They coughed as the dust from his hammering arose, until Fanyi tore strips from her clothing and tied them over their mouths and around Rhin’s muzzle, wetting them from the water supply in their bottle.
The crashing blows of the hammer made Sander’s head ring. If the monster had followed them down, it would be in no confusion over which direction it must take to follow them.
There was a final subsidence of a last metal plate and once more they faced the open way. Sander was hungry as well as dry-mouthed with thirst. But any remedy for that state still lay before them. All they could do was to struggle along as quickly as they could.
Not far ahead was a branching of the way. Once more Fanyi sounded her call to the fishers. But this time there came no answer. And though they pushed the torch close to the surface of the ground, they could detect no tracks. Sander turned to Rhin. For the first time the koyot moved out with more assurance than he had shown since they had taken to this underground way.
He lowered his head to sniff along the edge of those rusted shells of rails and to search the ground between them. Then he gave a sharp yelp of command and trotted along the inner of the two ways. Luckily they came to no more of those plugs of metal. But the passage sloped downward, and there were spreading patches of wet upon the walls, signs also that at one time water had risen to a point within a hand’s-breadth of the roof.
Sander watched those walls. It could well be that they had been loosened with the passing of the years, that even the small disturbance made by the passing of their own party could bring about a fall, entrapping or killing them all. Under his urging, they made the swiftest passage that they could. Yet that seemed to him to be agonizingly slow, and he listened tensely, not now for the monster that had attacked the house, but rather for any sound of shifting over their heads.
Fanyi called out and pointed ahead. There was a pile of the same rubble as he had seen in the mounds above. And this choked the whole of the way. But over it was a jagged hole in the roof, under which the debris made an unsteady platform.
A head hung in the open, eyes staring down at them. It was plain that the fishers had not hesitated to try that escape route, as dubious as it looked. Kai’s head disappeared as Rhin moved forward.
With caution, the koyot placed his forepaws, one after the other, part way up the mound of crumbling stuff, which sent a trickle of gravel and small stones thudding down as he so moved. He stood still, nosing ahead at the next portion of the rise, as if scent could assure him whether or not it would bear his weight.
Sander and Fanyi edged away as Rhin made a slow climb. The koyot panted as he went, his tongue lolling out of his half-open jaws, drool dripping from its tip. He planted each paw with delicate precision.
Up again, and another cascade of finer rubble. Only one more length and his head would be out of that hole. Sander crept to the edge of the mound, held the torch as high as he could to give Rhin all possible help.
Once more gravel rolled, bringing with it that same coarse sand that had slipped under their feet when they crossed the sea-desert. Now Rhin’s head and shoulders were out into the opening. His muscles bunched as he lunged up, scrabbling furiously on the edge of the opening with his forepaws.
Sander jumped back to escape the slide the koyot’s efforts caused. Now Rhin showed his head once more in the hole, looking downward and uttering a series of barks as if urging the humans to duplicate his feat as soon as possible.
The smith lit a second torch and then a third. These he planted butt down in the pile so they threw full light over that treacherous shifting surface. He shed his pack once more and pulled forth his coil of braided hide rope before he spoke to Fanyi.
“I am going up. When I make it, lash our packs, then stand well clear until I pull those up. After that I will drop the rope. Make it fast to your waist, and take all the time you need for the climb.”
With the rope’s end tied about his middle, he faced the slope. That last slide of gravel and small stones had luckily uncovered the edges of a few larger rocks that promised more stable footing. He tested the lowest of them as best he could and then cautiously scrambled up on it.
The space was narrow, hardly wide enough to afford room for his toes as he felt above, his hands slipping through loose material twice, before, under the moving stuff, he could locate a firm block. Wriggling carefully along, he managed to reach the second perch. Rhin gazed down, his yelps increased in volume. It was plain he was offering his full encouragement.
This last bit was even more tricky. Rhin’s emergence had broken the edge. In order to reach the crumbling remains, Sander must squirm forward over what looked in the limited light to be a very uncertain bit of surface. He remained where he was for a long moment, trying to breathe evenly, to steady his nerves before he moved out. Though he had never admitted this weakness, Sander had never taken joyfully to any scramble up a height, even when the surface he sought to climb was more hospitable. He did know enough not to look back, to concentrate only on what lay immediately ahead. He could not remain forever where he now was; there was nothing left to do but trust to fortune and his own strength and make this last attempt.
Now he dug both hands into the mass, seeking some better support. His nails tore, and he felt sharp pain in his fingers, ground between moving stones. But at last, he tightened his hold on something that did not shift as he slowly exerted more and more weight.
Sander pulled himself up as the whole surface under him appeared to crack. Somehow he got a firm brace under one knee, used that to push out farther ahead. He was still inches away from the edge, and he feared more than ever to trust any hold.
Rhin’s head had swung. Without warning the koyot snapped, his jaws closing on the hide jacket that strained tightly over Sander’s shoulders. The fangs in those jaws grazed skin as well as covering, and Sander gave a startled yell.
Rhin’s unexpected move brought him up, and he surged, much as the koyot had before him, out, skidding free across the self-encrusted ground under the full light of a large and glowing moon.
After that it was easy enough to jerk up their gear, find a convenient small rock to weight the rope, and drop it once more to Fanyi. With a line lashed about her, and Sander’s strength added to hers, her ascent was far easier and speedier than his struggle had been.
Once both were aloft, they had a chance to look about them. To the west rose the lines of a sloping beach. To the east was the plateau that once must have been an island, holding the near vanished city. The tunnel they had followed plainly had once run under the arm of the sea to connect the island with the main continent.
But where they were was certainly too open. That monster had perhaps not followed them into the lower ways. But if it or perhaps its fellows were denned in the city, one such could sight their small party here in the open and be on their trail again.
Sander found his body trembling as he stopped for his pack. His exertions in the tunnel, his hunger, and the tension of that last climb were taking their toll. To reach the one-time shore—to somehow find a shelter there—that he must force his body to do.
At least they could give the packs to Rhin here in the open. Sander fumbled with the rope, packing and lashing the gear. They had the rest of the torches still, but it was better not to light them and so mark themselves to any hostile eyes. They must make the moonlight do.
Stumbling often, Sander walked beside Rhin, Fanyi on the other side of the koyot. The fishers had again vanished. The smith supposed they had headed toward the beach.
He wavered as he walked, trying to control the shaking of his hands, ashamed to display his fatigue to Fanyi.
Luckily the terrain sloped upward gradually. There was no cliff to climb. Once up on the shore, they were ankle-deep in beach sand, faced by a wilderness of rocks, with grass growing among them. Sander lifted his head enough to look for the wood that had masked this same shore to the south where they had left it what seemed a very long time ago.