contrasted with the chill air surrounding her, it felt like a breath from the mouth of a huge animal. She pulled her hand back and listened. Faintly she heard the coarse snores of grawligs and the morning chatter of birds in the trees outside, an odd combination. Within the cave, only the drip of water from a far corner reached her ears.

Cautiously, she eased up to peer over the rock. A narrow passage stretched back into the darkness. Moist air flowed steadily from the opening.

I wonder what’s back there.

Again she tilted her head and listened intently. No sound came through the tunnel opening, no sound at all. Curiosity niggled at her thoughts.

What’s in that tunnel? How far back does it go? Why warm air?

She found herself crouched next to the hole and leaning in. She’d have to crawl on hands and knees. If she had a light of some sort, she could go in. She put a hand on the floor of the tunnel and placed her head within the opening.

What am I doing? I don’t want to go in there. I want to get away from the grawligs.

She drew back as if she’d nearly stepped off a high cliff. Her breathing came in quick, panicked puffs. Clenching her fists, fighting the urge to plunge into the tunnel, she remembered Mistress Meiger’s stern face.

Focus on what’s ahead.

Kale stretched a hand up and grabbed a rock ledge. In a minute she’d be out of the cave.

Still she wanted to turn back and explore the tunnel. The powerful urge to go through that underground passage scared her. It made no sense.

She climbed the last few feet to the top of the cave with firm determination. Kale cautiously poked her head and then her shoulders above the ground. Squinting in the bright morning sun, she considered the bushes around the rocks where she had fallen into the cave. Her present outlook was higher and a good twenty feet west of the sprawled grawligs. Not all of them had fallen asleep around the hole. That meant some were out of sight.

Awake or asleep? And how many?

As near as she could count, eleven uncouth ogres lay in piles in and around the bushes. Last night dozens of grawligs had gathered in the camp.

Where are the others?

She surveyed the surrounding area, first the low ground ahead. Then she turned and peered above her. The best route of escape lay over the rocks going west.

At least that looks like the best way.

She looked again at the beasts below. The grawligs might sleep for some time. They had feasted late and probably guzzled brillum, a brewed ale that none of the seven high races would consume.

Five, maybe ten minutes, and I’ll be in and out of that tunnel.

She slipped back into the cave and into the stone burrow before she could think twice about what she planned to do.

Thick, moist air settled on her skin as she groped her way in the dark. A sweet fragrance grew heavier as she moved farther and farther away from the cave. The dark, the smell, the damp, all screamed danger in her mind. Her arms and legs kept moving. She argued with herself, trying to force her body to back up and leave both the tunnel and the cave. None of her words, muttered softly in the cloying atmosphere, reached her ears.

Enchantment! she realized with a groan. She could not resist whatever pulled her into depths of darkness.

Trembling, she hoped fear would cause her to collapse.

Then I’d stop. Then I couldn’t go one bit farther.

But I probably couldn’t scoot backward either.

I’d be stuck. Stuck until I die.