“Have you been to the surface?” he asked, his voice suddenly serious.
“No, never.”
“Then how do you know so much about it?”
“My grandmother brought a couple of books on her flight…”
“Really? I would have thought Amelia Earhart wouldn’t have had much room for books, particularly when weight was such an issue. Besides, she disappeared in 1937, well before a lot of the technology you’re talking about was developed.”
Jess’s cheeks flushed and she made a coy smile. “The Gifted Ones have a giant library from the world above. As an outsider, I’ve been allowed to visit. I spent my life reading about science and the world above.”
“And yet you’ve never wanted to leave this place?”
“No. I’ve read enough to know that what we have here is a sort of utopia, long forgotten on the surface.”
They continued walking south in silence, following a trail that ran alongside the river. By late afternoon the river entered a deep ravine, the height of which seemed to rise as the distance between the near vertical edge of the ravine and the river seemed to narrow, until the trail split into two — with one branch turning toward the river where a manmade jetty had been built, and the other blending into the cliff-like rise of the valley wall.
Jess paused for a moment as though deciding which direction would be faster to take. Sam dropped his backpack, ready to have a short break. Then, without discussing anything with Sam or Tom she took the path to the left and started to climb. Sam made a quick exchange with Tom, who merely shrugged as if to say, I’m game if you are.
Sam met Tom’s eye. “She looks like she’s in some kind of hurry.”
Tom shrugged. “First time she’s met a stranger from the topside, and she doesn’t have any time to answer any number of questions. Go figure.”
Sam adjusted his backpack, and continued after her. “What do you make of her, Tom?”
“She seems lovely. A spitting image of her grandmother.”
“Right. That’s what I thought.” Sam watched her gracefully navigate a series of steep boulders. “Does that seem strange to you?”
“What?” Tom grinned. “That she looks like her grandmother?”
“Exactly. Where are her father and grandfather’s DNA?”
“I don’t know. Maybe she’ll explain… when we can catch up with her.”
“If you were the granddaughter of one of the most extraordinary aviators in history, who mysteriously disappeared, wouldn’t you want to tell that story to the first person you met?”
“Exactly,” said Tom.
“But she doesn’t seem to have any interest in telling her story.”
“What are you suggesting, Sam?”
“That maybe she’s not being all that truthful. That she has an alternative reason for bringing us deeper into this submerged world…”
Tom laughed. “Like the Sirens of ancient Greek Mythology whose voice lured nearby sailors to shipwreck on the rocky coast of their islands?”
Sam shrugged. “Okay, probably not quite right… but I still don’t know what to make of her.”
“Neither do I.” Tom met his eye. “You want to turn around and call it quits?”
Sam arched an eyebrow. “And miss out on finally finding the truth about the Master Builders?”
Tom shrugged. “It’s your call.”
“Hell no. We’ll follow her to the end.”
Chapter Seven
Sam tightened the strap for his backpack.
He took in a deep breath of air and followed Jess as the trail turned upward, where a series of small hand holds had been painstakingly carved into the granite side. Sam ran his eyes upward, tracing the imperceptible grooves that outlined the trail as it ran along the cliff before eventually heading upward some two hundred feet above.
He swallowed the fear that rose in his throat like bile. He’d never liked heights, and had a particular aversion to falling from them. But it didn’t matter. He’d come here to find the truth about the Master Builders and some risks had to be taken.
Sam progressed up the vertical trail, shifting his hands from each individual hand hold, purposely placing each hand and foot and testing it until he was certain it could support his weight before he moved on to the next one.
Over the course of the next two hours Sam made his way gradually higher on the cliff as it followed the river, until he was looking out onto the tops of the great Eucalyptus regnans trees.
Up ahead, Jess stopped on a small ledge long enough for them to catch up.
Sam paused, gritting his teeth as he prepared for the most dangerous traverse — exposed to more than two hundred and fifty feet of air below him.
Jess glanced at him, her mouth parting in an impish smile. “You don’t like heights, do you?”
Sam grinned. “Sure I do — just from the cockpit of a helicopter.”
Jess sat down so her legs were hanging off the ledge. “I’m afraid we don’t have any of those down here, although I’m sure my grandmother would have loved them.”
“I’m sure she would have.” Sam gripped the hold carved into the wall behind the ledge and pulled himself up, keeping his hands clamped over the rock tightly, and his back wedged up against the wall of granite.
Behind him, Tom shuffled across the traverse, hanging onto the carved rocky handholds with the comfort of a kid playing on the monkey gym. When he reached the ledge he stood upright, without holding onto anything, staring at the view across the river and out to the plains far into the horizon. His eyes landed on Sam. “How are you doing?”
Sam expelled a deep breath. “I’ve been better. I’d like to know how in the thousands of years people have lived down here, no one has thought to invent ropes to make this sort of climbing safe.”
“It is safe,” Jess argued. “Just don’t fall.”
“Sure.” Sam backed into an opening in the rock at the end of the ledge, formed between the main granite rockface, and a broken flake — a thin slab of rock detached from the main face — that extended another thirty feet higher, revealing a narrow chimney in between. “On that subject, do you want to tell us where we’re heading from here?”
Jess grinned. “I’m ready to answer any questions you may have about my grandmother and about this submerged world… if you’d like.”
“Oh, now you’re interested in talking.”
“Sure,” Jess replied, kicking her knees up back and forth across the open expanse to stretch them. “I need to catch my breath.”
Sam squeezed deeper into the chimney, feeling safer compressed between the two giant pieces of stone. His eyes darted around, searching for the next set of carved hand holds. “I’m going to take a raincheck on that. You mind telling us where we go from here?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“No.”
Jess turned her eyes upward. “I think it is.”
Sam followed her gaze. “We have to climb up this stone chimney?”
“Afraid so. It’s the only way to reach somewhere safe before night fall. Why else did you think I was racing to get here?”
“Why? What’s going to kill us after nightfall?”
She shrugged. “The more relevant question is, what’s not going to kill us after nightfall?”
“Really?” Sam said.
Jess nodded. “Afraid so.”
Tom met her eye with defiance. “We’re well armed to defend ourselves against whatever predators live here.”
“Your BB-guns won’t do much against the large apex predators that roam this place at night.”
Sam refused to be pulled into her superstitious fears. “So then, where are we headed?”
“Like I said, we climb.”